Peecycling technology
This summer, going to the toilet in the Belgian city of Ghent counts as scientific research. The Place to Pee in Blaarmeersen Park looks like a typical toilet block, but it’s actually an experimental installation equipped with Save! toilets and Lema urinals created by Swiss bathroom specialist Laufen. The Uridis treatment system by Hydrohm, a company formed by researchers at Ghent University, turns urine carefully collected in these special toilets into flush water and fertiliser.
A Place to Pee is just the latest project to look at the untapped potential of wee and the need to rethink the toilet. This year alone, there have been reports of researcher Chen Wei-Shan of the University of Wageningen in the Netherlands using wood compost and urine to heat buildings. Scientists in Durban, South Africa, (the international capital of urine recycling) are making bricks out of urine.
While finding uses for the nutrient-rich resource of wee isn’t new – it’s been used in fabric production and medicine for centuries – the focus on peecycling is also a chance to rethink the use of sewers and look for ways to improve sanitation worldwide. American science writer Chelsea Ward’s new book Pipe Dreams: The Urgent Global Quest to Transform the Toilet is a fascinating review of global solutions for human waste and what we need to do to change this.
As Ward says, we can’t stop producing waste. It’s the only resource that increases with population. Projects like A Place to Pee are a way to make the most of it.
High street revival
Bournemouth’s iconic department store, Bobby & Co, suffered the fate of many other high street shops. Built in 1915, the original store – part of a chain started in Margate – was sold to Debenhams in 1972, and when that group collapsed, the future looked bleak, But now Verve Properties has stepped in to renovate and revive. The original architectural features are reappearing – including copper domes and awnings – and the space has been changed into a marketplace for local and ethical businesses offering events and activities focused on sustainability, localism and community alongside products.
A beauty and wellness hall will be one of the first areas to open and an artist-run gallery space. There’ll also be Drool, the first food hall for dogs, which sells pupcakes, has a lick ’n’ mix station and a recycling centre for dog balls. Humans will have to wait until the end of the year before they get their own food market.
“Covid accelerated change underway in our town centres,” says Ashley Nicholson, the director of Verve Properties, “but this shift also presents an opportunity for a complete reboot in terms of the way we use town centres. The aim of our project is to prove that there’s a future for high streets – the way forward is to bring together the community whilst providing products locally sourced that can’t be bought or experienced on the internet. Sustainability isn’t and, indeed, must not be a fad.”
Bobby & Co in Bournemouth is set for a September opening
New school term
Silverlining Furniture is best known for making one-off pieces of furniture for the super-rich and their super-yachts. It’s a very particular market, and you may not be in the market to own one of its designs anytime soon, but Silverlining’s craft and quality is remarkable. Its furniture is on a par with art. Its craftsmen use materials ranging from carbon fibre and Kevlar to 13th-century wood. No wonder it calls its work “making magic”. Now craftspeople have the opportunity to learn the company’s trade secrets firsthand, as the Wrexham outfit opens an academy this summer. The programme will teach theory and history, as well as finishing, cabinet making, laser marquetry and leatherwork. The trainees will also be paid.
Silverlining Furniture founder Mark Boddington says his desire to start an education institution came from how much he enjoyed his own training at Parnham House, the renowned School for Craftsmen in Wood, under John Makepeace: “It was one of the most rewarding and fulfilling times of my life. I want people to discover the magic of furniture making.”
Boddington says that the academy will help ensure some specialist crafts don’t die out, as these skills become rarer in the mechanised age. The courses will also include the history and theory of these trades. This means school trips to the likes of Chatsworth House and Nostell Priory, as well as to engineering and design leaders such as Bentley Motors. “We want to inspire our trainees, expand their views and show how limitless creativity can be.”
To apply, contact Silverlining Furniture on recruitment@silverliningfurniture.com
The art of quilts
A shared interest in architecture, art, food and fashion brought artists Sheelagh Boyce and Annabelle Harty together. Known as Arrange Whatever Pieces Come Your Way, the duo make hand-sewn, architectural quilts and reconstructed fabric works. These are put together from clothes donated by friends and family, all sentimentally important.
Their next show is at Mount Stuart, Bute – where the modernist roots of the quilts work well with the Victorian and arts & crafts interiors – and works include a tablecloth made from waiters’ jackets and kitchen aprons from St John restaurant and Rochelle Canteen in London, which are run by Harty’s brother, Fergus Henderson.
When the exhibition starts at the end of August, Bute communities will be invited to join the show and work with the artists to make their own quilts from old, cherished garments. These quilts will be shown at Mount Stuart next year.
“Taking hundreds of hours to produce, each quilt is a unique object that tells its own story,” says Harty. “The intimacy and connection of working by hand on each quilt forms the bond between the fragments of clothing, their memories, and their histories.”
Gather and Arrange’s show runs from 28 August–31 October 2021 at Mount Stuart. If you are interested in taking part in this project, contact morven@mountstuart.com
The lowdown on the Londoner
Think of London’s Leicester Square and what comes to mind is film premieres, tourists and regrettable gift shops. High-end boutique hotels, not so much. But The Londoner – a £300m development that’s recently thrown off its builders’ awnings, in preparation for a September opening – opposite an All Bar One and across the way from M&M’s World London, is banking on changing that.
“It’s the world’s first super-boutique hotel,” says Charles Oak, The Londoner’s director. “People groan when I say that. But it just means ‘big’.”
He’s not kidding. As well as 350 bedrooms and 35 suites, there’s a ballroom, private members’ club, spa pool, gym, Japanese-style rooftop restaurant, whisky room, nail salon… the list, as they say, goes on. The Londoner is 16-storeys high… or should that be low? Westminster City Council stipulates no building above the eyeline of Nelson’s Column, so instead The Londoner went down – 52% of this “iceberg hotel” is beneath the street. The project represents the largest private excavation in the world.
Oak has worked with neighbouring institutions – the Donmar Warehouse, the National Gallery – to underline the UK’s place on the world stage for arts. Throughout the building there’s work by 400 artists, from Antony Gormley to Idris Khan to Alissa Coe.
Further distancing itself from the delights of Wok to Walk and Magic Mike Live is the hotel’s design. Overseen by acclaimed New York design duo Yabu Pushelberg it is a masterclass in earth tones, soft edges and “discreet” luxury.
“What people want out of a hotel hasn’t really changed,” says George Yabu. “They’ve always wanted somewhere to relax and switch off. We purposely avoided anything ‘Instagrammable’ – that moment has passed.” Leave that to the stars posing on the red carpet outside.
RIBA Awards revealed
The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has picked the 16 winners of the RIBA International Awards for Excellence 2021, a biennial selection of the best buildings in the world selected from the RIBA International Prize. Three key themes stand out amongst the winners: buildings which serve local communities in many different ways; new solutions to existing environmental problems; and a sensitivity to the history and social importance of a place.
Favourite designs include Friendship Hospital, the Satkhira community hospital in Bengal, which features a series of courtyards to improve light and cross ventilation within the building, as well as a mini-canal which collects usable rainwater and helps micro-climatic cooling. The Dongziguan Villagers’ Activity Centre in China – part of ongoing work by Gad Line + Studio to provide affordable, high-quality housing for rural communties – is situated between the new and old village to encourage interaction between all residents – and also provides space for public activities.
Special mention goes to The National Memorial for Peace and Justice, Alabama. It is America’s first memorial to the victims of racial terror lynchings, designed to honour them, document this savage history, and start conversations about racial justice.
Four projects will be shortlisted for this year’s prize and announced in September. The winner of the RIBA International Emerging Architect Prize and the RIBA International Prize 2021 will be revealed in November 2021.
