HOW CAN ARCHITECTURE BECOME AN INSTRUMENT FOR THOUGHT, INNOVATION, AND CREATIVITY AND A MEDIATOR BETWEEN PEOPLE AND THE ELEMENTS; EXPOSING AND SHELTERING IN ONE BREATH, AND TRANSFORMING A TEMPORARILY VACANT SITE INTO A THRIVING COMMON ROOM FOR THE CITY?
COMMON ROOM FOR THE RAINY CITY
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MAYFIELD, MANCHESTER
Study Level
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Year
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Institution​
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Location
BA Architecture Year 2​
2019
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Manchester School of Architecture // Studio
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Mayfield, Manchester
Located in a vacant site in Mayfield, central Manchester, the Common Room seeks to be a user-led collaborative space for working, trading, meetings and creating. Adajacent to Piccadilly Station a key node linking Manchester to the rest of the UK and beyond, the site almost begs to be a continuation of these programmes of travel, business, meeting and creating networks.
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Historically Mayfield was a key cog in the industrial revolution that gave Manchester its nickname of 'Cottonopolis', home to a print makers and fabric dying factory. Mayfield, once a prosperous hub now lies vacant and the Common Room aims to tackle this vacancy with a temporary installation that draws inspiration from the site's 'fabric' narrative with an overarching rain canopy that allows visitors to be confronted with and immersed within the rainy city of Manchester.
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A COMMON ROOM...
Identifying Mayfield’s position within the city: A district that acts as a permeable border between the established zones of Piccadilly and the university campus. Exploring the Cartesian Geometry of the site, sitting on the apex of 3 axes linking east from the university, south from Piccadilly station and from above as the rain cycles into water converging at the River Medlock. Defining a threshold within this ‘intertidal zone’ in which organised activity meets ungoverned community, and providing a space that through architecture invites function without regulating users, and thus inviting an alternative conversation between those who may not have convened before.
...FOR THE RAINY CITY
The ulterior programme of the space is to exploit the weather of the city, most typically the rainy days that are considered an all too common nuisance especially by those commuting in the city.
To create a canopy that provides shelter for its inhabitants, whilst immersing them in the experience of the rain. To take the rain on a walk, diverging it into channels and curtains that envelope the structure, creating an event and a spectacle of the mundane.
Simultaneously using the rain as an instrument to feed and cultivate the river be, nurturing back an ecology and that has long since left Mayfield and creating an Eden like space in the city. The canopy split into two elements with nine apexes or ‘legs’, is the commanding architecture of the design. It sits not only on a hierarchy in levels but as the crucial translator of rain into an experience. It acts as this translator between the language of rain as a burden and rain as an experience, event and instrument.
The purpose of the canopy is to change people’s mindset on the rain, to allow them to enjoy it, dare to run through it, to soak themselves through, or just run their hand through its path, or to simply just watch it, and embrace the water for the marvel that it is at its purest form.
SITE ANALYSIS AND ENVIRONMENTAL STUDY
EXPLORING FORM AND FUNCTION
CREATING PATHWAYS FOR THE RAIN
The five different experiences of rain created by the canopy allow visitors to confront the rain to different degrees on a scale of exposure. The wet column exposes the rainwater in its journey to the ground, it spreads and disperses the water so that it is less direct and ‘heavy’, a visitor can run their hand along the wall, feeling the water without the consequence of getting ‘wet’. The channel directs the rain into a stream, visible only via the semi-transparent canopy enveloping it, a visitor may not notice the stream of rain at first but they may hear it and realise the rain’s presence. The spiral playfully diverts the rain’s final stretch of its journey, creating a visual spectacle like water going down a drain. The stalactite dares visitors to ‘get wet’. The canopy finishes short of the ground and the dripping edges tempt visitors to put their hands, face, feet or whole self underneath it. Similarly, the rain walls and curtains, allow visitors to play chicken with the rain, running in and out of the waterfall threshold. It also magnifies the aural qualities of the rain, immersing the visitor’s within the sounds of water.
WET COLUMN 1.20
SPIRAL 1.20
CHANNEL 1.20
STALACTITE 1.20
1.20 STRUCTURAL DETAIL
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2mm STANDING SEAM BLACK ALUMINIUM SHEETING
30mm RIGID INSULATION DPM
50mm ACOUSTIC INSULATION
50mm STEEL METAL DECKING (150mm STEEL I BEAM)
25mm x 25mm STEEL RAILING
80mm x 80mm CLT BIRCH BATON BEAMS
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2
(COMPOSITE METAL PANEL)
2mm GASKET SEAL BLACK ALUMINIUM SHEETING
50mm RIGID INSULATION DPM
6mm PLYWOOD SHEETING
25mm x 25mm STEEL RAILING SECONDARY STRUCTURE
50mm ACOUSTIC INSULATION
10mm INTERIOR WALL PANELLING AND PLASTERING
150mm STEEL ‘0’ SHAPE COLUMNS
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3
6mm FLOORING BIRCH UNSTAINED
3mm SUB FLOO (PLYWOOD)
40mm ACOUSTIC INSULATION
50mm STEEL METAL DECKING (150mm STEEL I BEAM)
25mm x 25mm STEEL RAILING
80mm x 80mm CLT BIRCH BATON BEAMS
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4
6mm FLOORING BIRCH UNSTAINED
3mm SUB FLOOR (PLYWOOD)
30mm ACOUSTIC INSULATION
10mm PLYWOOD SUB FLOORING DPM
50mm RIGID INSULATION
250mm CAST CONCRETE SLAB FOUNDATION
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5
1mm EXTERNAL PTFE SEMI-TRANSPARENT SKIN
30mm ROUND STEELWORK JOINED BY 10mm ROUND STEEL BATONS TO A CENTRAL POINT (REPEATED OUTWARDS)
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6
50mm PVC PIPEWORK, STAINLESS STEEL COATING ON FUNNEL
10mm CAST STEEL RADIAL BRACKET
WEST ELEVATION 1.200
SOUTH ELEVATION 1.200
LASTING SYMBOLISM
The water tower is a convergent of the design’s experiential use of the rain and the practical use in repurposing and harvesting the water that is then pooled together. The whole site is linked beneath the ground by a series of pumped pipes which collect rainwater from each apex of the canopy’s ‘legs’ these channels either lead back into the river, feeding further cultivation of the river bed or lead directly into the buildings on-site used in the toilets and sinks within the workshop.
Most, however, is pumped into the water tower which then is linked to the rest of Mayfield, potentially providing water for construction works in Mayfield’s regeneration process, therefore making use of the water that otherwise would be ‘leftover’ to the rain experience. The water tower intends to be a permanent feature of the site, at present it sits as a recognizable symbolism for the use of water, its iconic shape unchallenged and left in rudimentary cast concrete, meaning that it can be appreciated for the beauty in both its simplicity and its purpose. When the temporary common room has gone and the regeneration of Mayfield continues the water tower stays sitting 22m above ground, as a consistent souvenir or reminder of the industrial roots of the site and the common room and its embracing of the rain.
The addition of a sweeping steel spiral staircase transforms it from just ‘water-storer’ to the observation deck. The water tower peaks just above the canopy, and so visitors can see from a bird’s eye perspective the pathways created in which the rain ebbs and flows as it descends onto visitors below. The viewing platform allows people to watch the ever-changing growth of the site and also acts as eyes and ears over the city, giving views beyond Mayfield to the aqueducts and the immediate cityscape.
WATER TOWER ELEVATION 1.1O0
