The new film school? It’s all held together with string…

Answer

Surface Architects’ complex designs for the new Centre for Research in Film and Visual Media at Birkbeck College, University of London, were a challenge that few fit out companies would even aspire to.

The design is an interlocking series of coloured zones with the key being a single point in the building’s basement with all angles for walls, floors and ceilings in the extension deriving from this original setting out point. The job required absolute attention to detail and there was absolutely no margin for error.

Amongst the innovative techniques used to deliver the designer’s vision, were three dimensional models and coloured set out drawings.

However the most effective tool was a simple ball of string. Lengths of it were used to physically mark out the floors, walls and ceilings and the obtuse and acute angles at which they met. This helped the specialists building the job to achieve the overall look.