#sitw13

Studio In The Woods 2013 During the summer I spent a week in Stanton Park, Swindon, participating in Studio in the Woods workshop, and educational program intended to encourage the exchange of architectural (and other) skills through experimental, hand-on learning and direct building experience.

  Studio in the Woods was conceived by Piers Taylor as a reaction to the way that architects are increasingly disconnected from the way that buildings are actually realised; they tend to imagine the process through drawing rather than ’doing’. Studio in the Woods is intended to give architects, students and designers a chance to learn from makers and work collectively to realise their own projects.

  Importantly, the project is also about teaching architects to reconnect with their context. Because the teams are working to such a small time scale in an unknown place, they must connect intimately with their site and be willing to respond to it, changing their design when necessary. The idea is to create organic, vernacular designs, which you often don’t see under normal circumstances. We worked in Stanton County Park, Swindon with 14 group members, including Susanne and Barbara from Erect Architecture.