Text: Florian HeilmeyerPhotos: Torsten Seidel, muf architecture / art
Projects
SHARED GROUND
A pilot scheme for one
kilometer of street in South
London close to the Tate
Modern. The principle of the
scheme makes shared ground
between public and private
interests. Consultation with
local residents, retailers,
developers and businesses
established the brief for a
scheme that realigns the road
to shift the priority from the car
to the pedestrian and widen
the pavement on the sunny
side of the street.
London, 1996 – 2001
A HORSES TAIL
While the Tilbury community
garden was under
construction, a local history
project was initiated and run
by muf with local children. The
project investigated on the
semilegal practice of grazing
ponies around Tilbury and thus
on the cultural and emotional
claims to the landscape.
Tilbury, 2003 – 2004
BARKING TOWN SQUARE
Winner of the European Prize
for Public Space, the square
shows muf‘s capacity to make
public space able to host more
than one thought. A folly wall
of recycled bricks could be a
ruin of Barking’s past, an
arboretum gives space for
leisure and pleasure while a
public arcade without shops
connects the square with the
new high street nearby.
London, 2005 – 2008
VILLA FRANKENSTEIN
Exhibition on the „obsessive“
relations between Venice and
Great Britain since John
Ruskins „Stones of Venice“
(1850). A collaboration of muf
architecture / art and Atelier
One engineers. British Pavilion,
Architectural Biennial
in Venice, 2010
FERAL ARCADIA -
BECKTON ALP
The Beckton Alp is the highest
manmade hill in England’s
southeast and a toxic 19th
century spoil heap from a
former gas work.
Feral Arcadia is turning this
into a place of play and
repose. muf started the project
by staying three months in a
portacabin at the base of the
alp, observing and
documenting „the use and
evidence of use, both human
and otherwise“. In 50 days,
over 300 people were
observed revealing that this
place is already being valued
for certain activities.
This will now lead to a master
plan for the site during the
second phase of the project.
Newham, 2010
HIGH STREET
It‘s the strap line for the
ancient road into the city
which will be the London 2012
Olympic Marathon route. Along
the street are a number of
public realm improvement
projects and muf are authors
of schemes for the
neighbourhoods. Each scheme
acknowledges the street as a
social space and makes room
on (and in particular just off)
the street for amenity and
pleasure; these schemes will
endure beyond the Olympic
celebrations.
Collaboration of muf
architecture / art with J&L
Gibbons and JMP.
London, 2010