The East Leeds Pavilion

Design-Construct-Explore-Together. Repeat?

Announcing a partnership between the East Leeds Project, MassBespoke^TM and the communities of east Leeds.

Design

It is our ambition to create a temporary ‘Pavilion’ on green space in east Leeds. Our preferred site is adjacent to Fearnville Leisure Centre in Gipton. The Pavilion will be a shared space, managed locally, where people come together for conversation, creativity and exchange. The process will be entered into collaboratively by local people alongside artists, architects, students and professionals from a range of disciplines, coming together to form an intergenerational project team. The project aims to reconnect with histories of innovation in sustainable social housing central to the founding vision for the Gipton estate in the 1930s, as we approach its centenary.

Construct

The Pavilion will utilise the MassBespoke^TM system developed in Leeds by Bauman Lyons architects. This pioneering technology democratises the construction process by enabling a community-led approach responding to local need. MassBespoke^TM employs a computer-controlled (CNC) cutting machine set up on site in a ‘Flying Factory’ to fabricate components from digital design files sent from anywhere in the world. From these, agile, high-performance timber cassettes are fabricated and rapidly assembled onsite by a local workforce comprising skilled and semi-skilled workers. Training is built into the project programme at every stage, and outputs will include enhanced digital literacy and skills development for those seeking employment. The project facilitates exchange between workers, residents and professionals sharing their respective skills, specialisms and enthusiasms with each other. MassBespoke^TM is designed to achieve high standards of environmental performance, optimise use of materials, eliminate waste, and remove the need for heavy transport and lifting equipment at all stages of construction.

Explore

The Pavilion will provide a maker space for activity led by stakeholders. As a creative hub it will enable responsiveness to key dates in the cultural calendar such as Light Night and the Gipton Gala, and provide a base for exploring the Wyke Beck Valley on foot and by bicycle. Although imagined as a temporary structure, the Pavilion will be robust and could remain in situ for a number of years. Over time, a ribbon of pavilions could be constructed throughout east Leeds, growing cultural infrastructure where little currently exists and specifically addressing the complete absence of creative workspaces in the east of the city. Structures constructed through the MassBespoke^TM system are potentially mobile, and once disassembled the land can be returned to its original state.

Repeat?

Once established, the Factory could enable many communities to build homes and other facilities. It could generate a new social enterprise of community makers supplying garden sheds, workshops, garages, house extensions and so on through a local supply chain adding social value to place making. The Pavilion will form an R&D phase as we test the technology, build community trust and enhance our understanding of local infrastructure needs, and gather our workforce and creative team. We are actively seeking potential partners and collaborators for the project including local residents, businesses and organisations, citywide training and service providers, and creative makers of all kinds, particularly those based in east Leeds.

If you’d like to get involved, please contact us for more information.

Photography credit: Andy Irving

Are you a Maker* in east Leeds?
Get involved by completing our online survey

*Maker – a person who makes things – people who are artists, knitters, bakers, fabricators, photographers, designers, musicians, dancers, builders, producers, craftspeople and gardeners… amateurs and professionals alike!

East Leeds Makers Research Project – Survey now live!

The East Leeds Project is undertaking a new research project – East Leeds Makers. The project is linked to our belief that creativity is fundamental to a healthy and happy life – for everyone, for individuals and communities. But beyond the city centre, across the whole of east Leeds, there are no dedicated spaces for making: no co-working spaces, artists’ studios, maker spaces, hack spaces, or open access workshops. We already know a handful of creative people living in east Leeds but we believe there are many more out there.

East Leeds Makers aims to find out who makes what in east Leeds, where they do it and who they do it with. Whether people draw, weave, print, bake, whittle, film or fabricate. We’re interested in a really broad definition of making and we don’t draw any distinction between professionals, amateurs and hobbyists.

We are working on the project with Katie Raw, East Leeds Project’s Undergraduate Placement from the School of Geography at the University of Leeds. Utilising Katie’s interest and prior experience of using geographical mapping software, we intend to produce a cultural map of the area.

Cultural mapping is about physically plotting the different cultural aspects, networks and connections that exist in an area onto a map. We want to uncover making skills, connections and trading opportunities within East Leeds and then map these links in a way that we can share with local communities.

The research project is an initial step towards the East Leeds Project’s ambition to create a Pavilion at Fearnville Fields in Gipton – a temporary structure designed and built by, with and for the community. We have a vision of a shared creative space that is open and accessible to all, a place for getting together to showcase, share and exchange our skills in making. This research project will inform how the Pavilion project develops, and help the growth of new networks for a wider conversation about creativity in our part of the city.

The research project is now live and will gather data over the next few months, with the intention of publishing our research in the summer of 2019. Please go to the survey by clicking the link below:

COMPLETE THE EAST LEEDS MAKERS ONLINE SURVEY

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