Case Study
Floating Cinema

The Floating Cinema was the brainchild of UP Projects, a public art agency, and began life as a pilot project in 2011 when it asked Studio Weave to customise a narrowboat to create an intimate, portable screening space on the water.

When the summer was over, the boat had to be returned. So Up Projects, with the support of The Architecture Foundation, managed to raise funds (partially through crowdfunding) to have its own bespoke floating cinema.

Projects' Floating Cinema seats 12. Photo Credit: Jack Hobhouse

Duggan Morris Architects (DMA) won the competition for the project with a barge-like design that advocates films as a 'precious cargo', connecting communities as it travels the waterways and encouraging discourse and engagement.

Designed for longevity, it has a solid steel hull, with the 12-seater auditorium partially sunk into the base of the boat, topped with a transparent, acrylic box that lights up when the projector is in use. The interior was inspired by classic mid-Twenties' auditoria. Pink felt curtains soften the simple interior elements of grey flooring, white chairs and white Formica finishes. A bespoke, high-quality A/V system includes a powerful telescopic external projector that can beam movies on a much-larger scale beyond the boat, for bigger audiences.

Projects' Floating Cinema seats 12. Photo Credit: Jack Hobhouse

DMA's initial idea of customising an old mid-Fifties canal boat had to be rejected due to cost, and the boat was created from scratch by Turks Shipyard on the Medway in Kent, using a hybrid engine that combines diesel and electric propulsion; it is powered by bio-fuel. Facilities include WC, auditorium, skipper's cabin and servery, A/V cupboard and deck. It can also be booked for events.

Client UP Productions, supported by The Legacy List with corporate partner Bloomberg
Architecture/design: Duggan Morris Architects
Manufacture Turks Boatyard, Chatham, Kent
Launch July 2013
Engine Hybrid Marine
A/V system The Useful Arts Organisation

Case study
Smith

Commissioned for 2014 Clerkenwell Design Week, Studio Weave wanted to showcase the innovative use of tools in making, from ancient crafts to modern fabrication techniques, as a way of highlighting the history of gold and silversmithing and manufacturing in Clerkenwell.

So it devised a simple pavilion and exhibition space that could host a range of contemporary makers' workshops. The pavilion was made from fibre-cement panel - a material created 100 years ago. Studio Weave's Je Ahn says: 'We thought it's a nice, recyclable material usually only used as cladding. We wanted to explore its structural quality and what we could do with it.'

Smith, a pavilion exhibition space, from Studio Weave. Photo Credit: Studio Weave

Panels were applied to a timber frame, outside and in. CNC milling engraved text on the interior panels, which also featured a mural depicting craft traditions, comprising pieces of panel intricately shaped through water-jet cutting, and then jigsaw-puzzled into place.

After the Design Week it was flat-packed to a fibre- cement maker in Belgium, with the intention to use it as a promotional structure in praise of the material. In this way the pavilion promoted both ancient craft and an unsung modern building material.

Client Clerkenwell Design Week
Architect Studio Weave
Area 3.65m x 6.12m
Fabricator Nicholas Alexander
Launch May 2014
Awards Highly commended, Civic Trust Award 2015; AJ Small Projects Award 2015, finalist