Blog: LDN to ST.A
Perhaps one of the only good things to come out of the pandemic is the ability for us all to work remotely opening up the options for where and how we work, much less restrictive on location. I recently relocated back to my home city of Glasgow at the end of 2021 and the opportunities for remote working has allowed me to team up once again with Richard on the opposite side of the country after spending many years working together at Orms.
Having lived and worked in London for the past 11 years moving from a 65 strong architectural practice in Orms to RKA, a small new practice based in St Andrews, was a little daunting. There is an invisible safety blanket wrapped around you at a larger practice with a huge resource pool of knowledge and creativity to draw from along with the support teams behind the scenes. Taking that blanket away is a scary prospect but as with all new opportunities incredibly exciting and liberating, and one which I was willing to jump at head first.
Prior to leaving Orms I spent the past 2.5 years working on a new commercial office led development in Moorgate constructed over the new Liverpool St Crossrail station ventilation shaft.
At a construction value of approximately £50M I led the project from Stage 2 Planning through to Stage 4 Tender. It will be a further 2 years or so before the building opens the doors to its new residents. Whilst these projects are high profile and prestigious, they are intense and a considerable personal commitment where at times often hard to maintain momentum over such an extended period.
The domestic nature of the projects im now working on carry no less intensity, in most cases moving from concept design to tender in the space of only 3-4 months. Fees & project teams are significantly smaller so these projects require an agility in our approach to maximise the design time against the administration tasks required (we don’t have the benefit if Project Managers at this scale).
The competition for projects in London drives a pace and design rigor not like anywhere else in the UK. The competition for our projects may not be at the same level but the pace of projects is rapid and the rigor of our design thinking should not be any less. The fast pace and quick turnaround of projects allows design ideas to be tested, constructed, tweaked and refined across a relatively short period of time which is incredibly satisfying and rewarding.
Whilst I still may be getting my head around the Scottish building regulations one benefit of working on the East coast of Scotland which London simply cannot compete with, the sea views on offer from our current site project in Anstruther.
