Project of the week: London’s Design Museum fit-out

Image: designmuseum.org

Fitting out the new home for the iconic Design Museum while the building itself was still being completed was a complex job to ensure it opened without any more delays. Tony O’Shea, senior operations manager at Willmott Dixon Interiors, talks to CM about the project.

Describe the project 

The £23m project involves the fit-out contract for the relocation of the Design Museum into its new home at the former Commonwealth Institute building in Kensington High Street.

Overall it involved refurbishing the Grade II-listed building into a 21st century museum providing three times more space than the Design Museum’s former location at Shad Thames, near London Bridge.

The museum is officially opening this week, almost two years later than originally planned. The project had originally been announced in 2012 and planned for completion by 2014. However, a number of architectural complications, including the construction of the distinctive hyperbolic paraboloid roof that dips at its centre, caused the project to be delayed by several years. 

The year-long fit-out contract has involved the installation of new galleries for permanent and temporary exhibitions, an auditorium, learning facilities, office space, common areas and a new destination bar and restaurant.

The museum will house 1,000 objects in its permanent exhibition – among them a London Underground train, a Ford Model T car, Gucci tennis shoes and Christian Louboutin’s Pigalle high heels – covering everything from fashion to engineering.

Developer Chelsfield and the Ilchester Estate donated the Commonwealth Institute building and land to the Design Museum, together with the cost of refurbishing the shell and core of the building. The construction was carried out by Mace.

Mace was appointed as the main contractor for the £83m project in 2102. The works involved the base build, restoration and comprehensive structural alterations of the Commonwealth Institute and construction of the luxury apartment blocks in the grounds, Hollandgreen, as well as their fit-out.

For the construction of the museum, Mace undertook a “cut and carve” method to retain the roof and perimeter structure of the old building while demolishing the internal floors and extending the basement of the new building. This created the expanded space, three times the size of its previous home at Shad Thames. 

An existing administration block was fully demolished for the new buildings and the works also included a redesign of the facades to allow natural light into the interior.

Vital statistics

The £23m contract was meant to take 56 weeks, but following some delays it stretched out to 68 weeks. There was, on average, 150 men working on site at any one time. 

The interiors have been remodelled by architect John Pawson and the project manager was Gardiner & Theobald.

What did the works entail?

Enabling works for the fit-out started on 24 May 2015. Once this was done we commenced with the steelworks and structural elements, which went on for 12 weeks, followed by all the insulation elements and then the fit-out.

Image: Willmott Dixon

The fit-out work covered six floors from lower basement up to a second floor to meet the design brief specified by John Pawson and OMA.

The original concrete floors have been removed, while the previously existing facade has been replaced with a double-glazed skin improving insulation and permitting daylight to enter.

What was the big challenge?

When we took the building from Mace in May 2015, all we got was a complete empty shell.

When we started, Mace was still finishing building, so we were almost working on a site within in a site, so this threw up a number of challenges with regards logistics, deliveries on site and working alongside each other while under pressure timewise.

We managed to work through it and then there was also working with local community and the residents. As part of the main contract Mace was building Hollandgreen, three new luxury apartment buildings.

Image: designmuseum.org

Some of the nearby residents have paid a lot of money for their apartments, millions, so you have to be respectful of them and this also limited the hours we could work. For this we worked alongside the estate managers.

We also surprisingly had to collaborate with Holland Park. There was an issue with getting some equipment on site in time and it appeared the best way was actually through the park. Obviously this was difficult as we again were under time constraints of the hours this could be done, but we managed to come to an agreement with the Holland Park Trust that allowed us to use the park for transportation.    

There was also just the pure expectation on the project, the way I see it with regards the build, it’s all about the detail, I almost see it as a permanent exhibit. It’s always on show but also has to be subtle to not overshadow the exhibits.

We did all the structural stuff, got that out of the way, then there were the three sectional handovers. One was the first floor area, as they needed to take occupation. Unusually compared to some projects, we progressed the middle part of the building first, the first floor, then went back and did the others.

Image: Willmott Dixon

Even though we’re Willmott Dixon and we have a construction background I think it was near the reach of our interior fit-out department and we managed to come through.

John Pawson wanted clean lines throughout and so everything such as LED light fittings had to be hidden, which also posed a challenge.

What will you take to other projects?

Just the overall collaboration we needed to navigate on this project, there were so many elements and a tight timeline overall. 

Champagne moment? 

There have been quite a few interesting moments throughout the works. But when people come round and actually see the site, there’s a real wow factor. I think I’ll probably give it six months or so and come down myself and watch for a few hours, and just see how people use the space and interact with it.