Returning the post office back into the centre of this small town from the back of a corner shop

In this project I focused on situating my design within the historic and traditional town of Hay-on-Wye as well as on centering the post office back within the centre of the town, making it vital to social and civic life again.

Taking roofs, such simple elements and abstracting them dramatically to give life to something as similarly common as a post office allowed it to regain its importance. The unusual forms of the roof take slate roof tiles back to their untreated state, as shards from a slate quarry.
The post office in Hay had been pushed into the back of a corner shop despite its role as a central civic building. My scheme intends to make it a central hub for the public activities within the town, allowing it to regain its importance.

The process took my project through many arrangements of the corten steel roof shards to find the right way for it to interact with the existing structures. It meets the existing market structure, the ground as well as a wall- growing out from the town. It was through these meetings that this abstracted and artful structure managed to nestle itself into the main town square.

This project was an exciting endeavour to create something entirely different and unusual in a town full of tradition. The spaces created encourage a flow of pedestrians- constantly interacting with people and site, still allowing the town to exist as it was, becoming a central part of the town. The sloping roofs allow light to enter in at different angles, and glass walls leave the scheme open, inspired by covered markets in Hay. It rounds Hay into one space.