Verticality

This project centres around the concept of verticality. It plays with the vertical lines that are expressed in the re-exposed brick piers of the existing Resolven Miners Welfare building and questions how these lines could be expressed in a new library café space. The verticality in the extension has been inspired by the work of others, particularly Níall McLaughlin Architects and the New Library, Magdalene College which uses large timber fins to control the way daylight enters the space. This experimentation with light inspired the technical imagination study of my project, which analysed different-sized fins and how these would alter the space's light quality, and in turn the building's structural

This went on to inspire the CLT panelled design which uses the ‘fin’ element as the key structural component of the design. My project’s primary stakeholders are the trust and the Neath Port Talbot council. The secondary stakeholders will be Men’s Sheds Cymru who are a charity that support the setting up of ‘shed’ workshops that are aimed at encouraging men to discuss their mental health in a space they may feel more comfortable in: a workshop. The introduction of this harks back to the original use of the building which was to encourage members of the community to gather.

. Repair café wales will run bi-monthly schemes in the forum aiming to encourage the sharing of skills and items to produce a circular economy. The Resolven community library will move to the café space reducing the need for two separate buildings and allowing the library to have longer opening hours which will ensure that more locals will be able to access its resources.

There are three key spaces introduced to the Resolven Miners Welfare. The first is the library café which is located in the new extension, which expresses the verticality concept through the CLT panels that compose the structure. These panels, spaced 1.2m apart, will either house window seats looking into the community garden or the bookshelves of the library. There will additionally be two ‘shed’ spaces, one on the ground floor and a smaller space on the second floor, that be fitted out after the renovations and constructions are completed. It is important that these spaces are tailored to what the members of the Men’s shed want to do with their space and they should be given the creative license to make this a space where they feel comfortable. The new community garden on the southwest side of the property will aim to reflect the industrial heritage of Resolven. It will do this through the use of Corten steel to create water troughs that will encourage local wildlife, and Corten raised planters for the growth of vegetables

Additionally, it is envisioned that a ‘living’ wall screening device will be used on the far west of the property to shield the houses to the west of the site in an attempt to reduce the impact on these residents.

Sustainability will be important for the project. As a community outreach project, it felt fitting that the Miners Welfare should try to abide by the Well-being of Future Generations Act and I sought to keep the aims of this legislation in mind whilst designing the project. At the beginning of the year, my team, Group 11 wrote a sustainability agenda which we wished to implement into our design. Our conclusion of this was that sustainability was something we wouldn’t tolerate as an afterthought, which fed through to the design decision made. This was especially true for the technology aspect of the project where I sought to introduce a sustainable alternative to typical design solutions.