Functionality meets craft in this Shoreditch non-profit studio

Photography: Henry Woide

Now home to self-described ‘creative incubators’ Common Knowledge, two unique floors of a former warehouse in Shoreditch have been gifted a new lease of life by London-based architecture firm THISS Studio. Fellow London designers Mitre and Mondays and recording studio Noatune were also invited to collaborate on the project, with the former developing a series of flexible, demountable furniture and the latter enlisted to install a triple-aspect, acoustically isolated recording space on the top floor. The result is an integrated, carefully considered workspace-cum-recording studio designed to feel like a home away from home for its resident artists and producers.

“There’s often too much distance between manager and artist,” explains Ben Blackburn, Director of Common Knowledge and Twenty Ten Management. “To have a site which offers creative workspace with a recording studio allows for more physical and emotional synergy.” The brief was therefore to create a modular, inclusive space that encourages better knowledge-sharing between music professionals and budding artists, which is at the heart of Common Knowledge’s mission.

Leaving the brick warehouse façade untouched (and retaining a dash of exposed brick throughout the interiors), THISS Studio retrofitted and restored the warehouse wherever possible, such as stripping layers of white paint from the original floorboards and replacing this with a rich, dark wood stain. Similarly, when faced with restrictions on their architectural and structural plans, the design team responded with bespoke furniture to better accommodate – rather than fight against – the building’s unique fixtures.

Working closely with Mitre and Mondays, prototypes were developed for custom seating, lighting and shelving units in a tactile palette of cork, aluminium and sycamore (the latter sourced from a felled tree in nearby Euston). Each bespoke piece was then fabricated locally at the Mitre and Mondays workshop in Islington, culminating in a selection of bold, red Valchromat joinery that acts as a unifying element throughout the double-height space.

This statement joinery begins as a wide balustrade on the second-floor entrance stairwell and sweeps up to a coworking space on the third level, where it takes the form of bench seating and integrated shelving. The combined seating and storage unit (stocked with vinyl records and industry titles) is joined by the main coworking desk, a toasted cork table comprised of two halves to enable multiple configurations. Opposite, inbuilt aluminium desks (chosen for their lightweight quality and recyclability) line the full length of one wall, while an original spiral staircase has been retrofitted with aluminium panels and painted in a serene shade of sage green.

Ascending to the mezzanine, the in-house recording studio features fabric panels, bass traps and Valchromat diffusers for high-quality acoustics. Cork panelling at the base of the room is also backed with sheep’s wool for added acoustic diffusion, while natural light filters in from an internal, circular window overlooking bespoke lighting sails and the coworking space below.