The project involves the design of a new village hall to form a community focus for the village of Holy Island.
The new hall carefully juxtaposes the need to provide an intimate human scale appropriate to that of the village set against the creation of more dynamic and symbolic form relating to the expansive landscape of the island. To achieve this, the new building is composed with a strong horizontal base from which the halls rising volume is read. The form of the hall’s roof is derived from the igneous geological outcrops which characterise the island and in particular the iconic silhouette of Lindisfarne Castle.
The scheme embraces a new public gathering space, gently tapering in plan it focuses upon the Hall’s entrance from which an extended roof provides a sheltering porch. Beyond this a glazed foyer forms a visual extension of the external space and provides access to a small bar, meeting rooms and the hall itself without the need for corridors. Public welfare facilities are discretely located behind the principle spaces and their placement creates two semi-private courtyard gardens to the northern side of the building.
The Hall itself forms an anchoring volume demarking the entrance to the external gathering space to which it can open directly via an expansive sliding glass screen to provide a semi-external stage for seasonal events such as the Lindisfarne Jazz and Blues Festival. The hall’s simple rectangular plan is inherently flexible and its section is carefully composed to mediate the transition from the more private northern courtyard to the public gathering space to the south.
