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Festival Hall
Conwy, Wales
2019
Sanctus Sanctorum : Holy of Holies
A festival hall with an historically oppressive backdrop provides a defiant response to context.
Axes misalign with the urban plan in a series of religious forms contained within a hortus conclusus.
Religion drives all aspects of the design, from the inspiration of form, to the usage and sacred experiences within.
The ‘Church’, ‘Cloister’ and ‘Crucifix’ are characters emerging from a flooded romantic garden behind a ‘ruined’ polycarbonate wall.
The drowning of culture by the English is embodied through a landscape adaption of John Everett Millais’ ‘Ophelia'.
The careful and functional division of programme into separate buildings allow music, theatre, art, exhibition, archive, cafe/bar and commerce to work cohesively within an architectural statement celebrating Welsh culture and reinstilling pride into a town which has been lost architecturally and psychologically to the power of Conwy castle.
Quayside Elevation
A barrel vault inspired performance space provides unique acoustics for a congregation sat within an adapted medieval church plan.
The laypeople enter via the narthex and sit in the nave whilst performers move about the altar ceremoniously underneath the north sky sunset crucifix.
Cranked Section
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