Imperial War Museum Learning Spaces
DJA worked with Imperial War Museums London (IWML) to create two floors of Learning and Events Spaces alongside their new Second World War and Holocaust Galleries. These new facilities provide the museum with a variety of different spaces to support their public engagement and learning programmes.
Both IWM’s learning centres (the Taube Family Holocaust Learning Centre and the Clore Learning Centre) offer a suite of multi-functional space within the museum. These needed to be hard working and can be used to deliver schools teaching, lectures and talks, craft workshops, survivor interviews, artefact handling, film screenings, evening events, school lunch breaks, and internal meetings.
As part of our work we held workshops, delivered presentations and produced drawings and visualisations to support the Client’s fundraising campaigns. We worked closely with IWM stakeholders to develop the brief and the design vision to their full potential. The interior design is inspired by two Paul Nash war paintings now exhibited in the spaces.
Flexible uses of the new spaces have been enabled by matching existing historic spaces to potential new uses, supported by careful design of bespoke joinery interventions which provide functionality and flexibility, but also richness and quality to the interior design. The joinery provides object display, out-of-sight storage for teaching props and art sinks, conceals AV equipment, and provides storage for coats and bags, stacking chairs and folding tables.
Careful consideration and co-ordination of a significant quantity of mechanical, electrical and Audio Visual system services was essential to conceal these seamlessly within the historic Grade II listed fabric.
Our work to help create the Learning and Events Spaces was carried out in parallel with our work as providers and leaders of the Basebuild Design team for the two new exhibitions galleries, where we worked in collaboration with Exhibition Designers Casson Mann and Ralph Appelbaum Associates.
Filed to: Arts and Museums, Heritage, Learning and Workspace, Interiors
