A brief visit to the new Central St Martins building in King's Cross. I was interested to see the new letterpress workshop and was given a tour of the site by Phil Baines who had a hand in allocating space – letterpress, amazingly, being the only workshop to grow in size – and also designed the wayfinding signage.
Ten acres of flexible studios, workshops and lecture theatres are built around a glazed 'street' with overhead walkways, a colossal art library and enough concrete to fill eight olympic swimming pools (resulting in poor mobile phone reception) – I can only liken the interior of the Grade II listed Granary Building to being in an airport terminal, which may be appropriate given the transport hub on its doorstep. It's a far cry from the beaten-up buildings I was taught in and teach in now* but the fluidity of the space instills a great feeling of potential and the retention of some of the building's features give it some much-needed character.
* The Foundation course, on which I have been teaching one day a week since September, is the only course not to have moved to King's Cross
