Caernarfon Arts Centre, North Wales

The Creative Enterprise Centre in Caernarfon is a project which has arisen from the resurgence of this area of North Wales in the creative industries, together with a perception of a need for a contemporary, flexible and medium sized performance space in the town. The building is effectively a hybrid between theatre / rehearsal spaces and small office spaces aimed at young creative companies. The essence of the idea is that whilst theatres generally spring to life in the evenings, the office side of the building is a daytime activity, and that putting these two functions together, both of which involve creative people, will ensure a building that has an intensity of use all day and evening. At the heart of the building must be the idea of communication between those working in the building, both amongst themselves and between themselves and visitors. There could be a great deal of communication between members of the public and the activities of the various offices.

The diagram of the building, inspired by its location on the dock, is to make a warehouse-like construction of three parallel sheds, an inner shed containing the large volumes, requiring large span structures, flanked on either side by small or more domestic scaled structural sheds of individual rooms. The inner shed, which has theatre at its east end and rehearsal rooms at its west end, then contains within it a large atrium foyer space within which is found all the circulation. The objective of the design has been to attempt to ensure that as many office spaces as possible on the first and second floors give directly onto walkways in this atrium space so that their activities and their presence is visible from everybody entering the building. The idea of this space is further strengthened with the presence of both theatre on one side and the rehearsal room on the other side as curved objects inserted into the warehouse shape of the building.

The exterior of the building is largely formed of a steel frame and green oak boarding. This forms a natural weathered grey patina over the years and acts as a rain screen to the building. External walkways are formed of galvanised steel, with perforated lightweight metal decks, with the exterior wall adjacent to the entrance formed of board-marked concrete. Windows are generally aluminium or steel. The interior of the building is filled with colour as a contrast to the relatively monochrome exterior.

Construction of the project was completed in January 2005.