Project Info:
Brief: Refurbishment and extension of a Nineteenth century warehouse building to provide up to 45,000sqft of multiple tenancy workspace aimed at businesses within the creative, digital and software sectors. Create a new reception and ‘front door’ to the wider Hoults Yard site.
Design: The Hoults Yard site is home to a wide range of businesses, with its campus like mix of historic and more modern industrial buildings housing over 100 different companies. Having undertaken a high level masterplanning exercise with Hoults, xsite identified the potential for refurbishment of a number of currently under exploited buildings and the need for a more legible ‘front door’ for The Yard as a whole.
The result was The Maling Exchange project to refurbish a key Victorian building located at the entrance to the site eventually providing 45,000sqft of workspace accommodation and a new reception for Hoults Yard.
Originally built as part of the famous Maling Pottery in Byker, the buildings had been in use as storage for decades. The design approach put an emphasis on providing value for money, aiming to bring out the character of the original building while delivering simple state of the art office space and distinct areas of design character.
The new ‘front door’ was created by removing a section of floor to create a double height reception space entered via an oversized lobby clad externally in black profiled metal and lined internally with birch ply. A simple and deliberate contrast to the robust Victorian warehouse building itself.
The project involved collaboration with designers Electrik Sheep Design who developed the brand for Maling Exchange inspired by the Maling Pottery back catalogue. This identity was then realised as a decorative element throughout the scheme on signage, specially commissioned prints and a wall of bespoke ceramic tiling behind the reception desk.