The main function of the Rivington Place Gallery and the Bernie Grant Center for the Arts is to encourage minority artists and artists in the UK by creating optimal conditions for their creativity and engaging in a wide range of educational activities.
Largely due to this, the projects of these buildings were commissioned by Ajaya, a native of Tanzania - today the only African among the British architectural establishment.
Rivington Place is also remarkable in that it is the first volunteer London art gallery in 40 years, for which a new building has been built. Within its walls will be located the administrative and exhibition premises of distinguished cultural organizations - inIVA (Institute of International Visual Arts) and the association "Autograph ABP", specializing in photography.
This building is also the first large public building realized by Ajaye after the libraries of the Ideas Store series in 2004 and 2005. It closes the row of closely adjoining houses along Rivington Street, and with its side - but at the same time wider façade - faces the dead-end alley of Rivington Place. Both facades are decorated in the same way: staggered black concrete panels alternate with glazing areas and sheets of plastic-coated aluminum, also black.
To visually give the building a greater height, Ajaye provided the five floors of the building with eight rows of windows. They differ from each other in size, and this technique, combined with the unusually small width of the streets on which the gallery opens, allowing you to see the building only in perspective, at a large angle, turns a relatively small structure (the length of the narrow facade is 11.5 m, wide - 35 m) into a clearly visible building.
The main entrance is located in the middle of the larger façade due to the need to arrange the main staircase in the center of the building; but the more important side of the gallery, facing bustling Rivington Street, also has its own door. This is an opening of 4 m in a strip of solid glazing; it is planned to be used during openings and for the installation of large works of art in exhibition halls, which are clearly visible from the street.
The compositional center of the layout is the atrium, which unites the three lower floors of the building. On the first floor there are cafes and exhibition halls, on the second - an educational center, on the third - a library and an auditorium. The two upper floors, closed to the public, are occupied by administrative offices.
The Bernie Grant Center for the Arts, located in the London borough of Tottenham, is named after the black MP who represented the area in Parliament until his death in 2000; it was he who came up with the idea of creating a cultural center that would expand the participation of representatives of British ethnic minorities in the field of art and the media. The ensemble with a total area of 3700 sq. m consists of three parts. "Epicenter" - a glazed administrative building - is attached to the building of the former Victorian baths (a huge pipe has also survived from them, which is now located on the territory of the complex). The "Business Corps", clad in brown slate, is occupied by local small businesses.
The main building, which is the cultural center itself, is a hangar-like structure with a canopy over the entrance made of amaranth wood, and its walls are sheathed with dark brown aluminum panels. The main auditorium inside is designed for 300 people, there is also an auxiliary hall for 70 seats, a cafe, choreographic and rehearsal studios. Together, all three buildings are united by a new square, linking them to the nearby College of Northeast London.
