Holland Green is an attractive area in the Royal District of Kensington and Chelsea, between the respectable Holland Park and the vibrant Kensington High Street. The complex project, on which work began back in 2008, consists of two parts: the reconstruction of the abandoned and nearly demolished building of the Commonwealth Institute (Robert Matthew, Johnson-Marshall and Partners, 1962 - now their firm is known as RMJM) for the needs of the Design Museum and the construction of modern residential buildings around it. The total cost of the project was £ 120 million and was overseen by John Pawson.
Led by Rainier de Graaf, a team of architects proposed, first of all, to demolish the administrative wing of the institute, thereby revealing the main volume. Actually, only the spectacular hypar roof and supporting structures have been preserved from the historic building; a new foundation was placed under them, the height of the floors was adjusted, the old facades were replaced with new ones made of energy-efficient fritted glass panels, while repeating the original drawing.
Around the substantially renovated building, there are three cube-shaped buildings containing 54 residential blocks ranging from 61 to 1626 m2 each. Square in plan, the bodies repeat the position of the central volume. Moreover, the architects decided on an interesting spatial game: all three are similar in shape, but have different sizes - here the architects themselves remind of nesting dolls - corresponding to the dimensions of neighboring buildings. Thus, it was possible to achieve close interaction of all objects and a sense of the real integrity of the quarter.
The appearance of the residential buildings was largely determined by the drawing of the facades of the former Institute of the Commonwealth. Their rigid "lattice" becomes the ideal backdrop for complex roof lines, as the architects figuratively put it, "fixing the curves of parabolas and hyperbolas like graph paper." But the strict division into vertical rectangles is randomly alternated with another grid dictated by the structure of the buildings. The protruding elements, balconies and open terraces formed in this way complicate the seemingly banal volumes even more.
All buildings have a single basement, which houses parking, storage areas, as well as a spa pool with overhead lights, a gym and a cinema. Finally, the access of cars to the territory of the complex is as limited as possible, and this entire complex system is placed in the natural environment. The landscape developed by West 8, on the one hand, contrasts with the strict geometry of the buildings, and on the other hand, interacts with the neighboring park and helps to fit the complex closer into the urban fabric.
