ENVIRONMENT DESIGN
WALL GRAPHICS + WAYFINDING
WALL GRAPHICS IN SCHOOL BUILDING
Thomas Tallis School is a Specialist Arts College and a National School of Creativity, for pupils aged 11–19. The school is located in Greenwich Council, South London. In collaboration with Gilles & Cecilie Studio, Ansten Studio was commissioned to develop wall graphics and signage for the new Thomas Tallis School building.
CATEGORY: CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT, CREATIVE WORKSHOPS, ENVIRONMENT DESIGN, WALLPAINTING, WAYFINDING, ILLUSTRATION
CLIENT:
A collaborative project with Gilles & Cecilie Studio
Concept development and facilitation of workshops: Nina Ansten and Cecilie M.Barstad
Graphic design: Gilles Jourdan and Nina Ansten
Illustration: Cecilie M.Barstad and Gilles Jourdan
Architects: McAslan + Partners
Award: This signage / wall graphics / illustration project was awarded with Diploma for best environment design in the 2015 Visuelt award
The designs express different ideas. Each building has its own theme: Memories and stories from the old school building, imaginary future careers, and thought experiments expressed in the form of imaginative questions. The graphics are designed to challenge, engage and inspire creativity. The designs were created based on ideas generated through a series of workshops, facilitated for a group of students and staff from the School.
The wall graphics is embellished in large atrium spaces in each of the main classroom blocks. Each of these 15 spaces is 10m by 4m. In addition there is 20 individual designs situated in a variety of other spaces across the site.
In addition to wall graphics and illustrations, there was developed a graphic line and design manual for the internal signage and wayfinding of the new school buildings. Colours are used as an effective tool in the wayfinding strategy, and applied both to signs and floors. The font 'Router Book' strike a balance between the playful wall graphics and the modern architectural feel of the building. Each block has a name and a number: Explore, Question, Innovate, Imagine, Create and Experiment:
A series of workshops, facilitated for pupils and staff, was used to create content and stories for the illustrations and graphics that are applied throughout the school. By participating in the process, the existing community of learners get the opportunity to make their mark on the new building and to develop a sense of ownership to it. The idea generating workshops were held at Tate Modern:
'Back then it didn’t feel as though these activities could one day be transformed into images. However, the innumerable jumbled thoughts, the hundreds of blog posts and the reams of paper littered with ideas and memories, came back a few months later as fully formed designs, each carefully channelling the individual ideas generated in the workshops and managing to say everything we hoped about the past, present and future of Thomas Tallis School.
The activities broadened my mind, showed me that there was a lot more to graphics and advertising you see every day. Not just an aesthetic image. Also, the thinking about the future made me consider design as a potential career path for myself'
—16-year-old student, Tallis School