Spike Island
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The Spike Island Centre, once a Brooke Bond factory
Tim Rolt Download Original
Conversion of a Brooke Bond tea factory in Bristol into an art gallery and studio centre for young artists
The existing buidling was externally sound; the architect's main task was to divide the interior into flexible spaces, which would include studios, offices, education and lecture rooms, a café and exhibition space. About 40 per cent of the space is sublet to arts organisations.
Structural interventions are minimal and the new elements are deliberately expressed as new insertions within the existing fabric. They comprise blockwork and ply-faced studio partitions, glazed screens, the creation of a sculpture courtyard by removing a small area of roof and the insertion of a passenger lift and escape stairs.
The main hall is a grand space with a 8m-span glass-block barrel-vaulted roof, with fine art studios situated on the first floor gallery space. The upper floor of the two-storey wing has been converted into a studio 'village' laid out in a grid.
Data
- Begun: 1996
- Completed: 1998
- Floor area: 9,000m2
- Sectors: Arts and culture, Education
- Total cost: £1.5M
- Funding: National Lottery
- Address: Spike Island, 133 Cumberland Road, Bristol, BS1 6UX, United Kingdom
Professional Team 
- Architect: Niall Phillips Architects
- Project architects: Craig Underdown, Irene Craik, Martin Gill, Niall Phillips, Tim Rolt
- Client: Artspace Bristol
- Consultant artist: Louise Barber
- Consultant artist: John O'Connor
- Structural engineer: Hyder Consulting
- Services engineer: Integrated Design Partnership
- Main contractor: Stansell
- Quantity surveyor: WPE
Suppliers
- Glazed screens: Reglit Profiled Glass Architecture
- Steelwork: Cabot Engineering
- Entrance doors and screen: Yeo Valley Joinery
- Roofing: D E Stamp
