Nothing is More Important Than Preserving Memories — A Conversation with Hugo Chan

If you were to pinpoint the most important aspects of adaptation, what would those be?

“I think there can be so many important things when it comes to building’s adaptation. Social and cultural generally take precedence, but I would put them under this umbrella term of “sustainability”, which has environmental, a social-cultural and economic context. If the economic and environmental benefits are more straightforward, the social and cultural aspect for me is the strongest one linked to this idea that our cities and buildings embody memories — ranging from significant cultural events to personal memories about a space. ”

“Often when architects try to uncover the significance of a community, we can discover along with these beautiful stories, little jewels in our community or neighborhood. So in that sense whether or not a building has to be adapted because the law says it must, architects should try to think about it as a starting point because of these benefits — that there is a story in all of the buildings. These memories may not be monumental per se, but they are memories that allow architects to either play with it or change it. I think that’s what adaptive reuse allows for: it gives us this flexibility and allows us to not just think about architecture constantly as this obsession with iconic buildings, with newness, but rather with what is already here. Sometimes these things don’t necessarily have to be changed, all they have to do is just be polished and tidied up, then they will be made new again and made just as relevant for the 21st century and beyond.”

In your observations and experience, what have been the successful ones?

“Many of them find the perfect balance between what should be demolished and what should be kept. Then I also would ask the question, what might this project look like in 10, 20, 50 years time? Will, it still be there and if not, why will it need to be demolished or changed? Though this is a very difficult question because it’s almost like you’re trying to predict a future, but it is crucial to ask these kind of question because there are different types of obsolescence that all buildings have to accept.”

“One successful adaptation project I have seen is a wonderful building by a company called Sheppard Robson, called the Sammy Ofer Center at the London Business School. The project has this perfect balance in converting this old council building Westminster Town Hall into a new learning hub for the London Business School. They were able to remove things that they knew weren’t operating well and they were also able to convert the library and do very minimal interventions to it. On top of that, they keep other fine details in the space, like the same proportion of windows, but upgrade the glass for the sake of the function. This requires in-depth understanding and research, so the project speaks out critical thinking and analysis throughout.”

The question architects should confront themselves with whenever they start a project is, “Do I have to do anything new?” or rather, “What is the reason for demolition?”.

Adaptive reuse needs to be thought far more broadly in architecture and it needs to be the starting point of every project in an urban context.

It is very important to introduce the clients’ idea of adaptation, as there are not that many green spaces left-right in this world, so we will only be adopting more and more buildings to new functions. It is essential to understand their research aspect of doing this and keeping them more input in parts of the social, the logical, and economic sense.

courtesy of the design story interview with hugo chan of studiohc on july 2020