INTERIOR DESIGN 2025
This catalogue is part of a collection published by the Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture (ESALA), Edinburgh College of Art, University of Edinburgh. It documents student design work produced in the BA Honours Interior Design programme in 2024 - 25. The full collection is available to view online at issuu.com/eca
Published in 2025 by The University of Edinburgh, under the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Non-Derivative 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0).
Olsson, Gina
Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh, 2025.
Text © Authors, 2025.
Images © Authors and Contributors, 2025.
Interior Design.
FOREWORD
Jenny Jones
External Examiner, 2020 - 2025
It has been a privilege to serve as External Examiner for this course over the past five years. This period has encompassed both the challenges of the pandemic and a significant institutional transition, as the programme moved from the School of Design to the School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture. That shift prompts a compelling question: how many courses could truly belong within both schools? Interior design, with its fluid and expansive character, is undoubtedly one of them.
The design of the interior asks students to be conscious of, engage and act in plural realms. It requires them, at the very least, to think tectonically, to be environmentally conscious, to activate the senses, and ultimately to translate ideas into immersive spatial experiences.
Throughout my time in this role, I have been consistently impressed by the coherence of the curriculum, the clarity and fairness of assessment practices, and the alignment of learning outcomes with both academic depth and professional relevance.
The programme is shaped by a culture of reflection and responsiveness that keeps it both current and grounded. Foundational knowledge is thoughtfully combined with contemporary thinking, and the structure of teaching and learning supports both independent exploration and guided development.
The work presented in these pages reflects the depth and breadth of the students’ learning. It stands as a testament to their commitment and creativity, and to the dedication of the academic staff who have supported them throughout and to the physical realm of the Edinburgh College of Art that holds the space for the magic to happen year after year.
In design, the outcome is always visible. What is shown here speaks clearly of a course that values critical inquiry, imagination, and scholarly independence.
Jenny Jones
FOREWORD
BY JENNY JONES
INTERIOR DESIGN
AN INTRODUCTION TO OUR PRACTICE
To practice as a designer is a joyful and wondrous thing. Akin to all artists it is a never-ending journey of discovery, a lifelong lesson where each answer begs a new question. As a creative discipline, interior design nestles comfortably somewhere between art and architecture, straddling scales from the body to the room to the city.
Historic sites bring an unexpected narrative as we harvest the urban landscape considering existing material to re-use from a host palette. New additions are appropriate to modern activities and can be timeless or explicitly of their time. Often temporal, many interior experiences need to respond to current trends, local context versus global attitude, housed within (and outside of) a range of sites, from the ruin to the contemporary container.
As we change buildings from the inside out, we reflect on societal changes and technological advances. Reusing spaces that already exist in our current urban estate is what interior design has always done, but now more than ever we feel the importance of it.
This renewed emphasis on current global agendas has always been a key consideration for the interior designer, as we discuss appropriate ways to intervene in the spaces we encounter. Inclusivity, sustainability, diversity, equity, accessibility, are constant topics embedded in our practice, aligned with shifts in fashion, popular culture and taste. Every project brief is unique and every response individual.
At the heart of every project are people – the client, the user, the community our interiors must serve. Empty spaces are not interiors, our goal is to create places filled with activity and life, rooms which are the backdrop to both the spectacular and the mundane are given equal consideration to make meaningful change to peoples’ lives. Interiors can be whimsical, transient, of their time, or timeless, but our goal is always to design spaces which are useful, bring joy, and sustainably respond to current and future needs and desires.
Here at ECA we aim to instil these values in each of our graduates, to ensure they embark on the next part of their creative journey as thoughtful, respectful and considerate designers who understand they have a moral and social responsibility, alongside the opportunity to makes changes for the good. Our programme seeks to show students that design is fun, courageous, challenging and exciting. Not all design needs to save the world, but some of it might, and that’s okay.
Within the catalogue this year we discuss a range of design values and teaching approaches within our programme at ECA. Our belief in these areas of focus remains pivotal to the way we teach, practice and continue to learn, and we hope that our graduates see their continuing skills in each as a way to further develop their own practice. Within each independent project showcased here you will see how our students are able to apply their accumulated knowledge, skills and design approach from our curriculum, to deliver a fantastic array of interior interventions in existing sites across our wonderful city of Edinburgh.
Well done to our Interior Design class of 2025!
OUR VALUES
HOW WE DRAW
ANDY SIDDALL
A central confidence that our students develop in their studies is their relationship to drawing as a form of communication.
We embed conventional orthographic hand drawing methods into the 1st year courses; teaching each method from first principles before exercising those skills around the city to sharpen observational spatial drawing.
Students develop their own style and drawing identity as they pursue concepts and design proposals in their first design projects, with an emphasis on iteration and shifting between sketching and drawing to develop work.
As Edgar Degas (1834 1917) is often quoted, “Art is not what you see, it’s what you make others see” and for us, the core skill of drawing is the common ground upon which we test, present, discuss and nurture design ambition.
measured single point perspective methods -
Concept sketches for a 1st year health and wellbeing project
Developing
Emilie Noel.
Drawing Spaces course using hand-drawn orthographic surveys at the National Museum of Scotland.
- Julia Zhu.
Design arrangement, material and light investigation models; Bladerunner
We shift interest towards ubiquitous digital skills in our second year but not without taking time to consider why we are creating drawings and their role in the design process.
Through 2 and 3 dimensional CAD programmes, we again teach drawing toolsets before encouraging students to consider the purpose and detail of drawing, increasing the scale and agency of their drawn ideas.
The complexity of our drawing increases as we engage with more atmospheric and curated images into our later 2nd and then 3rd year courses, relating to industry standards and conventions in production information and wide-ranging interior spatial image creation.
The breadth of drawing method, scale and technique presented through our graduate cohort celebrates the power that drawing has to invite our audience into our thinking; to see how we imagine people occupying our designs, how they are enabled through detail and lighting and the narrative relationship between what was there and what is considered as change.
Hotel - Yi Dong.
‘Substance’ Hotel- Callan Anderson.
Talented Mr Ripley Hotel - Roxie Cameron.
OUR VALUES
MAKING & MATERIALS
GINA OLSSON
Within our current digitized context, we strive to retain and emphasise how important our connection to physical making remains.
As educators, practitioners and researchers, we believe that the act of making provides designers with a vital haptic experience which improves our understanding not only of material form and how things go together; but also, of multi-sensory experience in the places we design.
We see making as a means in itself – a physical act which engages us in a process of experimentation, selection, assembly, and resolution, with a strong focus on process and development, rather than merely the finished article. This interaction with making offers the student alternative and complementary skills to both hand and computer drawing, which evoke a physical experience of materials, where we touch, weigh, smell, cut, glue, and assemble into miniaturised palettes and constructions, to imagine the spaces we will create.
This important process connects us to materials and finishes we select and specify, enabling us to make more appropriate and informed decisions.
Library in Gracemount Mansion by Saffron Boatfield
When we talk of making (and non-making) it is important to note that as designers, representation is often our only medium, we do not actually make interiors. We make information for others to make them for us.
Employing a tectonic approach within the studio and workshop serves an important purpose beyond the immediate act, in that it also strengthens our respect for and ability to communicate with the makers, manufacturers, and constructors who will ultimately create our designs for us and our clients.
For some, using their hands to create is their already happy place, for others it might be outside their comfort zone, but for all it can provide much needed respite from the screen. Physically handling stuff engages our brains in a different way. It can also be a lot of fun, and students enjoy creative studio sessions alongside learning in the technical workshops, with opportunities to work in wood, metal, casting, glass, and textiles, alongside a variety of digital making at the CAD/CAM facilities.
Making in a more ambiguous exploratory way as a developmental tool with the design process, can help us all to appease the creative block and try a new approach. Stepping away from the screen, (or the drawing board), and leaving the blank sheet of white paper to one side often facilitates risk taking and encourages us all to consider other ways of doing things.
Making early in the design process is often used to provoke ideas as we respond to project themes and narratives. Physical collage and abstract (scaled or scaleless) models may speak of the big idea, volumes of space, an interior strategy or material approach. We encourage use of recycled and found objects in these early experiments, where accidental textures and patterns can add a new dimension. Happy accidents are often the greatest delight in this early making.
As concepts turn to firmer ideas, a change in scale or approach to more precise modelmaking offers a chance to test out ideas in actual three-dimensions, working in tandem with orthographic scaled drawings, and three-dimensional sketches.
Final presentation models can bring the section to life, communicating a precise scaled cut through, show us a construction detail at 1:10, 1:5 or even 1:1, as a prototype junction to test out how a material may respond, connect, join and be joined to another.
Material experimentation with finishes, manipulation, testing, and connecting gives much insight into both limitations and possibilities of material selection, knowledge and experience impossible to gleam from viewing digitised samples on screen or in a printed catalogue.
In our year two material reimagined course, researching and analysing a given material family, small groups of students explored their material in sites around the city, before returning to the workshop to recreate the current material condition. Students then experimented with alternative sustainable inventions to reimagine a version of that material, embedded with similar or new qualities and properties, with a focus on our material understanding, shaped through beliefs, culture and narrative.
In third year, our students further develop skills in material specification and construction detailing, by retracing interior detail case studies communicated in drawn and model form. Students are supported to create scale models of their own bespoke interior details, zooming in to test out and express junctions and finishes. Year four students revisit, and reflect on this learning to deliver considered material specifications and interior construction details as an integral part of their final year projects
OUR VALUES
LIGHTING INTERIORS
GILLIAN TREACY
Lighting plays a crucial role in determining our perception of an interior’s spatial qualities, colours, materiality and ambiance. The integration of ephemeral daylight and sunlight into an interior supports the wellbeing of occupants through providing a connection to their external environmental conditions.
We encourage students to develop environmentally sustainable design practice through exploring and analysing the appropriate use of daylight first before application of artificial lighting strategies in every project.
Students learn about lighting interior spaces through exploring real places, in real-time, to encourage visual understanding of the intangible experience of light in a space. Experiential teaching methods include visiting building interiors and hands-on industry sample workshops, offering invaluable insights into real-world applications of lighting design. Observing how light behaves in different settings and interior environments enhances technical and conceptual understanding.
Lighting Workshop Visit to Stoane Lighting, Edinburgh
Student Visit to St Albert’s Chaplaincy
Lighting Contrast Tonal Sketch - Raaida Hossain
Every student learns to reveal the lighting of a space through recording, analysing, testing and evaluating, using real-time digital measurement tools, analogue drawing skills and technical design language. This process cultivates an understanding of lighting technologies, sustainable design practice and the creative opportunities in lighting narrative.
Current research and lighting design process is discussed in lectures and explored and applied in workshops. Through these explorations students can then approach lighting their own projects with confidence, initiating a creative lighting design brief and developing a nuanced understanding of interior atmosphere alongside responding to the technical demands and expectations of a professional design team.
Lighting Project Sketches - Mira Belkin-Sessler
Students develop a chosen spatial design project and, through conceptual studies, diagrams and drawings create a lighting proposal for the spaces, capturing both the pragmatic and aesthetic elements of lighting design whilst communicating their design intent. Engaging with lighting design during undergraduate study cultivates a comprehensive grasp of how light and space converge to create positive, harmonious interiors, positively impacting the interiors of future clients and interior inhabitants.
This year’s students proposed lighting designs for a variety of interiors from small-scale library reading nooks to larger libraries, retail, offices and hospitality projects using layers of both natural and artificial light to add depth and authenticity to their designed interiors.
Interior Lightboxes - Digital Render by Jingwen Zhou
Physical Model Lighting Test - Lilly Choi
01
DEEP DIVE
AN INTERACTIVE NEURODIVERSE EXPERIENCE
ELLIE ALEXANDER
“Deep Dive” creates a welcoming space for families, offering an interactive experience designed to meet the unique sensory needs of both children and adults with autism in Edinburgh. Located in the former Infirmary Street Baths, this reimagined community asset helps families relax without judgment, connect with others, and build a supportive community in a safe environment.
Autistic individuals often face sensory challenges, both hyper- and hypo sensitive. This experience centre offers tailored, calming environments to support well-being activities, with benefits extending to families through ongoing support and care.
Embracing biophilic design, the space brings natural elements indoors, inspired by local surroundings, to create a calming atmosphere that reduces stress and enhances user experience. It supports emotional exploration through innovative wet and dry sensory environments, blending historic architecture with contemporary technology.
With a central city location, “Deep Dive” builds on the existing building’s historic past as a public health asset, evolving it into a hub for connection, support, and sensory relief. This unique environment offers families a welcoming place to return to, helping them navigate the often-overwhelming world with comfort and community.
Sensory pads in technology zone
Atrium cafe overlooking sensory maze
Diagram
Section Through ‘Deep Dive’ from Infirmary Street
TRANQUIL TRANSITIONS
A PROGRAMME FOR THE DISPLACED
DEEMAH ALOMRAN
Youth homelessness in the UK has been steadily rising, driven by factors such as family economic struggles, mental health challenges, and domestic abuse. As designers, we have a responsibility to create well-designed, research-informed solutions that address the needs of different groups.
Repurposing the Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop in Newhaven to the north of the city; an ideal site due to its secluded, natural setting and adaptable steel structure, the project aims to support displaced youth as they step into adult life. Without stable housing, many face academic setbacks and limited job opportunities due to the lack of a fixed address. Accommodation is organised around a clear, central atrium space that brings light and views into the interiors, connecting users of the spaces to their location and improving their physiological and mental health and wellbeing. The project offers workshops focused on essential life and career skills such as IT, cooking, financial literacy, CV writing, and legal rights.
A secondary voluntary track will support artistic development, recognizing that creative pursuits often feel out of reach without stability. The ambition is to ensure that participants can focus on personal growth and long-term reintegration into society.
03
MARKET HUB
COMMUNITY CULINARY COLLECTIVE
MIRA LENA BELKIN-SESSLER
Market Hub is located within the historic Edinburgh Fruitmarket at 45 Market Street. This project re imagines the site as a communitycentred educational and recreational space that addresses pressing issues of food waste and food insecurity. At its core, the Market Hub philosophy is driven by the belief that food has the power to connect us back to one another, to ourselves, and to our earth.
Scotland is one of the most agriculturally blessed countries in the world, growing incredible produce all year round that deserves to be celebrated! This project provides a unique opportunity for members of the local community and culinary/agriculture industry professionals to come together and do so.
The style of the space draws inspiration from the Mid-Century design era, a period that marked the initial decline of the global produce trade, and the closure of the Fruitmarket. In light of this connection, the design seeks to restore our relationship with fresh food by creating a design that fosters creativity, curiosity, and connections.
The new interior hosts a range of culinary activities to include the restaurant, an ingredients and appliance retail area, indoor growing space, fermentation lab, demonstration kitchens, and an art studio dedicated to creating materials from food waste.
b.
THE CLEAN BEACH
MARINE SUSTAINABILITY CENTRE
LILLY CHOI
The Marine Sustainability Centre is an interactive space designed for children; combining education, play, and environmental research within the former McDonald Road Library in Leith, Edinburgh.
The project addresses the growing need for early ecological awareness by offering hands-on experiences with marine waste and live observation of water quality studies. Natural light, sustainable materials, and underwater-themed designs create an immersive atmosphere that encourages empathy, curiosity, and responsibility towards ocean preservation.
The centre responds to a vital environmental and educational gap by engaging children in the challenges of marine pollution and sustainability. A transparent research lab allows young visitors to witness ongoing water quality experiments, linking real science to daily life. Alongside, creative workshops using marine debris spark imagination and critical thinking.
The design prioritizes tactile learning, open visibility, and emotional connection through textured surfaces, oceanic colours, and ambient lighting. Up-cycled and natural materials, including reclaimed wood and sea plastics, are integrated throughout. Overall, the centre not only teaches ecological values but also fosters a sense of agency;
CULTURAL SYMBIOSIS CENTRE
A BRIDGE BETWEEN EDINBURGHS CULTURES
DARIA FRUNZULICA
My project is a personal response to Edinburgh’s rich multicultural identity, a city where people, stories and traditions from all over the world intersect. Set within the Royal Botanic Garden, the Cultural Symbiosis Centre reimagines the John Hope Gateway Building as a vibrant multiuse space featuring an auditorium, bistro, workshops and a cultural retail space.
The existing architecture, with its stunning timber ceiling structure, fullheight glazing and open-plan layout, made the site ideal for my vision. Its sense of openness, warmth and transparency naturally supports a design that encourages cultural exchange and shared experience.
The building’s location is equally meaningful. Surrounded by global plant life, the garden itself reflects the project’s central idea of coexistence and diversity. My project builds on this synergy, using interior interventions and material choices to create an inviting, flexible environment where people of all backgrounds and generations feel seen, welcomed and connected.
long and short sections through the cultural centre
section through auditorium
06
HOME IN THE COMMUNITY
A DAYTIME SANCTUARY
ARJUN GILL
This project transforms the former Leith Methodist Church (1862), into a daytime community centre for the unhoused. The building ceased to be a church in 2008 when it was converted into a neighbourhood hub for the YMCA centre and has been out of use since 2023.
Motivated by seeing how the housing crisis can isolate vulnerable young people and fracture communities this project explores how design can counter that; creating emotionally supportive, inclusive spaces that foster dignity and connection.
The building has been reinvented to explore the vertical height of the existing sanctuary space by creating an open, skylit, interior courtyard community cafe. The surrounding spaces provide cellular accommodation with design interventions connecting activities and community through careful material selection, providing nuanced levels of privacy defined by spatial function and curated interior views.
Focusing on shared spaces for youth, the project imagines how interior design can build belonging through warm, non-institutional design interventions that encourage interaction for those often socially marginalised.
east-west section as proposed
north-south section as proposed
HOME IN THE COMMUNITY
07
CREATIVE COMMONS
ACCESS TO VISUAL ARTS
RAAIDA HOSSAIN
Creativity is often undervalued, particularly for adults who missed early access to the arts. Cultural and socioeconomic barriers, especially within BAME communities, can discourage creative pursuits and contribute to a lack of diversity in the creative industry.
This goal of this project is to address these gaps by offering lowpressure, beginner-friendly workshops in drawing and painting, a materials hub, exhibitions of artists’ work, and a social space, creating inclusive access to arts education and expression an a flexible designed environment.
This project is based in Fountainbridge Library, a 1940 Art Decoinfluenced Neo-Classical building with high ceilings and full-length windows, making it ideal for creative workshops, galleries, and lightfilled social spaces.
The design draws on the simplicity of traditional gallery spaces, paired with textures and patterns inspired by art materials, such as ceiling baffles that imitate the flow of watercolours while offering acoustic control. Cultural and local art influence features like Moroccan Zellige patterns in the handrails and the Paisley (Boteh) motif, common in South Asian art, incorporated into the doors.
STUDENT HUB
ACCOMMODATION & SOCIAL WELLBEING VENUE
EVE JOHNSTONE
Situated in Summerhall Arts Centre in Newington, Edinburgh, the Student Hub is a space to provide sanctuary for all Edinburgh students. This project aims to tackle the mental health crisis across students in the UK by creating a space that harbours good mental wellbeing, rest and relaxation.
The inspiration behind the design was driven by restorative environment theory, and the overwhelmingly negative data collected from students’ experiences at University due to inadequate student accommodation provisions. This design aims to respond to these issues, connecting users to nature, bridging the gap between the natural and built environment, creating a sense of community within a hub to support students during their time at University.
Summerhall is an idyllic location, a short distance from the University’s main campus, with close proximity to nature, a private courtyard and direct access to the Meadows. The project adapts the existing interior layout to provide innovatively designed student accommodation focussing on individual personal living spaces, optional interaction zones and spaces to connect with the wider student community. The design includes public social spaces for Edinburgh students to visit and socialise, engage in recreational activities, study or visit the ‘wellbeing tower’ to access therapy, yoga, meditation and learning spaces.
Section Showing the Student Hub Accommodation and Atrium
the shared kitchen with indoor garden, using repurposed lecture theatre
PAW SPACE
STUDENT PET CENTRE
JIAYU LUO
This project proposes a student-oriented community pet centre located at 3 Bristo Place, near the University of Edinburgh. Originally built as a Seventh Day Adventist Church, the historic site has been sensitively transformed into a multifunctional space that supports both human and animal needs.
The centre includes areas for grooming, second-hand pet goods, DIY workshops, and social interaction. Pet-friendly materials, safe circulation routes, and calming sensory elements such as natural light and textures are incorporated to ensure comfort for animals. The design goes beyond human-centred thinking, taking into account how pets experience and move through the environment.
By addressing practical needs and encouraging responsible ownership, the centre provides a supportive environment for students and their pets. It promotes shared learning, care, and connectionstrengthening the bond between people and animals while fostering inclusive community values.
Pet-friendly Material Palette
Relaxation Zone for People and Pets
THE QUEER CULTURE HUB
HOUSING, HEALTH CLINIC & HUB
HOLLY MCINTYRE
Inserted into an existing building, previously functioning as a hotel and restaurant, this project repurposes a courtyard building in Edinburgh’s Old Town, on Bristo Place. Responding to the historic interior and fabric in its design strategies, it will become home to The Queer Culture Hub with adjoining accommodation and health clinic, gathered around a social courtyard—creating a new collection of inclusive spaces for support, expression, and community.
Queer is an umbrella term that encompasses a wide range of identities and experiences. But what defines Queer Culture? It’s expressed through dance, music, fashion, art, literature, sports, community, love, activism, and the freedom to be oneself. It represents a rich, open, and inclusive culture shaped by both resilience and a history of exclusion.
In Edinburgh the queer community is vibrant and diverse—spanning different ages, races, and interests—but there is still a noticeable lack of a central, connected space in the city. Many queer individuals seek and deserve a dedicated venue as proposed by this project; a safe, welcoming hub for gathering, connecting, and cultivating an authentic sense of belonging.
The design inserts a new spatial strategy into the building responding to its historic character. Thoughtful design interventions spark joy, activity, and engagement through the creation of open, connected spaces encouraging community interaction within the culture hub. Surrounding spaces use muted tones to elicit a sense of calm and security for the users.
Upper Floor View of Event Space
HIKERS
HAVEN
GEMMA O’NEILL
This project introduces a dedicated hiking education and resource centre aimed at making hiking more accessible and less overwhelming for beginners, with a focus on young adults in their 20s and 30s as the main users.
Located in Meadowbank, Edinburgh, the centre is well-placed near urban green spaces, such as Arthur’s Seat, with beginner-friendly hiking routes. The design follows a hybrid typology, combining spaces for education, equipment hire, and social interaction. The central theme supports outdoor wellbeing, environmental responsibility, and creating new relationships through practical, hands-on learning.
The architectural approach highlights the use of natural materials and open-plan layouts to reflect a connection to nature. The large interior footprint is redefined through the play of interior volumes through the introduction of key interior features including a climbing wall, ‘wild’ swimming pool, and flexible workshop rooms, encouraging activity throughout the year.
A second-hand gear exchange and rental area ensure the space is inclusive and affordable for all users. Acting as both a learning hub and a space for the wider community, the centre builds confidence, skills, and enthusiasm for the outdoors.
Rendered long section through the main map library and the ‘wild’ swimming pool on the first floor. Illustrating the impact each room has on the other.
HIKERS
BOTANICAL HAVEN
WELLNESS SPA
LARA SWINSON
Botanical Haven is a tranquil wellness spa nestled within the peaceful surroundings of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, offering picturesque views of Edinburgh Castle. Designed for guests aged 16 and over, it provides a restorative sanctuary for those seeking relaxation, rejuvenation, and a deeper connection to the natural world.
Located within Inverleith House, a charming 17th-century Georgian building, the new spaces are sensitively integrated into the existing structural plan, opening up at ground floor to connect spaces and views to the exterior landscape. The wellness spa offers a variety of immersive, nature-inspired experiences including a biophilic pool and a herbal sauna with private changing rooms, a snug library, and a ‘garden-to-table’ herbal tea lounge. Guests can also take part in yoga and meditation sessions, and enjoy specialised spa treatments and aromatherapy using fresh botanical ingredients.
The space is thoughtfully designed with sustainability and biophilic principles at its core, incorporating environmentally conscious materials such as FSC-certified European oak, along with reclaimed and recycled tiles and fabrics. Water features including a rainwater pool and a gentle waterfall as well as abundant greenery create a harmonious connection between the wellness spa and its natural landscape.
Biophilic Rainwater Pool
Single Treatment Room
Herbal Tea Lounge
13
SOUND REFRAMED
INTERACTIVE MUSIC PERFORMANCE CENTRE
QIUSHI ZHANG
This project transforms the Edinburgh Royal Commonwealth Pool into a classical concert hall, aiming to reintroduce classical music to younger audiences in a new and engaging way. In an era of rapid digital development, classical music is often perceived as distant and inaccessible. The design seeks to reframe this “tradition” through spatial language, turning it into a cultural experience that is tangible, immersive, and participatory.
The design strategy is grounded in acoustic research, with a focus on controlling reverberation time, optimizing ceiling reflections, and carefully selecting sound-absorbing materials. The program integrates educational zones, interactive experiences, and flexible event spaces, encouraging young audiences to engage with music in multiple ways. Driven by strategic spatial transformation of the volumes of the existing swimming pool halls, the project respects the memory of the original structure while creating a contemporary vessel for classical music— one that allows it to be not only heard, but truly felt.
This image illustrates the atmosphere of the main concert hall during a performance. Viewed from the audience area toward the stage, the space is defined by warm materials and soft lighting, creating an immersive, calm, and acoustically rich environment and a strong sense of engagement.
SOUND REFRAMED
This image shows an interactive music experience space designed for young audiences. It features a central exhibition area and three modular pods arranged in a circular layout for flexible use and clear circulation.
Conducting Pod: Visitors can conduct a virtual orchestra using motion sensors or simulated tools, exploring rhythm and dynamic control.
Instrument Pod: Real or digital instruments are available for trial, encouraging physical interaction and active participation.
Digital Music Pod: This space allows users to experiment with electronic music, looping, and modular sound creation, connecting with contemporary forms of expression.
WEAVING FEMALE FOCUSSED SUSTAINABLE WORKPLACE
This project aims to address the gender gap in office design by focusing on the needs of female employees in the fast fashion industry. Located at 60 Morrison Street in Edinburgh’s Exchange Business District, the project adapts a single floor of a vacant speculative office building by inserting new zones to accommodate public facing cafe and catwalk spaces, flexible office areas and more private meeting and welfare spaces.
The design considers the specific challenges faced by women, particularly in fast-paced, high-pressure environments. It creates an inclusive, inspiring, and supportive workspace that directly responds to these needs through flexible, ergonomic layouts, private areas for rest and personal use, and shared wellness-focused amenities.
These elements are intended to enhance daily comfort, support worklife balance, and promote a stronger sense of equality and belonging in the workplace. There is an emphasis on the sustainable profile of materials used and the configuration of moving partitions and furniture.
My approach focuses on transforming the existing building into a femalefriendly office that aligns with user values and work culture—creating a space that supports productivity, well-being, and collaboration.
YUTONG ZHANG
15
IN SENSE SYNC
A SENSORY WORLD FOR ADHD MINDS
JINGWEN ZHOU
In Sense Sync re-imagines Edinburgh’s historic McDonald Road Fire Station in Leith as a sensory hub, supporting individuals with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). The existing structure is preserved and enhanced through sensory-responsive strategies addressing focus, regulation, and environmental over stimulation.
Design interventions include intuitive circulation, adaptable sensory zones, and the use of a pentagon-based layout. The pentagon serves as both a spatial and symbolic framework—its five sides reflecting the five senses: visual, auditory, olfactory, tactile, and proprioceptive (perception or awareness of the position and movement of the body). This geometry informs the zoning strategy, enabling a clear, multisensory design response.
Key spaces support physical activity, creative expression, and guided learning, offering structure and flexibility for diverse engagement styles. Natural materials, controlled lighting, modular wayfinding, and cool, muted colour palettes reduce cognitive load and promote calm navigation.
The re-purposed building functions both as a therapeutic environment and as a public interface for awareness, fostering community dialogue around neurodiversity and sensory inclusivity.
Amphitheatre Guided learning spaces
Art room
The play and physical core
Sensory rooms
Spatial Transformation The play and physical core
The
Art room
Amphitheatre
Play becomes a pathway to focus, regulation, and sensory discovery
BEAVERHALL HOUSE
ADAPTIVE REUSE OF INDUSTRIAL HERITAGE IN LEITH
SHENXU ZHU
This project proposes a contemporary identity for an unused building within Leith’s industrial heritage landscape; to support the sustainable development of the city and to bring vitality to the local community.
The project site is located on the north side of the Beaverhall House industrial estate in Canonmills, just to the north of Edinburgh’s city centre. The building has been used for light industrial production over the last century. As a result of urban development and industrial restructuring, the building is currently unused and rented out as a warehouse.
The central aim of the project is to de-industrialise the building in order to integrate it into the current urban context. My design focuses on spatial interventions to remove the ‘collectivist’ mode of production of the building. And to reorganise these collective production spaces into diverse and flexible spaces for creative industries. This will provide the local community with a potential base for creative industries and creative workers.
At the same time, I will introduce commercial spaces while redefining the building’s productive properties. This is intended to contribute to the wellbeing of the people who work in it and to enhance the impact of the project on the local community.
IMAGE REFERENCES
Cover
- Lighting Design for Spaces: Student sketchbooks
Inside Cover
- Spatial Journey by Shenxu Zhu
- Dream Library in Gracemount Mansion by Yichen Jiang
Foreword
- Year 2 tutorials discussing work in progress in the studio
Interior Design
- Year 3 lighting visit to Museum of Scotland
- Concept Sketch by Shenxu Zhu
- Week 4 Interior Explorations event
- Industry mentor session in the studio with Mhairi-Claire Dickson
- Industry mentor session in the studio with Tamas Turdean
- Week 4 - team profile activity
Making & Materials
- Material group work: Concrete (Yi Dong, Mimi Ogilvie, Joyce Wu)
- Glass alternative experiments by Aili Jin
- Material group work: Timber (Callan Anderson, Willian Cao, Amy Guo, Ce Luo, Olivia Rix )
Year 4 project thumbnails
- Shenxu Zhu, Jingwen Zhou, Jiayu Luo, Gemma O’Neill, Lilly Choi, Ellie Alexander
Epilogue
- Layering structure concept by Deemah Alomran
- ‘Pockets of Calm’ by Holly McIntyre
- ‘Interior Explorations’ Collaborative Event. Semester 1
2025 Graduating Students
Ellie Alexander, Deemah Alomran, Mira Lena Belkin-Sessler, Lilly Choi, Daria Fruzulica, Arjun Gill, Raaida Hossain, Eve Johnstone, Jiayu Luo, Holly McIntyre, Gemma O’Neill, Lara Swinson, Qiushi Zhang, Jingwen Zhou, Shenxu Zhu
Programme Director
Gina Olsson
Year 4 Tutors
Eleni Geragidi, Marisa Giannasi, Ed Hollis, Maria Koleva, Brian Proudfoot, Dave Loder, Andy Siddall, Gillian Treacy
Industry Mentors
Morag Dearsley, Mhairi-Claire Dickson, Ross McNally, & Tamas Turdean
24-25 Visitors
Anna Naughton, Alicia Storie, Amber Watters
Special Thanks
our External Examiner - Jenny Jones all Technicians in the ECA Workshops ESALA SASS, Student Support, & ITTS
2025 Catalogue designed & collated by Marisa Giannasi, Gina Olsson, Andy Siddall & Gillian Treacy
The format of the catalogue has evolved from the inaugural catalogue series produced for the ESALA MArch studios 2017–18, designed by Emma Bennett and Rachel Braude, with support from Adrian Hawker Printed by J Thomson Colour Printers Ltd., Glasgow
