INTRODUCTION This project has been designed to create an environment that is stimulating for children’s imagination and makes reference to the fictional worlds found in children’s literature. Key texts included Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and BFG, Mary Norton’s The Borrowers, Lewis Carol’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, and Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden, as well as references to nursery rhymes such as Hansel & Gretel and Jack & the Beanstalk. Common themes of the literature were change in scale, palaces & Queens, and chocolate and cakes. These themes form a design language for an architectural proposal at Buckingham Palace, London. HM The Queen Invites about 8000 people every year to large tea parties in the palace gardens, this existing narrative of a giant tea party is retold through the architectural composition. TEA FOR TWO(hundred) has dual function; in the winter months it stands as a folly in Buckingham Palace Gardens, and in the summer months it transforms into a summer school; playing host to two hundred hand picked British Child Prodigies. The guests spend the whole summer at the Palace; Sleeping, Eating, Washing, Studying, and Playing in the new building which is designed to look like a setting for a giant Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip to have Tea for Two. A vast table accommodates a Kitchen and Dining room with a rooftop terrace, and forks and spoons below hoist up hanging bunk beds. A huge feather-filled table cloth unfolds at night to insulate the sleeping quarters. A Glass bottomed Swimming Pool acts as a roof for a huge bathroom where the ceremony of bathing is celebrated, the steamy atmosphere is exaggerated with a bespoke ventilation strategy. Outside there are mobile changing rooms and a mini-amphitheatre, which are shaded by two colossal deck chair canopies. The canopies have small pockets, in which the children can study privately. Vegetables and flowers are grown on the canopies, and there is also a system of hose pipes to heat water using heat from the sun, the pipes weave in stripes just like the pattern on a deck chair. All the beds in the design are also multifunctional as lifts, there are some fireman style sliding poles, and slings draped from the shading canopy. These details intend to provoke an imaginative interaction between the children and the architecture so that they will have more fun during their stay and soak up some creative atmosphere for their summer studies.
The focus area of this report will be - Section 2 Building Construction, fabrication and Materials All the investigations take into account the important client HM Queen Elizabeth II, who would wish to be a champion of the best British Craft, and all design & materials should be fit for royalty. The Building will be prefabricated and assembled as quickly as possible in Buckingham Palace Gardens so as not to disturb the Royal Family.
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