E
volving, as the firm itself says, from its founders’ spirit of
“post-war optimistic regeneration,” Shepheard Epstein
Hunter has maintained the bar at a high level into the
21st century. Its continued achievement in sectors including
housing, as well as schools and universities has been validated in
around 60 award schemes since the turn of the millennium.
The genesis of Shepheard Epstein Hunter had a very different
initial guise – in this case the partnership of architects Derek
Bridgewater and Edward Mitchell, formed in 1936. Peter
Shepheard became a partner in 1948, and finally Gabriel Epstein in
1955, as Bridgewater, Shepheard and Epstein, the former retiring in
the 60s to see Peter Hunter appointed.
Peter Shepheard trained at the Liverpool School of Architecture,
when the school’s ethos, says director Ann Lakshmanan, was
unusual in “encouraging aspiring architects to devote their skills
and energy to public sector housing.” The firm’s initial driving
ethos was “practical, simple and robust architecture,” says
Lakshmanan, and this was a useful adjunct to the post-war
national reconstruction effort, naturally providing opportunities in
social housing as well as educational establishments. She adds that
the approach was “interested in the relationship between natural
and built environments, and always people-focused.”
When it came to growing the firm to meet demands, the maxim
applied was “big enough to do major projects, small enough for the
partners and directors to stay close to the work,” says director
Charles Dokk-Olsen. He continues: “The biggest we have been is
around 60 people, but we generally stay smaller than that, and we
are able to compete effectively with much bigger practices.”
While the firm has grown over the years, it remains important
for it to be a “close-knit group of people who all know each other
and feel like one team, despite working on many different projects
at different stages,” says Dokk-Olsen. The office has instigated
practical measures to help ensure this happens, for example the
whole office (which is in Clerkenwell) gets together once a week to
have lunch.
In terms of landmark projects, Ann Lakshmanan picks out
the University of Lancaster campus as one which “clearly shows
the principles that are important to the practice,” and which
“perhaps fostered our interest in masterplanning and landscape on
a big scale.”The greenfield project had an early concept of a “scheme of
human scale buildings and courtyards growing from the centre of
the site, with a clear circulation pattern of a north-south spine
separating vehicles and pedestrians, and canopies and buildings
offering shelter.” The mixed use programme has a generally mixed
layout creating a “lively and active campus,” with residential on
upper floors, teaching in the middle floors, and ground floors
“given over to social and communal uses.” She adds that the
spine “has allowed the university to grow outwards without losing
coherence, and with minimal disruption.”Working practices
The studio takes a flexible approach to deploying staff on projects.
Depending on the size and complexity, a director, associate or lead
architect is assigned, and each will be hands-on. However, as it’s a
relatively small team, all staff are required to be flexible, potentially
working on a variety of projects, which may be at different stages.Shepheard Epstein Hunter may have garnered a strong reputation in its long history,
from an initial focus on high quality public housing, but the practice hasn’t been
resting on its laurels. James Parker spoke to two of its directorsTHE FINAL FRONTIER
Phase One of Space Park Leicester is a £20m building for research as well as
collaboration in ‘space-enabled’ technologiesShepheard Epstein Hunter
PRACTICE PROFILE
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