new internal constitution to the outside. Since making the change
to being an employee ownership trust – accompanied also by a
move of studio – through which Apt retained all its staff. Geen
says: “Personally, it has really energised the studio.”
As for the name – Apt – the architects chose it not only on
linguistic merit; being short and punchy, semantically there
was a joint desire for “a single word that would communicate
astuteness and resourcefulness.” Geen is also keen to clarify that:
“We’re not A-P-T; we’re Apt.”
At the time of the rebrand in October, the architects didn’t
want to have a big press launch. Instead, clients, family, and
friends were invited to a more informal big party as a celebra-
tion. “There were a few press releases, but friends promoting the
rebrand produced great referrals – a positive ripple,” says Geen.The practice
Apt – currently made up of 55 individuals – is helmed by three
studio leaders; Niall Monaghan, Robin Partington and Geen
himself, each of whom are involved in multiple projects at any
one time. Then there are four project leaders; the “individuals
who drive the talent”: James Ewen, Mark Williams-Jones, Nat
Lee and Stephane Piazza.
Over the years, Apt has honed a mechanism for driving an
energetic approach towards each brief, having established a
board of directors and a board of trustees made up of bothinternal and external personnel, including non-executive
chairman David Hearn. In practice, “the directors report to
the trust and the trustees, holding everything accountable,
encouraging energy and being at the top of our game.”
The architects claim to champion a “contextual response” in
their approach to each brief. Over the course of a six to seven
year project, the brief’s essence can gradually be manipulated or
even lost. Through exploring the context of a project, Apt
respond to this problem by building a project ‘manifesto’: “one
sentence that becomes a key thing that excites us about the
client’s brief at the project’s outset”, explains Geen. “We keep
that at the head of every one of our design reviews amidst all the
other opportunities and challenges that come.”Innovative craftsmanship
According to Apt, two emblematic words summing up their
output are ‘craftsmanship’ and ‘innovation’. Geen substantiates
the former referring to Merchant Square, a master plan which
enveloped the design for a number of buildings: “One of the
things I’m very excited about is materiality. ‘Craft’ would be
what materials we thought would resonate with the people, and
for Merchant Square, cast iron was chosen.”
The architects experimented with the material by cooking
it at various temperatures to preserve its aesthetic as well as
preventing the surface from rubbing off on the clothing of users:
“450 degrees celsius, 550, 600 – it would come out at different
colours and textures – the whole process became a journey of
material exploration.”
On the subject of innovation, Geen describes a design-stage
project in Hammersmith, where the client came to the architects
with a brief which was ultimately about scale, the amount of
space, and the type of space. Geen explains: “The innovation
here appeared when we wrote our manifesto for the project – it
was about what the future of the office environment was.”
According to Geen, some of the most successful buildings are
those which require limited architectural attention for 20-30
years after construction; those that had multiple uses over time
and no fixed typology; “from office to residential to education;
buildings that morph, change and adapt.” In this same vein, 66
Hammersmith Road incorporates numerous measures that will
allow it, once built, to adapt in time to the specific demands of
the occupier.The future for Apt
Other more niche projects that Apt has collaborated on include
a room in Oxford’s Bodleian Library, The Treasury, which houses
a host of artefacts. “This was a space that we created that is
about elegance and simplicity, in which the architecture
became secondary. I’d love to see the studio explore more of
these things.”
Members of Apt’s studio also contributed to an “energised
piece of collaboration” with Russian architect Alexander Brodsky
on a temporary pavilion, which only had a life of four weeks.
Geen notes: “Looking ahead, it would be nice to build on these
smaller collaborations.”
Reflecting on their progress until now, Apt has, as one of its core
aims, to communicate and share its projects with a variety of
audiences. As the practice’s efforts in creating inspiring architecture
in the past have not gone unrewarded, Geen and his colleagues are
hopeful that the rebrand will follow suit, embellishing the talent
behind the name.From the beginning, the architects
always wanted the studio to develop
into “a place of trust and fun”
BACK TO LIFE
Parker House, a collection of apartments in Covent Garden that brought an old
building back to life
22INSIGHTSWWW.ARCHITECTSDATAFILE.CO.UK ADF JUNE 2019