ashton porter architects

Abigail Ashton and Andrew Porter graduated with distinction from the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London in 1994. Their joint diploma project ' Mechanical Landscapes ' was awarded the Bannister Fletcher Medal for best Bartlett diploma project and they subsequently won the Royal Institute of British Architects Silver Medal for best national diploma students. On graduation they both worked as designers for Christine Hawley Architects on a variety of projects, and principally they were project architects for the Kitagata Social Housing project in Gifu Prefecture, Japan. Kitagata was a £13m project for 107 apartments within a larger housing complex master-planned by Arata Isozaki Associates. It is widely published internationally. Other projects include a number of international competitions such a first prize winning competition for Salford University and a shortlisted Congress Centre for the EUR district in Rome. In addition, they have worked for Cook & Hawley Architects and Sir Peter Cook; most notably on the first prize winning competition for a Museum for Roman Antiquities in Pfaffenberg, Austria and the Federation Square Competition in Melbourne. In 1995 Ashton and Porter collaborated on their first project together - the Petrie Museum of Egyptology in Bloomsbury, London. They were awarded Second Prize. In 1998 Ashton and Porter formally set up in practice as "ashton porter" with their first built commission - Formation Studios - and have since then completed a number of residential and commercial commissions in the UK as well as prize winning competitions both nationally and abroad. Between 2003 and 2007 Andrew Porter collaborated with Christine Hawley CBE on a numbers theoretical and competition projects as "Hawley + Porter". In 2007 Ashton and Porter set up "Metamode" in collaboration with Christine Hawley and Moyang Yang. Metamode is a design group for exploring new urban models and speculative architecture in South East Asia. The group has been invited by both local government departments and developers to investigate new models for urban development in Mainland China. They primarily undertakes direct commissions, funded research and invited competitions for concept and planning stages of work. Metamode is experienced in working in multi-disciplinary teams and forming joint collaborations with both local architects, contractors and developers. They also collaborate with CABR (Chinese Academy for Building Research) who are the largest research and development institute in China. Metamode has recently won the Hakka Museum and Culture Park in Heyuan City and, in collaboration with the Shenzhen practice UNIT, the A8 Tower in Shenzhen, which is currently under construction. In addition they both continue to practice primarily as "ashton porter architects" and have recently been runners up in the Peacepentagon Competition in New York and continue to build commissions in the UK. ashton porter's "suburbanstudio" project has recently won the NLA (New London Architecture) "Don't Move, Improve" Award for best residential addition and refurbishment for 2011-12. It was also a Finalist in the RIBA London Regional Awards 2012. Ashton and Porter have also taught at various schools of architecture and design including visiting Professorships at the Staedel Academy in Frankfurt am Maim; they currently teach at the Bartlett School of Architecture UCL. They jointly teach Diploma Unit 21 and Porter is Deputy Director of Post Professional Masters Programmes at the Bartlett.