Power Crazy

Janice Kirkpatrick’s favourite building generates a rush of energy and excitement.

If I go back far enough, my most enduring love is for the architecture of power generation and for all of the tunnelling, damming and the pioneering British engineering that goes with it.

It all started in the ’60s with the hum of a sub-station and a fascination with the little buildings that sang. My father took me to Pitlochry to show me how electricity was made. Instead he explained how fish ladders worked. I imagined that the water contained behind the dam boiled with fish like it did when they squeezed in their dozens through the glass viewing-chamber to be quickly counted on their journey to and from the sea. Electricity and salmon occupied the same compartment in my mind, fused together by their momentary exposure in a water-filled screen: a very Scottish marriage of physics and fish.

As I grew older I learned to look beyond the cauldron of fins and tails towards the smoothly engineered earthworks covered in swathes of manicured grass. I saw architecture that worked with nature, heralding a new era of enlightened industrialisation after more than a century spent scarring the landscape.

My favourite building is Tongland Power Station and dam built in 1934. It’s the largest of the six power stations, seven dams and two tunnels that form the Galloway hydro-electric scheme that runs from Carsphairn in the North to Kirkcudbright in the South, taking in the waters of Doon, Dee and Deugh and Lochs Ken, Doon and Clatteringshaws. Conceived by engineer William McLellan, it was the biggest hydroelectric scheme of its type in Britain. It was a functional model of the new spirit of improvement, formed to produce the clean, modern power that would help build a brave new world.

To find the now diminutive Tongland dam you take the A711 to Kirkcudbright and wait for the power station to appear. Its hygienic dimensions emerge suddenly from the tight waltz of closely set bends that follow the course of the River Dee. Adjacent to it sits a vast Vitrolite-green Aldo Rossi drum that I presume carries water within its matt dimensions. If you travel past the entrance and across the bridge, looking upstream, the view is equally shocking, revealing the sub-structure that allows the turbine hall to hang above the river bed, its smoothly rendered surface contrasting deliciously with the jagged stone and spluttering water beneath it. Someone somewhere had the pleasure of drawing this lovely thing.

I first visited the pale, high vaulted turbine hall on a school trip. I felt the familiar sub-sonic throb as I entered a building that was lined with the same cheap wooden panelling as the corridors in my school. I remember the grey enamelled casings for the control units and their black and white dials with solemn faces and Bakelite buttons. I was directed through a door and on to a balcony overhanging the turbine hall. I could distantly hear the man in the laboratory coat talking about inlet diameters and outlet values while, for the very first time, it struck me that a space could be beautiful, and exciting.

The great generating hall, set on a single floor with three massive turbines placed beneath the finely fenestrated ten metre tall windows, gave the impression of a church that had been constructed for a new era. It was painted in the palest blue and bathed in pure white light. I remember the sense of having all that heaviness and weight of water coursing menacingly beneath me with so much lightness high above.

Drive You Wild

These days it’s hard not to encounter scooter-mounted celebrities sporting obigatory anoraks, open-face helmets and wide grins. Jamie Oliver and the Gallagher boys cut a dash about town on their Vespas, so too does Patrick Cox with his Wannabee customised snakeskin models. XX even has a gold-plated special. I wonder who’ll be first with a diamond-studded Lambretta, Diesel StyleLab sports or a Gucci Titanium two-stroke.

‘Step-thrus’, as their called in the trade, are both efficient, a la mode and on the road. Luckily you can expect to pay around £2,500 for a new model that will give up to 100 miles between refills, and a full tank of petrol costs less than a fiver. This is just as well because Italian legends Vespa, Lambretta, and Grand Prix winning newcomer Aprilia, offer the best in branded accessories and leisure clothing that can be worn with impunity.

Scooters are much lighter and more agile than ‘proper’ motorbikes. They’re inexpensive to buy, run and insure. You won’t need a car parking space to own one because they can be kept indoors: most are beautiful enough to make a pleasing addition to your hallway, kitchen or livingroom, but do ask your Mother first.

You can ride anything under 125cc or 33bhp if you have a car license, undertake Compulsory Basic Training and display ‘L’ plates. You must wear a helmet and you’d be mad not to wear gloves, not least because Dainesse race gloves are to die for. But if you want your partner to go pillion you’ll have to sit your full motorcycle test—better to buy a matched pair of scoots and enjoy B road runs or country picnics.

Not only do scooters beat bikes in town, they allow you to arrive at meetings looking like a civilian rather than an extraterrestrial. There’s enough underseat space to stash a helmet, gloves and waterproof suit (not that you’ll need one as the there’s lots of wet-leg protection from the front faring. As Sir Terence will testify it’s easy to fit luggage racks and hooks. He should know because he’s carried furniture on the back of his Vespa!

Scooters first became sexy when Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn rode a Vespa in Roman Holiday. You too can get the look by joining 200,000 others and buying the latest generation of Piaggio’s Vespa ET2 50cc and 125cc two-strokers or ET4 125cc four-stroke model, first launched 53 years ago. If you’d like something bigger try their PX which comes in 125cc and 200cc. But make sure you get a copy of Vespa Vintage Catalogue of exclusive or rare spares and accessories which will make your scooter distinct from the 16 millon other little legends produced by this evergreen marque. Alternatively you can buy one of the many retro models produced by Italian or Japanese companies. Aprilia’a Habana Custom offers a US inspired alternative to the Italian tradition.

Even committed bikers grudgingly admit that scooters have some advantages over motorcycles. Many bikers also own scooters therefore it’s not unusual to the two groups to exchange a nod or wave rather than punches on Brighton Beach. If you’re sympathetic to the sportsbike aesthetic or simply prefer something more modern you need look no further than the Grand Prix paddock.

The ultimate accessory for every Superbike, Grand Prix and F1 racer is the scooter he uses to nip between luxury motorhome, pit lane and paddock. Renault, Aprilia, Honda and Yamaha all produce scooters with gorgeous race replica fuselage, motorcyle spec brakes and unbelievable suspension. This year’s most coveted model is Aprilia’s DI Tech which comes in 50cc and 125cc models. This scooter features innovate direct injection two-stroke technology that’s bred for the track and has super-low emissions. It’s ripping performance, maintenance and reliability promise to be a generation ahead of the competition.

It does seem that scooters, as with food, wine and furniture and clothing, are the latest in a long list of Continental imports to the UK. While they’ve obviously saved the best ’til last, I just can’t help but wonder who’ll be first with a diamond-studded DITECH or a Paul Smith two-stoke stripy scooter.

Devil worship

Getting my hands on the keys to this baby changed my life.

I grew up loving Lamborghini: the outspoken Italian marque that first appeared at the Turin Motor Show in 1963, one year after I was born.

Like Concorde, there is never anything average or politically correct about a Lamborghini. The cars are sexual and uncompromising, with shattering exhaust notes, astonishing horizontality and brazen good looks. In the ’60s and ’70s they were enjoyed by the rich and groovy. Twiggy’s manager cruised the King’s Road in a lime green Miura, the only car ever designed with eyelashes.

Ferruccio Lamborghini, the company’s founder, was a wealthy businessman who studied industrial arts in Bologna before amassing a fortune building tractors from scrap. He had a passion for powerful cars and, like many creatively arrogant Italians of his generation, disdained the opinions of others. Instead, he worked with a talented coterie who shared his singular vision of a definitive supercar.

Ferruccio employed Marcello Gandini to design his lineage of road legal race cars. Gandini became Bertone’s chief designer in 1965, replacing the celebrated Giugiaro. In 1971 he created a Lamborghini that made Pininfarina’s Ferrari Testarossa look like a fleet car—it was called the Countach.

While Lamborghini’s rampaging bull badge poked fun at Ferrari’s prancing horse in reality the car wasn’t all that it promised to be. It was gorgeous and powerful but handled like a bull, with heavy controls and capricious roadholding. It was the archetypal man’s car and Rod Stewart was a serial owner.

Twenty-eight years of incremental change ensured the Countach endured as the image of the definitive supercar. It remained special, not for what is actually was, but for what it could be and wanted to be, and for what it has now become. Today, under Audi’s stewardship, the legend has matured into the reengineered Lamborghini Diablo—the car Gandini always meant it to be.

The Diablo takes its signature silhouette from Gandini’s original Countach. It’s a triumph of styling; yesterday’s stealth bomber with a super-low profile, proto-diamond-cut fuselage, gull-winged doors and brutal sculptural beauty. A host of improvements including a revised chassis and suspension systems, ABS and a wider and lighter carbon body conspire with the new six litre V12 550bhp engine to recreate the supercar for the third millennium.

New technology has finally delivered the dream, civilising the bull without taming it. Driving the Diablo is an occasion in itself. In town it’s a shockingly usable crowd pleaser that won’t embarrass you by being difficult to reverse park. Stick the Diablo in second and take it anywhere, third gear takes you everywhere else, if you can afford the petrol. Inside, there’s no space for shopping or anything else, nor would you want there to be. It fills every part of your brain with more excitement than it’s immediately possible to comprehend. The four-wheel drive (Viscous Tracking in Lambo-lingo), delivers awesome stability as you feed it limitless helpings of creamy, cataclysmic power. On the open road the Diablo handles with calculated ferocity and huge enthusiasm. Like Robbie Williams it pulls in any gear. If you’re man enough to give it its head and shift the stick it will charge from 0–62 in 3.56 seconds before warping to an outrageous 205 mph accompanied by a soundtrack and price tag of biblical dimensions. I can’t stop grinning. The Diablo is the ultimate, unforgettable, infernal combustion experience. I could never get tired of this. It really is this good.

Now ravished by the new Diablo I feel rather desolate, although short of selling my flat, at £156,000 it’s beyond my reach. But everyone should have something absurd that they crave, a fabulous addiction or an unreasonable desire. Mine will remain a not-so-secret lifelong love affair with the exotic Italian beast I waited so long to drive.

Speed Freaks

The thing about cars is that we’ve come to expect too much from them. They have to be comfier than a Parker Knoll recliner, safe, economical, environmentally right-on and have racing stripes, oh, and it helps if they’re easy to drive. Unfortunately in trying to do everything adequately they end up doing nothing very well. In the automotive industries’ search for “one car that fits all” even the grand marques have been swayed by market forces, worshipping luggage space and economy over sheer emotional performance. Not so the Lotus Elise …

Don’t buy a Lotus Elise if you’re self-conscious because people will stare. The Elise looks like nothing else on the road. It’s an amalgamation of every classic mid-engined sports car you’ve ever dreamed of owning but it’s more practical, more affordable, probably better-made and a bigger performer than most others.

In fact, the Elise is too inexpensive to be a status symbol, but its single-minded engineering and styling ensure other motorists understand that you take your driving very seriously.

The exterior view is low and extreme; sculptured, air-scooped, vented and sexy from every angle. The front is unfeasibily short with E-type styled headlamps curving to meet the low screen with its single wiper-blade. The bonnet carries the unmistakable green and yellow Lotus badge and two meshed segments venting the radiator beneath. As one would expect it’s a cabriolet and comes with a detachable black fabric roof that’s easily removed and stowed in the tiny luggage compartment next to the engine. It’s cute from behind with neat twin chrome exhausts and a tiny integral spoiler, but don’t be deceived, it’s shod with fat low-profile tyres and branded alloys revealing sizable brake discs lurking behind.

The interior view is every bit as spare and practically stylish as the lightweight plastic exterior bodywork. While the Elise looks great from behind it expects the same of its driver, so if you don’t plan on getting intimate with your passenger you’ll have to drive alone. Occupants sit on the floor, hugged in leather and not much padding, and if you insist on keeping the roof on getting in and out is fun.

The interior is reminiscent of an aircraft cockpit with its beautiful aluminium floor and hi-tech glued construction (I think they made the wheels from glue too because it really sticks to the road.) You sit wedged within the chassis with your outside elbow leaning on the door-sill—this helps provide a snug bracing position against cornering forces, not that this car moves much even when cornering hard. Behind the leather-covered race steering wheel there’s a speedo, a rev counter and a fuel gauge. There’s excellent close-ratio transmission, a cigar-lighter, a heater, the possibility of a radio and, behind the seats, an elasticated bag for maps and snacks. There are no sun visors, navigational systems or electric windows—because this car is designed to be driven by people who adore driving.

The Elise, with its revvy 1,800cc Rover engine, demands you go around roundabouts two or three times and turn-off motorways to find A-Class corners. Ideally, you lose the roof because driving is best when you feel the rush of air above your head and smell the countryside as you fly past.

The Elise will do 0–60mph in 5.5 seconds, accelerating more quickly than all but supercars and sports bikes. It stops with startling efficiency and stability. This car isn’t about top-end speed but it’s peerless handling and driver feedback makes even moderate speeds feel thrilling and rewarding.

It’s tough to find a new car to get excited about, never mind one that’s made in the UK, and it’s a rare pleasure to find one that not only looks good but is fantastic to drive, even if there’s no room for the kids or the shopping. This is a racing car at heart, precision lightweight engineering for the serious aesthete. You’re rewarded for driving well, but rarely punished for getting things wrong. The Elise is designed to entertain you and one lucky friend so throw a toothbrush and some Calvins in the boot and go touring. If you can’t find real country roads, book the race track.

Handsome Devil

A few moments spent contemplating the dowdy fairings of the average police bike will tell you that many of BMW’s efforts at two-wheeled transport have been less than passionate affairs.

A BMW was the sensible choice for the older enthusiast who sought nothing more than a functional, safe ride, an ample seat for the missus and lots of practical hard plastic luggage. BMW made dull but worthy bikes for the aesthetically challenged, who enjoyed the benefits of filtering rush hour traffic while secretly craving the kind of safety, comfort and predictability you’d expect to find in a car. BMW bikes even provided stereo sound, heated handlebar grips, fog lights and shaft rather than chain drive. The company not only invented ABS braking, but was also the first to apply it to bikes—which didn’t endear them to the biking fraternity, who prefer to take the Fifth Amendment on when and how to slow down or stop.

Bikers believed BMW bikes were a triumph of function over fun and safety over stylish self-expression. They’re perfect for the police, who can’t be seen to be enjoying themselves as they ride about town in imperious twosomes, protected by the unappealing Teutonic badge of boredom.

No one accuses BMW of producing sexy bikes. So perhaps I could be forgiven for thinking my eyes were deceiving me when I saw the latest additions to the German manufacturer’s range; the R1150 R sport, and its big brother, the R1 150 RT tourer, which I had the unexpected pleasure of riding for one glorious weekend.

Nothing looks, sounds or feels quite like a Beemer. They’re powered by BMW’s signature Boxer engine; a flat twin with massive cylinder heads that protrude like giant metallic elbows from each side of the front fairing. Their beefy throb makes the bike rock gently from side to side when it’s standing still, while its 1130cc of big twin grunt gives it a capable, long-legged gait that’s very relaxed and deceptively fast, and feels a bit like wearing a pair of seven-league boots. Its car-style dash tells you which of the six gears you’re in, including the high-speed economy sixth, in which you can cover around 200 miles on one tank of petrol.

At 279kg (613lb), the R1 150 RT is one and a half times the weight of the average sports bike, but its low centre of gravity makes it easy to handle at slow speed. It’s perfect for waltzing deliciously around bends aided by the wide handlebars and a near-perfect front suspension, thanks to the new light-weight Telelever front forks. It’s such an unlikely configuration for a vehicle designed to duck, dive and lean at precarious angles, though, that I’m surprised it ever got off the drawing board. I’m also amazed that it actually works extremely well on the road.

Over the past few months, the company has been gradually rationalising and modernising its motorcycle product range. Out have gone the sorry silhouettes we’ve grown used to and in have come shiny metals, exotic alloys and scrumptious plastics—mine was sea blue shot through with iridescent mint! The bike press can’t quite believe that BMW has created such a handsome bike!

BMW’s head of design, Dave Robb, says the RT has “got more of a jaw to it, more profile. We think it’s very important that our motorcycles have character you can see from a distance, and it now has some movement forward visually that it didn’t have before.”

I found not only that the RT moved enthusiastically forward but also that I could actually see the road ahead, whereas my sports-biking friends could not. I was very happy astride this characterful rogue, watching flies ping off its adjustable electric windscreen—which is amazing, given that frankly I never thought I’d see the day when I would gladly swap my sportsbike for a tourer.

One thing’s for sure; this big Beemer has changed BMW’s position in the motorcycle market. And, after my fantastic weekend trial, I personally think that every girl should own a barrel-chested star like this one.

On Your Bike

Janice Kirkpatrick looks at accelerating innovation in the motorcycle industry.

If you’re a designer the odds are you’ll crash your motorcycle. Insurance statistics show that we belong to the professional group most likely to fall off our bikes. But we’re also among the most likely to climb on them in the first place. Research doesn’t explain why creative people have an affinity for two wheels, but it may have something to do with our enthusiasm for environmental concerns and our ability to spot an attractive idea when we see it.

It’s hardly surprising then, that it was a BMW motorcycle-riding, in-house designer who talked the manufacturer into producing the strange C1 car/bike hybrid, launched to a stunned automotive audience in May 2000.

Even committed non-drivers couldn’t have missed the launch of the new C1. Its image reverberated throughout the motor trade and entered the Sunday supplements before spreading to the style magazines. It’s a brave and iconoclastic package designed to persuade executive car drivers to leave the car at home, get out of the traffic and save the planet. The C1 is the first of a new generation of hybrid vehicles that the motor industry has spent years talking about, but never, until now, had the nerve to back.

While bike accidents are statistically decreasing, safety remains the reason most drivers cite for not travelling by motorcycle. BMW tackled this problem head-on by designing the C1 with passive safety features similar to those you’d find in a car; the C1 could almost be a section through a Land Rover Discovery, with a seatbelt, dashboard, windscreen wipers, two wheels and a roof. Like a car you sit in it, rather than on it. But unlike a motorcycle or scooter, where the rider relies on defensive riding and protective clothing, the C1 uses the vehicle’s frame and bodywork to absorb the impact of a crash, while restraining the rider with a protective cage. BMW is also keen to tell C1 owners not to buy costly protective leathers, or even a helmet (subject to legislation). Experienced motorcyclists feel BMW may be pushing their expectations of safety features to far, but with the cleanest petrol engine on the market and 97 miles on one gallon of petrol, who cares what they wear?

BMW is playing a long-term game to win riders by changing hardened attitudes to two-wheeled transport through the use of radical design-led solutions, and it may succeed. It has enjoyed record motorcycle sales for the past eight years and launched a more powerful version of the C1, the C1 200, in January this year.

Meanwhile, the rest of the automotive industry continues to manufacture more traditional products that continue to attract new riders, who are anxious to play a part in reducing traffic congestion, fuel costs and exhaust emissions. In February, the London Motorcycle and Scooter Show attracted 18,600 visitors, the majority of them novices or non-riders who placed scooters high on their list of “most wanted” vehicles.

Until now, nostalgia and speed were the two greatest reasons to take to two wheels. But today it’s easy to see why bike ownership is rapidly increasing: 1.1m people travel to London daily but only 12,000 use motorcycles or scooters. The average commute by car is 55 minutes, while journey times are 33 per cent less by motorcycle on a typical rural-urban commuter route. Research by the European Commission reveals that motorcycles and scooters consume between 55 per cent and 81 per cent less fuel than cars over the same journey, and riders don’t feel their blood pressure rise every time the traffic stops.

A snapshot of the London show reveals why some models stand out from the rest. For those not yet in-the-know, here’s a design guide to the motorcycle industry.

Japanese motorcycles are the industry tabloids, with huge market share and racy, tell-it-as-it-is names like Majesty, Hornet, Ninja, Drag Star and Bandit. They’re underpinned by superlative technology, build quality and performance, but often fail to satisfy in the styling stakes with their fag packet graphics and plasticky fairings. The Italian marques—Ducati, Aprillia, Benelli, Piaggio, Italjey and MV Agusta—are the colour supplements; emotional, desirable and often expensive, but with designer fairings and components, and graphics you’d be proud to be seen with. Apart from the odd Ducati Monster, the Italians prefer to describe themselves with numbers and letters. They use more flat colour in preference to decals because they’re more attractive and can afford to reveal their sexy contours. Aprillia and Ducati have even broken with tradition, adopting sans serif typography for their corporate identities, amid howls of protest. The Ducati marque is designed by New York consultancy Vignelli Associates.

BMW and Triumph have northern European broadsheet tendencies. BMW acknowledges, rather than celebrates, German engineering. It exhibits an innovative, if sensible approach to safety. Four recent additions to its range include the R1150RT tourer, the R1150R roadster, the R1200C Avantgarde cruiser and the K1200RS sports tourer, all available with the company’s own anti-lock braking system and a three-phase catalytic converter. BWM has a predilection for bland colours, constabulary graphics and a protestant attitude to styling, with the exception of the exuberant R1150GS off-roader.

Triumph is the British motorcycle industry’s own success story. It’s a grand old marque that’s been given a fresh lease of life, best represented by the new Daytona 955i, the best-selling flagship of the Triumph range since the original fuel-injected super-sports triple (then called the T595 Daytona) was launched in 1997. The T595 was the first Hinckley-built Triumph designed to complete directly with high performance machines from Japan and Italy, therefore hedging its bets and using both names and numbers to differentiate it’s products. Triumph is an industry legend and literal heavyweight. It’s retained its old script-styled marque, but funked up the finishes with gorgeous, bright, metallic colours. It continues to offer loyal riders a dose of macho nostalgia which underpins sports performance with a certain dignity, even if the bikes appear to get lighter and brighter with every new model.

Some of us are prepared to pay more for a heritage brand, so why not consider something a little further from home? Harley Davidson and Harley-powered Buell defy comparisons to the world of publishing and head straight for Hollywood. Harley is pure Walt Disney, peddling the romance of the open road. Owning one is about more than just owning a bike. It’s a lifestyle choice, complete with fringed leather bags and a host of accessories, including swimwear, aftershave and ceramic eagles.

But you can own a bit of two-wheeled history without living the American Dream. Piaggio manufactures the world’s best known and best selling scooter, the new generation 50cc Vespa ET4, as modelled by Natalie and Nicole Appleton of pop group All Saints at the London show (while boyband Five posed alongside their Ducati Monsters). Or you could go for something with a race pedigree, such as Ducati’s first retro bike, the MH 900e, inspired by British biking legend Mike Haliwood’s Isle of Man TT race-winning mount from 1978.

The UK is Europe’s fastest growing motorcycle market and there’s a two-wheeler for you, regardless of your age, class, sex or prejudice. Manufacturers are keen to ensure no niche is passed over in the two-wheeled revolution. Consequently, past models and marques are mined for every last trace of marketability, while new ranges are created to capture the hearts of new generations. Piaggio’s Gilera Ice is a new model targeted at “street kids—to make its rider stand out in a crowd”, while the Piaggio NRG MC3 has a “flat, footrest space that easily holds a large bag or rucksack of schoolbooks”.

In 2000 there was a 25 per cent increase in women taking Compulsory Basic Training (as a prelude to the full motorcycle license) with a similar increase expected in 2001. This means 25,000 women are currently shopping for two-wheeled transport and manufacturers are producing equipment aimed specifically at them.

The hot favourites for this year are Aprilia’s stylish and revolutionary Ditech and Benelli’s Tornado. The Ditech scooter has a radically new two-stroke, direct-injection engine that’s designed to cut fuel consumption and maintenance drastically while improving performance. Being a two-stroke (as opposed to a four-stroke) means it makes more power for less weight. It also looks fantastic and smells great.

Finally, a tip for the motorcycle to watch out for must be Benelli’s beautiful new Tornado 850 triple, which will be in showrooms later this year. But don’t take my word for it. Visit its website at www.tornadobenelli.com where you can see and hear the Tornado. You can even download an attractive screensaver. This will give you something to look at while you plan what you are going to fall off next.

Tips from the top

Janice Kirkpatrick, director, Graven Images: “A big part of being successful is to remind yourself of what you’re best at and what makes you happiest.”

A New Life for Limestone

Specification involves decision making and in many ways a process of elimination, in the same way that you trawl the entire assemblage of high street stores with your partner seemingly in search of the holy grail, only to find yourself back at your first port of call purchasing their initial object of desire. (This purely from a male perspective, of course!) During the journey you will have hinted at, or at least leant towards, a particular choice of object in the hope of short cutting the elimination process.

As an interior design specifier you endure these journeys daily, swapping roles with your partner, your own role being taken on by a never ending stream of salespeople and glossy brochures. Relying on instinct, information, budget, and if you’re fortunate, previous experience of a particular product or material, you reach a decision. You could argue that by sticking to a tried and tested palette of materials you could expect to guarantee reliability, performance and ultimately the success of a proven formulae. But by the same token you might argue that familiarity can breed repetitiveness and in many instances you can ‘expect the expected’. My own feeling is that as an architect or designer, you have a duty based on your acquired knowledge and experience to push the boundaries and limitations within our respective fields, and to strive for interesting, intelligent, coherent and if possible unexpected solutions. To consistently do this, however, ultimately entails an element of risk, and it is at this stage that you place your trust in the hands of the suppliers, manufacturers and installers.

In recent times limestone has been a material whose performance in commercial use has suffered severely in terms of bad press. On occasion limestone falls into the category of ‘design from photography’, which occurs when designers, architects and other specifiers judge the suitability of certain materials partly on the basis of their inclusion within certain well published projects. It had been viewed wrongly as a cheap alternative to marble and dumped into the UK market on the back of projects such as the ‘Grand Louvre’ completed in 1993 by JM Pei. Some of the softer, cheaper Spanish, Portuguese and French stones were never intended to be used on floors but poor marketing and uniformed specifiers wrongly selected them, resulting in the aforementioned bad press to the extent that in some practices specification of limestone is banned. The most common failures in the faulty stones were discolouration, surface breakdown, pitting and inability to clean, and yet most stones were given test certificates.

Domus Tiles recently enlisted the help of eminent geologist Kip Jeffrey to evaluate the performance of an extensive range of limestone under stringent criteria to provide two ranges of high quality durable flooring tiles. Testing was carried out on over one hundred stones and to date only eleven have met the Domus criteria, (understandable when you consider that chalk is a form of limestone.) That isn’t to say that other suppliers don’t have suitable ranges of commercial limestone available, but my own experience of limestone has been limited to the Domus range which was specified recently in Tun Ton Restaurant in Glasgow by Graven Images, and to date has performed well. Domus have provided a fairly extensive brochure relating to this particular subject which explains in simple terms their own range, criteria and methods of testing limestone, while for the stone boffins out there the importance of microstructure, microposity and mineralogy are also discussed.

The great pyramids Cheops in Egypt has almost 2.5 million limestone blocks, some weighing up to 70 tonnes. The tolerance of these blocks—plus or minus 1mm—surpasses even modern day technology when you consider that a 300x300mm square limestone tile, machine manufactured today has a similar tolerance. The complexity and precision achieved in constructing this Egyptian colossus is further highlighted by the fact that a thin layer of hard limestone veneer was added on top of the softer core of limestone block, initially for greater durability but also for the reflective qualities of the harder stone which would have cast an enormous glow from the pyramids as the sun rose.

Rubber: Revolution or Evolution?

Rubber ducks, rubber rings, rubber dummies, hot water bottles, wellies and condoms. Whether we like to admit it or not, most of us, at some point in our lives, will have had a close personal relationship with some form of rubber object. This tactile raw material has a friendly, almost therapeutic quality to touch, perhaps explaining the widespread use of rubber in the design of toys.

As a designer you develop your own process of design and through experience learn that the spark of inspiration needed to fuel any idea can be triggered by an obscure source. A subliminal seed sewn in a happy childhood memory could be enough of a magnetic pull towards the choice of a particular colour or material (where a toy duck can be the catalyst for specifying a yellow rubber floor). My own experience of specification adds fuel to the argument that a client’s pre-conceived subliminal perceptions of certain materials or colours will often tip the scales in favour of their use in a project or their removal from it. I’ve known instances where clients where clients will happily propose deletion of important elements in a scheme as a cost saving exercise in order to save their ‘rubber wall’. They assume the role of the eco warrior and ego warrior rolled into one. If truth be told I’m sure most designers would hold their hand up, guilty of the same sin or avarice, in order to retain a precious element. In most instances both the designer and the client have their own personal hierarchy of design elements within a project. If on occasion they are in close proximity or in tandem with each other then often more dramatic results can be achieved as the ‘bigger picture’ and strong ideas are left intact. Rubber in this balance more often than not benefits from its own portrayal as a daring avant-garde pillar of contemporary design.

My evolution into adult rubberhood was sparked by the discovery of rubber giants ‘Dalsouple’ (at IDI in Earls Court, 1992) who by their own admission are “huge in rubber”. Since our first encounter, and Tim Gaukrogers subsequent gospel, I have spread their rubber over floors, walls, stairs and even ceilings to help advance their rubber revolution.

Dalsouple’s latest flooring product has been developed to expand the possibilities and options available to specifiers faced with the task of covering metal access floors. Most new buildings and major refurbishments, especially office buildings, use under floor cabling with metallic access floor tiles suspended on adjustable legs to allow easy access for modification and repair work. While convenient and cost effective this limits the choice of floorcovering to carpet and carpet tiles which can be laid without adhesive. Resilient floorcoverings (eg; vinyl, linoleum, rubber, laminates) that have to be fully bonded to the sub floor for dimentional stability cannot be used on metallic access floors.

Dalsouple have found a solution to increase the choice for specifiers. Their new rubber tile range is manufactured using a flexible underlay of composite magnetic material which has been specially re-inforced. They can then be loose laid on the metallic sub-floor, and the totally magnetic base holds the tiles securely in place. When access to the sub-floor is required, the magnetic tiles can be lifted and re-positioned time after time without any loss of performance.

Dalsouple’s new approach to access flooring not only provides a high level of performance but opens a Pandora’s Box of colour and texture for contemporary office design. The rubber is available in a huge range of colours, textures and finishes. Each of the thirty different relief patterns plus smooth surface tiles are available in 60 standard colours, with special colours matched at no additional cost. Marble and terrazzo finishes can be created in any colour combination to the client’s specification. Floors are hygienic, easy to clean, anti-slip and highly resistant to cigarette burns. Floors are also anti-static and therefore ideal for computer areas. The heaviest traffic environments don’t cause any problems while the tiles remain soft underfoot and noise absorbent. Aside though from its technical advances and practical attractions and purely from a designers point of view, it feels great and looks fantastic.

We specified Dalsouple’s new product in a recent Graven Images project to design the Glasgow offices for computer games company, Red Lemon. When I proposed the new Dalsouple magnetic floor to their Managing Director, Andy Campbell, the wry smile on his face re-affirmed my earlier suspicions concerning our client’s subliminal thoughts about sticky rubber.

The magnetic rubber used in their reception area is conductive with the clean contemporary aesthetic outlined in the client’s original brief.

The irony in Red Lemon’s rubber revolution is encapsulated in my aforementioned evolutionary theory where little boys with toys grow up into big boys with bigger toys! At Red Lemon they’ve swapped their rubber ducks for rubber joysticks!

Dalsouple have asked us to point out that they have a patent pending for this magnetic flooring product.

Brand Space

Hello and thank you for inviting me, and my husband Ross, to Kapp and to Design Talks. It’s my first time in Norway – we’ve been planning to visit for a long time and we will definitely come back and spend more time exploring this fabulous country.
 
Graven Images
Ross, who’s an architect, and I, (a graphic designer) founded our design business, Graven Images, because we wanted to work together and because we wanted to work across different areas of design. 22 years later, we’re still working together, along with around 35 other people, and we’re working across an ever-widening range of design disciplines to deliver projects for clients in many sectors and in many different countries.
 
We believe that understanding and working across both 2 and 3-dimensions benefits both us and our clients: greater trust, access and shared understanding give us a much wider, more strategic, perspective on how design can help businesses; and this ‘bigger’ opportunity delivers a more holistic and strategic design solution than just a short-term tactical fix. The more we understand about a project, the better we can control or influence its outcome and the more successful it will be. This way of working also gives us a deeper, closer relationship with our client that saves time because we know each other, it therefore saves resources and ultimately, money.
 
Because we’re able to design lots of different things, historically it has been different to explain what we do: “we can design your logotype, print, website, intranet, internal and external communications and marketing collateral; but we can also design your building signage: and we’ll sort our your packaging: and we can design your workplace too, and your retail spaces…” In order to keep things simple we’ve organised ourselves around four teams that are focused on the three broad sectors within which we work: Corporate, Hotels & Leisure and Public Sector & Government. Within each of these broad sectors we do three things: Branding & Communications Design, Interior Design and Exhibition Design.
 
But enough about us – I’ll should probably explain what I mean by ‘Brands’ and ‘Brand Space’ and demonstrate how it works by looking at some of our recent projects.
 
‘Brands’ and ‘Brand Space’
 
Ross and I chose ‘Brand Space’ as the title for this talk because it’s useful in explaining what brands are, how they can be controlled and how their reach and power can be extended into environments and spaces.
 
‘Brands’
Branding is a devastatingly efficient way of communicating often very complicated ideas using a commonly understood shorthand language that transcends linguistic boundaries and that can be precise, malleable (pliable and easily influenced) and can evolve and change over time to reflect cultural change.
 
However, for most people a brand is a flat graphic thing that’s added to a product or service so it can be identified or explained. It’s usually printed or embroidered or stuck-on with glue – like a label – rather than being integrated with a product, a service or even a place. This limited idea of a ‘brand’ persists in many very big organisations because it’s much easier to say something than to actually do it. Our local police cars carry the slogan “building safer communities”, which is a great thing to aspire to but impossible for a police force to achieve. Consequently they look like idealist dreamers or dishonest liars.
 
You might have noticed that there are thousands of brand creators around: graphic designers; visual identity specialists; and so on. But when I was at Art School in the 1980s there were approximately the same numbers of students in each of the design disciplines – in product design, in graphic design, in interior design, and so on. So where did these thousands of brand designers come from? The simple answer is that businesses and industries needed lots of them quickly, because of the globalisation of almost everything (including language – sorry, I can’t speak Norwegian). In order to compete in the global marketplace every company had to clearly identify itself, distinguish its products and its services from its competitors, and communicate its unique offering to prospective customers who could now ‘knock’ on its front door via the Internet.
 
However, if you scratch the surface of a brand you often find that the flat graphic packaging is more impressive that the business contained within it. Few businesses truly live up to the promise of their 2-dimensional branding and their brochures and websites, and fewer still have internal departments that work together to deliver an integrated customer-facing experience that reflects their ‘brand promise’ in all of their many dimensions.
 
One of the ways to find out if a company REALLY is as good its ‘brand promise’ is to look through its windows. And I mean literally look through its windows or walk through its doors. Visit and see how its workplaces, shops and visitor centres match up to the brand values expressed in its literature.
 
 
‘Brand Space’
Around ten years ago we noticed an extraordinary disconnection between a company’s brand, described in its literature, and its physical environmental reality. We discovered this because we design 2-dimensional branding and communications and 3-dimensional workplaces. And our clients would give us different design briefings depending on whether they were from the Marketing Department or from the Property Department. In some really big businesses we discovered that the Marketing Department and the Property Department have never met. Where they had met, they rarely liked each other, and regarded themselves as rivals fighting for resources.
 
According to the Property people the Marketing guys are usually noisy, a bit flaky, impractical, profligate with the company’s money, incapable of sticking to deadlines, and have a huge budget.
 
According to the Marketing guys the Property people are dull, unimaginative, inflexible, slow, and have a huge budget.
 
Both of these scenarios might sound familiar, and there’s probably some truth in both of them – but when you consider that Property is often a business’s second-largest overhead after People, and that Marketing is usually its third – it’s dumb that they don’t talk to one other.
 
And if they don’t talk (which is most of the time), the result is the creation of expensive work environments that UNDERMINE businesses because they reveal the un-branded truth about how much they ACTUALLY value their staff and their customers, rather than by behaving in the ways that fit with their brand as it’s expressed in their brochures and two-dimensional branding.
 
The problem for designers like us is how to mix oil and water: how to mix the Marketing Department and the Property Department: how to mix 2-dimensional branding and 3-dimenisional branding: how to balance customer and employee expectations with business realities. You might have noticed that Brand Designers aren’t good at making things that aren’t flat, and that Interior Designers and Architects aren’t great communicators – in fact Interior Designers don’t see a company’s brand as being relevant to them at all…
 
In order to resolve all of these things we decided we needed a TOOL that would help us to bring the 2-Dimensional and 3-Dimensional aspects of a brand, the Marketing and Property Departments, and the Brand Designers and the Interior Designers, all together so we could have a holistic approach to brand design. Our tool allows us to analyse the sequence of messages communicated to people (including clients and customers) as they move through a business’s interior environment. It’s very simple: first you define a linear route and then you slice it into little bits – like one of those medical scanners – then you analyse each slice and work out how it’s affecting your senses and what that means. We can then compare the result with marketing information about the business and find out if it’s ‘on-brand’ or delusional. More importantly, we can work out what we need to do to make the environment ‘on-brand’, or how we need to refine the brand to fit the real business rather than the aspirational business that doesn’t exist. This is what I mean by ‘Brand Space’ – it’s about ensuring that business expectations are delivered in every dimension.
 
Over the years we’ve honed our tool to make it work really well. We normally use it to show how businesses are subtly and unknowingly communicating messages that they would rather not.
 
Some of our recent projects
In an ideal world the 2 and 3-dimensional aspects of a brand would be developed together but it’s unusual for that to happen because 2-dimensional branding is easier and the name usually comes first because both Brand Designers and Clients share the common linguistic language.
 
But we have put some slides together that illustrate some of the things that we are talking about. I’ve included only five projects including a coffee shop, a hotel, a self-service restaurant, an workplace for an insurance company and a workplace for a big media company.