Detail of the project ed. 2020

NIALL MCLAUGH­LIN – BISH­OP EDWARD KING CHAPEL

Design­er	Niall McLaugh­lin
Loca­tion	Cud­des­don, Oxfordshire
Design Team	Archi­tect — Niall McLaugh­lin Architects Build­ing Con­trac­tor — Beard Construction Struc­tur­al Engi­neer — Price and Myers M & E Engi­neer — Syn­er­gy Con­sult­ing Engineers Acoustic Engi­neer — Paul Gillieron Acoustic Design Land­scape Archi­tect / Arbori­cul­tur­al­ist — The Land­scape Partnership Quan­ti­ty Sur­vey­or / BREEAM Asses­sor — Ridge and Part­ners LLP Stone Con­sul­tant — Har­ri­son Goldman Access Con­sul­tant — Jane Toplis Associates Plan­ning Con­sul­tant — Nathaniel Lich­field and Partners CDM Coor­di­na­tor — HCD Man­age­ment Ltd Approved Build­ing Con­trol Inspec­tor — HCD Build­ing Control Con­struc­tion Con­sul­tant — Richard Bayfield
Year	2013
Pho­to credits	“1‑External” Niall McLaugh­lin Architects “2‑External” Niall McLaugh­lin Architects “3‑External” Niall McLaugh­lin Architects “4‑External” Nick Kane “5‑External” Nick Kane “1‑Internal” Nick Kane “2‑Internal” Niall McLaugh­lin Architects “3‑Internal” Niall McLaugh­lin Architects “4‑Internal” Den­nis Gilbert “5‑Internal” Den­nis Gilbert

Pho­to external

Project descrip­tion

Ripon The­o­log­i­cal Col­lege sought a new chapel to serve the col­lege com­mu­ni­ty and a small order of nuns. The brief asked for a space that would accom­mo­date the range of wor­ship­ping needs of the two com­mu­ni­ties in an antiphonal arrange­ment, suit­able for both com­mu­nal gath­er­ings and per­son­al prayer.

On the site is a large beech tree on the brow of the hill. Fac­ing away from the beech and the build­ings behind, a ring of mature trees on high ground over­looks a val­ley. This clear­ing has a par­tic­u­lar char­ac­ter, full of wind, light and rustling leaves. We sought to cap­ture this with­in the building.

The start­ing point for this project was the word ‘nave’. The word describes the cen­tral space of a church, but shares the same ori­gin as ‘navis’, a ship, and also means the still cen­tre of a turn­ing wheel. Still­ness, amidst move­ment seemed to embody the prepa­ra­tion for priest­hood. From this, two archi­tec­tur­al images emerged. The first is the hol­low in the ground as a meet­ing place of the com­mu­ni­ty. The sec­ond is the ship-like struc­ture float­ing above the tree canopy, a gath­er­ing place for light and sound. We used the geom­e­try of the ellipse to reflect the idea of the exchange between per­fect and imper­fect at the cen­tre of Chris­t­ian thought. To con­struct an ellipse the sta­ble cir­cle plays against the line. It is about move­ment back and forth. The move­ment, inher­ent in the geom­e­try, is expressed in the chapel by the perime­ter ambu­la­to­ry. One can walk around the chapel, look­ing into the brighter space in the centre.

The chapel, seen from the out­side, is a sin­gle stone enclo­sure. We used Clip­sham stone which is sym­pa­thet­ic to the exist­ing lime­stone build­ings near­by. The base of the chapel and ancil­lary struc­tures are clad in reg­u­lar cours­es of ash­lar stone. The upper sec­tion of the chapel is dressed in cropped walling stone, laid in a dog-tooth bond. The chapel wall is sur­mount­ed by a halo of stone fins. The roof and inter­nal frame are self-sup­­port­ing and inde­pen­dent of the exter­nal walls.

The inter­nal tim­ber struc­ture is made of glu­lam­i­nat­ed spruce sec­tions. This struc­ture express­es the geo­met­ri­cal con­struc­tion of the ellipse, a fer­ry­ing between cen­tre and edge with straight lines. As one moves around the chapel, an unfold­ing rhythm inter­plays between the columns and the sim­ple ellip­ti­cal walls beyond. The chapel can be seen as a ship in a bot­tle, the hid­den nave.

Illus­tra­tive project report
Down­load report

Pho­to internal

Tech­ni­cal drawings

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