LiveWorks Theatre Building, Newcastle Development, England Architecture Images, Architect

LiveWorks Theatre in Newcastle

Cultural Amenity in Newcastle, Tyneside, Northeast England design by Flanagan Lawrence Architects

22 Jun 2017

LiveWorks Newcastle

Location: Live Theatre, Broad Chare, Quayside, Newcastle, England

Design: Flanagan Lawrence

Live Works wins RIBA National Award

Live Works by Flanagan Lawrence – part of Live Theatre’s evolving cultural quarter in Newcastle upon Tyne, UK – has been recognised with an RIBA National Award.

The scheme has already received a RIBA Northeast Regional Award, the RIBA NorthEast Conservation Award and the RIBA Northeast Client of the Year Award. The National Award was announced yesterday.

image courtesy of architects

Live Works was also a Civic Trust Awards National Winner in March and has been nominated for a British Construction Industry Award 2017. The project has also been shortlisted for the World Architecture Festival, RICS (Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors) Awards Northeast, and Constructing Excellence Northeast.

Flanagan Lawrence’s Live Works has transformed a century-old gap on the Newcastle Quayside into a vibrant public place. The project comprises a new centre for children and young people’s writing in a converted Grade 2 listed almshouse; a vibrant, public ‘pocket park’, which reopens and revitalises the only remaining Georgian courtyard in the city; and a new office building.

The RIBA describes how the project “…secures the commercial future of a nationally significant theatre company in an impressively controlled and coherent mixed-use city centre development. It preserves the historic quayside grain while providing a new type of engaging, informal and inhabited public space.”

Jason Flanagan, Creative Director at Flanagan Lawrence, adds: “The Live Works project has provided us with a remarkable architectural opportunity to create a new courtyard for Live with the Children’s Writing Centre and a new outdoor performance space for Live Theatre. The new building links the quayside and the public square with an arcade along Trinity Chare. The sandstone façade completes the gap in the river frontage which has been empty for more than a hundred years.”

Jim Beirne, Chief Executive Live Theatre says: “We were delighted to work with Flanagan Lawrence to bring the ambitious Live Works project to fruition and delighted that it has now been recognised with an RIBA National Award in addition to three RIBA Northeast Awards – for the building, for our approach to conservation, and for being a ‘committed passionate and visionary client’.”

RIBA National Awards 2017

19 Dec 2014

LiveWorks Theatre Building in Newcastle

Location: Live Theatre, Broad Chare, Quayside, Newcastle, England

Design: Flanagan Lawrence

A new cultural amenity for Newcastle

Live Theatre’s new quayside development in Newcastle upon Tyne has begun work on site. The ambitous cultural development, designed by Flanagan Lawrence, creates an outdoor performance space for Live Theatre and transforms an existing 19th-century alms house into a children and young people’s writing centre. In addition, the scheme creates a new public park and a commercial office building along the quayside frontage.

LiveWorks is a new £10 million capital scheme by Live Theatre, who purchased the quayside frontage and adjacent buildings in February 2014. Live Theatre was granted planning consent and listed building consent for the development by unanimous decision at a Newcastle City Council Planning Committee in June 2014. Constrution began in December 2014.

The proposals have been praised in terms of their urban benefits, highlighting the sensitivity of the architectural design and its response to its urban context, significantly enlivening the setting to the historic almshouses.

The scheme features several outdoor spaces, providing break-out areas with views of All Saint’s Church and the suite of alms houses adjoining the site to the north; in addition, the project offers views of the Sage Gateshead, the River and the Tyne and Gateshead Millennium Bridges to the south.

The Quayside frontage is sandstone clad for three storeys with a recessed mansard level above. At ground level the end bay provides an entrance into the courtyard via a colonnade abutting the historic Trinity Chare.

Within the newly widened Chare the building steps back to open up toward the Listed Almshouse and the public courtyard space behind. The courtyard frontages are brick clad, matching the stone front / brick rear dialogue prevalent in the locality. The arrangement and articulation of openings on these elevations are more varied and informal, reflecting the additive nature of the development of the existing courtyard frontages.

The purchase of the land and buildings and the development of the site has been supported by a £2.5 million grant from the Northeast European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) Programme 2007 to 2013 and a preferential loan of £6 million from Newcastle City Council. Fundraising is continuing with grants from The Catherine Cookson Charitable Trust, the Gillian Dickinson Trust, The Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, the Monument Trust, Garfield Weston Foundation, The Sir James Knott Trust, the Social Investment Business and the Wolfson Foundation already secured. The project has also secured a loan facility of up to £2 million from the Northeast Local Enterprise Partnership.

Jason Flanagan, Director at Flanagan Lawrence comments:
“LiveWorks provides us as architects with a remarkable opportunity to create a new public park and outdoor performance space for Live Theatre and a children and young people’s writing centre. The public park is framed by historic Georgian alms houses and Quayside warehouses, while the new office building with its sandstone facade on the Quayside completes a gap in the river frontage which has been empty for a century.”

Jim Beirne, Chief Executive, Live Theatre states:
“Once complete LiveWorks will provide many future opportunities for businesses, artists, children and young people. The project will also help to secure an income for the core work of Live Theatre into the future.”

Paul Callaghan, Chair, Live Theatre and Chair of Newcastle Gateshead Initiative, adds:
“This wonderful project is not only significant for Live Theatre but also for Newcastle and Gateshead as a whole. It will be an amazing place for people of all ages, but particularly for children and young people. This key site has stood empty for too long and we are delighted that we are going to be able to transform it into something so special.”

LiveWorks Theatre in Newcastle – Building Information

Lead Architects: Flanagan Lawrence
Contractor Brims Construction
Structure and Civil Engineers CK21
M&E Avoca-CE
Town Planners Hedley Planning
Cost Consultants Turner Townsend
Landscape Designers Oobe
Lighting Consultants Michael Grubb Studio

LiveWorks development will create:
– A new landmark building on Newcastle’s Quayside with c.1,500sqm net of premium office space with river views
– New commercial opportunities and visibility on the busy Quayside thoroughfare for Live Theatre
– A landscaped green space, a new pocket park at the centre of the site with public pedestrian access from the Quayside and a public and performance space managed and programmed by Live Theatre in daily use by tenants, neighbours and the public and transforming this part of the Quayside
– An additional revenue for the core creative and education work of Live Theatre, and a social, cultural and commercial return which will help Live Theatre’s future resilience.

LiveWorks Theatre in Newcastle images / information received 191214

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Live Theatre, Broad Chare, Quayside, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 3DQ, UK