Bringing a heritage building back into occupation
Lyons Works
This feasibility study for developer Hammerson proposes new uses to bring Lyons Works, an imposing heritage building in Leeds city centre back into occupation.
Originally a state-of-the-art textiles factory for the Alexandres tailoring company, the 84m x 17m colossus stretches from Templar Street to Lady Lane. Since the factory closed, the building has been used as a Chinese restaurant, Chinese shopping arcade, and nightclub. The building is currently vacant and in a state of disrepair. The building was a bespoke design intended to be more than a typical factory, with significant windows, roof lights and wind cowls providing ventilation and light.
Group Ginger’s design approach celebrates the unique aspects of the building and reinforces its original purpose as a factory. We have re-interpreted the factory as a multi-let, flexible environment capable of hosting multiple organisations and uses to complement the wider Eastgate masterplan within which it sits, and its new residential community.
The building’s epic scale produces both opportunities and challenges. The design retains the proportions, introducing a central circulation hub/atrium and perimeter cores to allow for multiple occupation and flexibility without cutting the building into smaller parts which would lose the dramatic internal scale.
The floor-to-floor heights are relatively low and insufficient to allow for conventional horizontal services. The vertical perimeter cores allow for service distribution, allowing the original structure to be exposed, making a feature of the buildings historic character. A new external public space offers amenity for building users, as well as a fitting setting for the elegance of the façade. This pushes vehicles away from the building, allowing natural ventilation without having to mitigate the negative aspects of noise and pollution. The simplicity of this approach is both carbon and cost-effective and is less intrusive to the original building.
Details
Stage
Feasibility 2019
