Common Ground

An installation considering sustainable use of finite resources as well as the question of how accessible our urban environment is. Taking in the history of the site in their approach to materiality, the installation will also celebrate the history of St Mary-le-Bow in Bow Churchyard.

In its approach to materiality, using recycled materials salvaged from nearby sites of manufacture, this piece will build on the church’s legacy of layered re-construction and re-use. After its destruction, Sir Christopher Wren rebuilt St Mary-le-Bow in 1680, with a tower that used the Roman gravel roadway as its foundations. In this way, the project will also highlight Wren’s 300-year anniversary this year, drawing attention to the ethos of architecture and re-use.

Designers Urban Radicals and Saqqra have taken the theme of ‘common ground’ as their focus for this installation. The intervention takes the common motifs of accessible design, often latent in our everyday public realm, and raises these to a level that users can see and engage with through physical touch. These motifs are often most apparent on the ground or horizontal plane, a surface shared - in common - by a range of users.