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Hackney School of Food

Hackney

Project Details

£250,000 to £499,999

Practice

Surman Weston Ltd

Surman Weston, Studio 104 , Sugarhouse Studios , 19 Collett Road , LONDON , SE16 4DJ

The multi-award-winning Hackney School of Food is a part of a nationwide initiative to help get young children to cook healthy food that they actually want to eat. The project is being launched in collaboration with Hackney's LEAP Federation and Chefs in Schools, a charity that aims to improve the quality of primary school dinners by employing professional chefs in school kitchens. The Hackney School of Food will be affiliated with the charity and will provide the facilities for professional chefs to teach children how to grow, cook and eat healthy and delicious food. The project converts the school's former caretaker’s cottage into a professional kitchen and transforms the landscaping around to include a large vegetable garden, a productive greenhouse and a formal kitchen garden. To allow the project to be a success, the scheme has been designed to achieve maximum impact for the minimum budget, using robust materials and simple details to make spaces that are both functional and beautiful. Everything has to be suitable for both children and adults so height-adjustable cooking units have been specially designed for the scheme. The aesthetic was also designed to be inviting and playful without becoming infantile, so as to appeal to all age groups. After school hours and out of term time, the kitchen and gardens will also be used by local community groups for an adult food programme. The project won 6 architectural awards, including the RIBA J MacEwen Award for architecture for the common good, 2 Civic Trust Awards and 2 Hackney Design Awards. We have also garnered additional funding by winning the William Sutton Prize for Social Innovation, which has allowed us to invest in creating a guide to help others wanting to launch further Schools of Food. The Hackney School of Food project was won by Surman Weston via an invited competition and was completed in 2020.