This project offered a unique opportunity, to house facilities for the storage and display of the National Collection on Women, with associated social and education facilities. Located in Whitechapel, the new-build library emerges from behind the retained facade of a derelict Victorian wash-house: a reminder of the rather different work done there by women in earlier days. The brief was complex: a library, archival store, lecture theatre, exhibition space, cafe, and offices where all required. These spaces come to life through the measured interplay of oak, stone, brick, and steel. Spaces for study and the storage and exhibition of the Collection have been ordered in a design which is particularly notable for the sustainability strategy on a dense inner-city site. “Through their commitment and enterprise, this practice has created for their client the realisation of a high ambition for a world class cultural space.” Professor Deian Hopkin, Vice Chancellor & Chief Executive of South Bank University