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If Tea Could Talk

Part 1 Project 2021
Anan Tian
University of Liverpool | UK
Like architecture, food is intertwined into our everyday lives and intrinsically connected to living sustainably in a healthy built environment. This project for a Student Wellbeing Centre at the University of Liverpool explores the culture of tea, creating a series of ritual experiences which address all the senses simultaneously.

The project adopts a more empathetic approach to architecture. It reveals the poetic potential of the creative re-use of existing structures, and how it is possible to reflect contemporary values in a dialogue between old and new, while simultaneously reducing the carbon footprint of our architecture.

The project re-interprets the white-tiled celebration of modernism of the 1965 YRM Electrical Engineering Building and updates it for the world of the post-pandemic Climate Emergency. The pandemic has broken connections between individuals and social groups, e.g. between the university and local communities. The Wellbeing Centre provides somewhere for students, academics, locals, and visitors to communicate, share, and socialise with each other.

Through a sequence of thresholds and carefully environmentally considered spatial experiences developed from the tea ritual, stress levels are reduced, and people are brought together to mingle.

Anan Tian

Tutor(s)

2021
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