PRAU studio - Poynton House, Oxford Terrace, Christchurch

PRAU studio should feel like a place you want to be in. Conceived as a casual living room, it caters to different ways of working/creating and encourages a fluid interchange between team members, filled with furniture, books and objects that we love and inspire us. 

Having a passion for the Christchurch school, the studio is located in ‘Poynton House’ designed in the 1970s by David Allen. Constructed in the Christchurch style of concrete block walls painted white with precast concrete ribbed floors. We saw potential to pull the exterior quality of the building into the new space. This honest structure had been covered up throughout the years with grid ceilings, carpet and accumulations of conduits. PRAU studio strips this back to reveal and express the construction of the building, adding minimal partitions and a single joinery unit. 

Ever fascinated by the ephemeral design of the Memphis Group and Italian radical design, excerpts of colour and abstract decoration position and subtly contrast themselves amongst the modernist structure of block and concrete.

An arrangement of chairs and audio greets you upon entry. Primary workspaces sit adjacent, benefiting from the views and natural light. Linen curtains border both the entry and a high, steel topped table for making, generating more intimate spaces, whilst providing some acoustic relief. To the rear of the studio is a meeting space, accessed through a deep steel archway. Thresholds between spaces are marked with steel plate. Sitting beneath a large existing concrete beam is a focal joinery unit, creating a ‘wall’ that serves to divide the back of house area (kitchenette, library and printing), from the main studio space. Lacquered in deep green with a green powder steel bench top it serves as both a functional yet heavily curated piece.