Supporting a uK SucceSS Story: The impacT of - Research Councils ...

Grass roots developments
“The Festival
aims to highlight
London’s building
design and
construction to a
global audience
just weeks before
the start of the
Games.”
First year architecture and interior architecture students at
London Metropolitan University are designing a ‘pop-up’
initiative of models, ideas and proposals to make ‘High Street
2012’ ‘a Place of Pleasure’, in Aldgate, East London. ‘High Street
2012’ is a project to improve and celebrate one of London’s
great high streets and is part of the London Festival of
Architecture. The Festival aims to highlight London’s building
design and construction to a global audience just weeks before
the start of the Games. Using abandoned spaces to create
‘garden rooms’ the project is one of the biggest projects of
its kind to encourage students to gain experience working
with some of the largest organisations in the university’s local
community.
While many universities have been aiding the UK’s regeneration,
the University of Sheffield has played a unique role in London
2012. PhD student Helen Hoyle has produced trial plots at the
Olympic venues where she has manipulated native London
plants to delay the flowering process by six weeks to produce
a spectacular flowering display in East London during the
opening ceremony.
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SECTION FIVE : THE GAMES: past, present and future