Hi, Nick. How are you doing?

 

I'm very well. How are you? 

 

I'm very well, thank you. I wanted to ask you, having been to your event, a while back now about Studio Smithfield, could you talk about where we are with this meanwhile project? And actually, for our readers who don't know about it, what it is and what the whole venture is behind it. 

 

Yes of course. So, Studio Smithfield, as the name gives away, is based in Smithfield; it's the top floors of the market. It's a workspace but has a lot more going on than that, like many of our other sites. It has a lot of culture embedded in it, and event space and public-facing stuff as well. The nitty-gritty of it is 27 odd thousand square foot in the market and owned by the City - the Corporation of London officially. And it's a sign of what's coming down the line as perhaps some more change. I think you mentioned that this was meanwhile, but this stretches ‘meanwhile’ to fairly permanent; it's quite a long project - seven to 10 years on this one. It's about 30,000 square foot; 27,000 square foot of primarily workspace but which has a lot of other things plugged into it. So, a lot of culture: The Paul Smith Foundation, some event space and exhibitions space, as well as the sort of more traditional creative workspace that we do. It's open now and we've got some tenants in occupation already. We've got people like Publica - an interesting architectural company, and we're talking to the Design Council who I'm hoping are moving in later this year.

 

Really?

 

Yeah. Then there’s the really lovely charity called Drawing Matters, which is run by a guy called Neil Hobhouse, who has a place in Somerset where he has all these incredible old architectural plans from hundreds of years ago. They do a lot of workshops with new architects, studying, schools, but also companies go and have days out there and look at drawings of columns or something, I guess.

 

It's drawing skills, is it?

 

Yeah, it is using drawing, realizing that architecture now is very much - well, I'm not an architect, but a lot is computer drawing. It's looking back and saying, well, let's look at the drawing. So that's really exciting. Then we've currently got some guys in who are doing some really interesting artwork. And then we'll do some openings for London Gallery Weekend, which is in a couple of weekends, I think. So the idea is that it's a public building, open to the public as much as it is workspace.

 

Do you vet the tenants, because they all sound like they're broadly from the cultural sector? How does that work? And to what degree is it a testbed for what comes next in terms of tenants?

 

Well, I think you know that Projekt essentially is a kind of cultural and creative workspace. People have called us workspace developers now, which I find quite strange, but I guess we are. All our tenants are from those industries. I mean, London is all creative industries, really, I think. But it feels like we attract different buildings – we've got 14 sites dotted around London now. Different buildings obviously attract different types of businesses. You know, a big warehouse in the docks is going to attract people building sets, for example. Whereas here, we're much more thinking about where we are in London, you know, what the area's like. And then I guess, how we're sort of pushing out there as well; a lot of the people come through our network. I don't think we curate buildings as such, but I think we naturally find people that fit, if that makes sense.  Although it's not widely known, one day the markets of London will relocate from out of the centre of London. And this really is looking at what this building can do in the future and the types of people that will be in here and work in. Obviously, there are other great market buildings like Covent Garden or Spitalfields, which are amazing and very successful, but essentially are kind of retail touristy leisure kind of places. The aspiration for this isn't that. I think using this project, the Smithfield Studio, is a kind of a signpost of where this could go to.

 

Interestingly, I was in old Billingsgate Market last week for the Footprint show and that in a sense shows the direction and flexibility of these former market buildings, doesn't it? I think it's quite well known that the City is moving some of these markets out east, isn't it, to Barking and Dagenham?  So, tell me about Paul Smith's involvement. How did that come about? What is his interest? And what does he get out of it? What's the payback?

 

(laughs) Ha! Yes, well, I mean, apart from being able to say, “Paul Smithfield” on things, I guess! (laughs). All our buildings are very much about creating platforms for people. Creating space for people to grow from, because that's kind of what we do. So, we were looking and finding a way to work with the GLA and the City with some studio space that we were working with and a free studio programme for startups. It was mainly going to be fashion-led. We were looking around at how we would do that and we put the bare bones of a structure together that we would basically give X amount of studio spaces. We put together a program for free studio space that would support upcoming new businesses, and new designers in the fashion industry. And as we were working through and putting that programme and project together Kirsten Dunne in the GLA said, we would be talking to the Paul Smith Foundation, which was looking for a home. And it felt like a very natural marriage. We were trying to do the studios; Paul Smith, obviously is a global name and a really good guy as well. And they were looking to have a kind of mentorship and put their name to something that really would accelerate the career paths of these startups, new businesses, and designers. So really, we all came together and decided that we would have the Foundation here. So, the foundation is running the space, we're providing the space and funding. The first cohort comes in in June; we had 190 applications, whittled down to six, and they will be the first starters.

 

And in terms of the payback, does Paul Smith get first dibs on the talent that's coming through?

 

(laughs) I've spoken to Paul a few times about this and really it is just about wanting to do some good stuff. 

 

Oh, good. Maybe I was being cynical. Okay.

 

No! I kind of thought great, we'll get them in and then we've captured some tenants for the future. But I don't think he's thinking about capturing designers for the future. I think it really is about the fact that people like Paul Smith, like myself, you start on your own. You don’t really have any support and backing, and you kind of carve out a space yourself. Being able to share that knowledge, I think, especially in design and fashion, people who can be great designers, but know very little about how business works. So, the programme is really as much about supporting them to run a successful business as becoming a successful designer.

 

Sure. So, moving on to Projekt. What's next for you guys? Where are you looking?

 

We are always looking, to be honest. And there are always different sites and new things coming around. Obviously, we've got quite a bit on Smithfield to get going on. We've got a couple of big sites in the Docks we are working on at the moment. We have got a big site we're doing with the guys from Broadwick, which is a big venue down there. There's another big site right on the river that we're just about to get on to, which will be more of a big, creative cultural space. A giant shed, basically. We'll have some really interesting set designers and set build going in there. And then we're looking at some outdoor space where we can really activate the river frontage. So that's really interesting; really excited about that one, because I often feel the river in certain parts of London is very locked off from people. We've got a site over way out west, which is the old Glaxo SmithKline building out in Greenford. Really beautiful, very much out of our usual stomping ground. We've got a couple of sites outside London, and this one is a really lovely 1930s building

 

Yes, I know it. What are you doing there?

 

Like all the sites, it will have a mixture of workspace, studios, event space, and a public-facing cafe bar kind of thing going on in there. And then lots of shoot space as well. Everyone likes taking photos in a 1930s derelict Art Deco building…

 

Brilliant. Well, it sounds like business is thriving and you're super busy.

 

Yes, we are. We've got a lot going on at the moment and I’m really enjoying it as well, actually. Me and the rest of the team are having quite a nice time. So, it is good. I know for lots of people, it's quite difficult, quite challenging times. But we're hopefully being able to navigate our way through that at the moment.

 

Good. Well, good luck with Smithfield as well. Or ‘Paul Smithfield’ as you call it. Was that a joke, or is that actually something he's considering? (laughs)

 

That was a joke (laughs)

 

It's very good. 

 

I said it once and I thought 'oh no'... It's very much Studio Smithfield (laughs).

 

Yeah. All right. Thanks for talking to me. 

 

Brilliant. Cheers, David!