architectural practice
Morris+Company, 2022
Morris+Company is an award-winning architecture practice based in Hackney, east London. We have applied circular economy principles to the retrofit of our own studio, gallery and café space on Mare Street, reducing waste, reusing materials, and designing for longevity. Through our public exhibition and event programme we place the creative ‘act’ of architecture onto the high street.
London Fields
277
Our main entrance is via the HOME Café - there is a small step to enter - however we have a side entrance with level access on request.
Our Mare Street studios place the creative ‘act’ of architecture directly onto the high street, engaging local communities through shared workspaces and a public café, gallery, event and exhibition space on the ground floor.
Occupying part of a late Victorian former factory and warehouse building, this transformational retrofit project has been designed using circular principles with sustainable strategies for re-use, recycling and flexibility.
Our current exhibition, ‘The Circular City Starts With Community’, explores how circular economy principles can reshape the way we design, build, make and live in our cities.
At its heart is the idea of a Community Circular Economy Hub (CCE): a place where businesses, materials and communities come together to transform waste into useful resources.
Bringing together local makers, reclaimed materials and research by UCL and Morris+Company, the exhibition considers the environmental, spatial and social potential of reuse, while reflecting our own commitment at Morris+Company to putting circular principles into practice as a business.
It asks what happens when waste becomes a resource, and when the places that manage those resources become part of the community itself.
The café interiors were designed by Elly Ward Morris and Joe Morris. An exercise in adaptive re-use and minimal intervention, the interior design showcases sustainable materials, slow and low waste methods of construction and concepts of circular design. From cleaning products to waste management, throughout all business operations we strive for lower impacts, deeper knowledge and continuous creativity, and for opportunities to share such techniques and insights with others.
