Shop front_2

Once the ground floor section of the brick columns were fixed in place, the fabrication of the timber cross members could commence. The whole front section of the shop is almost entirely glazed, requiring a complex timber framing structure to provide integrity. The design features a large, covered and gated porch with a mirrored ceiling.

The facade box section was gradually built up in a way that would provide a method of routing wire cables to supply the internal lighting.

At the same height as the timber facade, the brick column contains solid terra-cotta block featuring carved border designs. This was replicated by building up tiny mitred moulding frames  from obeche timber.

At this stage it was necessary to establish a method for suspending the shop ceiling/first floor beams. I decided to use the inner edge of the facade structure as a means of fixing the assembly. Due to the large amount of cut-away wall and ceiling required to give good internal view of the shop floor, it seemed sensible to restrict the amount of area of the first floor to two small sections - an area adjacent to the shop front and a small area to form a landing at the top of the staircase.

These floor sections took the form of 1mm thick white plastic to represent white ceiling planks, a 6mm thick balsa core for rigidity and then 0.8mm thick birch ply cladding to represent floor planking.

From this point it was possible to continue the upward journey of the brick columns towards the roof level. Now we really start to get an idea of the form of the shop front with a nice sense of the internal space.