Southbank Centre Archive Studio

As part of the Southbank’s long-term programme of restoration and improvement, and alongside the renovation of the Hayward Gallery and the Queen Elizabeth Hall, the Southbank has opened up their extensive archive to the public. The Grade I Listed building is home to this innovative programme and will host an evolving series of events and exhibitions.

The Archive Studio is a free-standing, self-supporting structure; an open framework that makes the scale of archival process apparent to visitors, allowing them to meet the archive team and actively engage with the collection. Held together with polished brass nuts and bolts and clad in perforated hardboard the Archive Studio complements the iconic, Grade I listed, modernist interior of the Royal Festival Hall. Aiming towards greater sustainability, the framework makes use of an efficient and modular method of lightweight construction, and the hardboard body makes use of a material composed of recycled wood fibres and naturally occurring lignin as the bond.