3MS Film School | George Voniatis

Sugar House Lane is located within Lower Lee Valley to the South of the 2012 Olympic venues. The road is encompassed with buildings relating to the film industry thus labelling itself a Media Village. Within it reside companies which provide everything from recording studios stage production catering services equipment lending services lighting services an acting school etc. The services the Media Village provides are lent out to third parties who would like to record a film or TV episode within the facilities. Missing from the area is the creation of filmmaking talent. The project is about merging the thriving film industry within the area with a school to provide new talent in the form of Directors Producers Editors Cinematographers Sound Designers Screen Writers and Animators directly to the Media Village. Allowing 3 Mills Studios to create their own movies and become a self sustainable organisation by the launch of their own label. The building uses local geometry and building trajectories in the creation of its exterior form to visually link and relate to the existing studio buildings as well as to the industrial buildings to the West of Lee Valley Canal. The volumetric arrangement of spaces uses the film production process as a precedent. A walk through the building will take the users through areas that represent the process of filmmaking from the acquisition of the script to the creation of the gold master and distribution. The use of film techniques as a means of formulating spaces and aesthetics allows for students to experience different film making techniques in both physical as well as visual ways throughout the building. By doing this the building becomes a tool in the teaching of filmmaking rather than only a vessel for learning to happen within.