Conventional architectural practice is predominantly concerned with how buildings look from the outside and how they relate to the buildings around them. This “outside first” approach to design begins by establishing a set of external rules and constraints which the building must obey. Planning authorities are the guardians of the “outside first” approach to design, demanding drawn plans and elevations littered with the reassuring annotation; “to match existing”.

This year, we will resist the “outside first” approach and instead develop experimental design methods which explore buildings from the inside out. To do this we will begin with a close observation of the identity and requirements of the end users of the building. Having first defined the unique character and materiality of the objects and spaces within the building, we will then zoom out to imagine the outside of the building as a manifestation of the individual identities and processes contained within it.