MSA Live 26

Hi, my name is Elvira I am originally from Spain but also grew up in London. I am a BA1 student particularly interested in building community through the use of social spaces in architecture, so I am really excited about how our project in Worthington Park!

17/03/26 - fourth meeting date
In our fourth annual group meeting, we planned our engagement activities for the upcoming site visit. As part of this, we decided that we will create small maquettes that participants can interact with during the visit. These will allow participants to physically place and arrange elements on the floor plan, encouraging hands-on involvement and helping us better understand their preferences and priorities.
In addition, we agreed to include a QR code on our poster that links to a Google Form. This will act as another engagement tool, enabling us to gather feedback from a wider audience in a quick and accessible way.
We discussed and confirmed potential dates for the site visit, ensuring that everyone is prepared for the next stage of the project. Overall, this meeting was productive in clarifying our design ideas and planning effective ways to engage with the community.

During our site visit, precise measurements were conducted. Integrating these with the existing floor plans provided by our collaborator, we have developed digital models in both Rhino and SketchUp to serve as the foundation for subsequent design development. Our next phase of engagement will involve generating drawings and renderings to explore and present design options for our end-users.

3/3/26

SESSION 3: GROUP PROGRESS AND PLANNING

During this session, we were tasked with completing our risk assessment, budget proposal, and project proposal. As a group, we discussed how our project would develop over time, carefully planning a timeline that would allow us to make the most of the work ahead.

We identified two key groups from the list provided by our collaborator that we would engage with for the upcoming workshops, ensuring that our approach is both relevant and inclusive. Alongside this, we began outlining a budget plan based on the resources and materials we anticipate needing. We also had a discussion with our tutor to better understand the purpose of the risk assessment and how we could minimise potential risks during site visits and throughout the project.

In addition, we started working on our Ethos application, considering how our project aligns with broader values and responsibilities. As a group, we had an open conversation about what is important to us within this project, reflecting on how we are distributing roles, whether any adjustments are needed, and what we each hope to gain from the experience moving forward.

Workshop prep

Our group met again today, powered by good vibes and even better weather. We discussed our upcoming workshop activity, agreed on a date, and set out clear action points for the next few weeks to help us prepare. We also received feedback on our timeline, budget proposal, and risk assessment. By the end of the meeting, the group split up to refine and finish these documents.

Hi! I’m Rouba, a first-year Architecture student at MSA. I’m really excited to take part in MSA Live, as it is a valuable opportunity to connect with architecture students across different year groups and gain insight from their experiences. I’m particularly looking forward to developing my skills and contributing positively to spaces within our communities.

17/3/26

This session marked a clear shift from discussion to definition. We concentrated on finalising our ethics application and preparing thoroughly for next week’s site visit — organising consent forms, documentation, and structuring potential interviews with members of the public in a respectful and transparent manner. The emphasis was on responsibility: ensuring we actively listen and accurately represent the community’s voice.

Ruiqi then brought our previous conversations into focus through a confident architectural pitch. He synthesised our ideas into a coherent design theory, outlining a spatial direction aligned with both our chosen users and Monton Unitarian Church. As a group, we offered refinements and strengthened key elements, encouraged by how close the proposal feels to realisation.

We now approach the site visit with clarity and momentum. With the core concept established, we are progressing into 3D modelling and visual experimentation, developing the scheme in direct response to Anna’s brief and the wider ethos of the church.

Hi There! I'm Kobe, an MArch 1 student at the Manchester School of Architecture, currently representing the CPU Ai Atelier. I undertook my BArch at Portsmouth School of Architecture, before working with a renowned London-based architecture practice called ACA Studios.

Looking forward, my ultimate hope is to contribute in the spaces between architecture and art; where skills are transfered to the more experimentative disciplines such as the entertainment arts, film and video games. I am keen to engage with the collaborative contexts of this live project, and anticipate our team's success in the contributions of each of our individual passions and interests.

Session 5: The Carpet Session (Accountability Hour)

This session, now officially known as the "Carpet Session", was all about reflection, review, and collaboration

We revisited our blog posts, filled in the gaps, and made sure we had shared accountability.

The highlight (and slight reality check) was our review with the tutor. It was a genuinely productive session where we realised that while splitting into mini teams felt efficient, it also left a few gaps in our submissions. We now acknowledge we should all stay in the loop, or we all suffer the consequences. Enhancing our communication is now our main priority.

On the bright side, we’re leaving more organised and aligned. We set future dates to meet with our collaborator and started discussing initial design ideas, this time with everyone on the same page (literally and metaphorically).

A bit humbling, very useful, and definitely necessary. The Carpet Session has spoken.

17/03/2026. Group brainstorm seesion with Matt. We discussed ideas for potential activities and considered what the final level of completion for the project might look like. Matt also provided feedback on several details, such as the project background and strategies for encouraging public participation in the activity survey.

Ethics Said “No” (So We Try Again)

Setting up the project! With the 6 March submission deadline looming, last week was a bit of a ‘get our act together’ moment as we worked through submissions for the project timeline, ethics application, risk assessment, and budget proposal - tedious, but necessary planning bits.

We mapped out a timeline structured through project stages and weekly tasks, from early definition and briefing through concept design, coordination, technical development, and final handover. It became painfully clear what depends on what, especially that engagement has to wait for ethical approval. We received feedback soon after submission and found our ethics application needed more work, so we’re now reworking it properly around being respectful and explicit on consent, inclusion, and representation.

Alongside that, we completed a risk assessment covering things like model-making, site visits, and public engagement, with controls in place to reduce risk. Finally, we submitted a budget proposal capped at £100, balancing practical needs (materials, printing, travel, stakeholder refreshments) with the most important line item: a “submission treat (pizza!)” to keep morale intact.

With the planning in place, we can move forward with a clearer structure, shared expectations, and (hopefully) less chaos.

17/03/2026

Today started with the group deciding that we could perhaps live without windows in Crawford House, but the distinct lack of tables in our seminar room was agreed upon to be not okay. Once some tables had been successfully located, a spread of images plans and tracing paper flooded the table with the aim of ‘spewing out’ ideas onto paper. To match our client's needs, we first understood the heat issues of the 1960s building, being too cold in the summer as well as too hot in the winter, leading us to believe thermal alterations are a key part of our project. As well as this, the usage of the site needed to be considered for those with disabilities as well as elderly people, with them being the focus of Dandelion, forcing us to consider their specific needs and the adaption of the site required to meet these needs.

As a group we went out on a site exploration, following a suggested route that we developed for our project. Starting by Platt Fields Pond, we walked through the park, chatting and making note of the surrounding environment. We then walked through Rusholme, passing multiple green spaces and noting their clear potential, while also acknowledging drawbacks and how to tackle them. Our walking route ended in Whitworth park, and we then continued to the MTC to consolidate our thoughts and findings. It was a lovely way to both generate ideas from the site, and interact with each other more after our first meeting. This was a very valuable day!

Session 3
In this session, we worked together figuring out our plans for workshopping with the children of the Hyde Community, finalising our pre-requisite forms such as the ethics waver, risk assessment, budget proposal, and timeline, finally we started to discuss our site analysis.

We started with finishing off and submitting our pre-requisite forms in order to meet the deadline of 13th March. Then after we moved to brainstorming our plans with the children of Hyde.

10/02/26
During this week our group began to form poster ideas, some of which we discussed over this weeks Teams meeting. We created a poll to get everyone’s ideas over WhatsApp on the posters, provided feedback and finalised the poster!

Last week, our team visited Sale for a really insightful day of research and exploration. We spent the morning with our collaborator, Steve, who kindly arranged a visit to Sale Library, where we were given access to the local archives. Being able to look through old maps and historical documents gave us a much deeper understanding of the area and its development over time. This was incredibly valuable in helping us begin to envision our contribution to the upcoming festival.

Later in the day, we visited the church and met with Reverend Becky, who shared the history of the building and explained its importance within the Sale community. Experiencing the space in person was particularly helpful, as it allowed us to start thinking more concretely about how the church could be used as part of the festival.

Beyond the practical insights, the visit also helped us feel more connected to the place and its people. Spending time in Sale and engaging directly with its history and community gave us a stronger foundation for developing a thoughtful and responsive proposal.

Our third MSA Live session focused on finalising our ethics application and having another site visit. We started by reviewing the ethics documents prepared last week, ensuring all our administrative documents were in line with the requirements. In doing so, we evaluated our planned community engagement activity and realised it required modification to align with our collaborator’s vision for the project. Taking this on board, we held a brainstorming session to develop a new engagement activity and updated our risk assessments to ensure it applies to our modified community engagement activity.

Once the ethics application was complete, we shifted our focus back to the site. The group travelled to Holt Town for another site visit, walking the stretch down to New Islington. This on-the-ground exploration was crucial; it allowed us to gather primary data for our site analysis and begin identifying the most strategic, high-potential locations for the new transportation hub.

Day 3 - Planning and Project logistics - 03/03/26

Our third meeting focused on organising the practical elements needed to move the project forward. The group split into smaller teams to work on key preparatory tasks, including the ethics documentation, risk assessment, time planning, and an initial project budget. These discussions also highlighted some logistical challenges, such as the cost and coordination of travel to Wigan, which we began working through as a group.
Alongside these tasks, we continued developing our plan for the proposed site visit to Wigan. The aim of the visit is to gather insights directly from the local community and better understand the area we are designing for. As a team, we discussed potential activities for the day, including speaking with local residents and observing the surrounding environment.
To support this, we identified several questions and requests that needed to be confirmed with our client, David from Wigan & Leigh Community Charity. These included whether it would be possible to visit local primary schools, access the proposed building site, and obtain resources that are not publicly available online, such as floor plans of the existing building.
By the end of the session, our spokesperson had prepared to contact David to seek permission and clarify these details, helping ensure our planned visit and engagement activities can move forward smoothly.

Brief Review
03/03/2026
With a deeper understanding of the task and its potential outputs, we deemed it crucial to look at plans of the site and its surrounding regions. Our collaborators highlighted regions of the area that might be ideal for development which we further explored. In doing so, we also thought about other considerations such as the regions within the green belt which may either aid or restrict certain developments. This provided clarity of the site, particularly in anticipation of a site visit!!!

Overall Mood(s): Analytical

SESSION 03: SITE VISIT
During our session this week, the group discussed initial ideas regarding which materials will be used in our den construction, keeping sustainability and waste reuse at the forefront of our plans. Additionally, we had conversations with our collaborator, The Common Land Collective, on the plans for our community engagement project, examining how we engineer the engagement to best gather information that will be useful to the process of developing our final designs.
Later this week, our group completed an initial visit to our site in Chelford, here, we met with our collaborator and discussed in more detail their expectations from us and our ideas for the space, such as where the dens will be positioned, what their functions might be, and what other features they hope to integrate into the site. Before heading to the site, we established who would collect what information, to establish an efficient system that helped us collect detailed information to analyse and feed our design process. At the site, each group worked to gather the necessary information which we plan to discuss in more detail in future sessions to support our understanding of the location.

For today, we finished off the ground floor level of our cardboard model:
We traced the floor plan again, but this time adding extra thickness on the exterior so that there is a distinct separation between the two floors. After creating the exterior walls, we came across a problem with the wall where the slits we made to bend the cardboard were too prominent so we first experimented with different styles to cover the gap and choose one that suited the design.
In our next group meeting, we will discuss how our model will be used in the engagement activities.

Like the history of the Baths themselves, we want this project to champion community involvement. This means that before any designing takes place, it is important that we understand what the community wants, so that this can guide us throughout the design process.

To explore this, we devised a survey intended to help us learn what users of the Baths feel is currently missing from the site, as well as what they would like to see more of.

When visiting the Baths last Friday, I gained staff consent before conducting the survey. To include a range of voices and reduce bias, I aimed to interview both users and staff across a variety of ages, genders, and backgrounds.

While the answers provided many useful insights, the conversations that emerged from some of the questions were just as valuable. They helped me understand how people use the Baths in different ways, and how any potential redevelopment could affect them differently.

Stay tuned for more public engagement exercises and updates on how these will inform our future design!

03/03/26

This week, we finalised our project timeline and reassessed our budget and risk assessment following further discussions about what our community engagement task with the people of Stockport could involve. After brainstorming ideas as a group, we agreed on a final concept. We then discussed the budget required to carry out the activity and identified the potential risks involved in implementing it.

In addition, we revisited a task set during the previous meeting in which each group member created visualised collages representing their individual interpretations and responses to the site. When considered alongside further research into the history of the area, this discussion began to shape the direction of our project. As the brief allows for flexibility and creativity, this process helped us begin defining a clearer focus for our project.

W3: 03/03/2026
For this week’s session, instead of all trying to discuss and resolve one decision together, we learnt to split into much smaller groups and trust each other’s abilities and decision-making to complete more tasks simultaneously, like drafting sketches onto site plans, conducting demographic research on our area, and carrying out a site analysis. We were much more productive compared to last week, and time flew by so fast this time!

Today we took a big step forward with our second client meeting, discussing about our sites and further developing our understanding of the brief. We presented what we have so far to the client and note down their likes and requests. It was very useful for us as a group to further consult the client, ensuring we start our actual designs with the right idea. They reminded us that the aim to increase social interactions in the community wasn’t shown as clearly in the poster, suggesting that we add more elements of human interaction. Other than the addition to the poster, the clients were pleased by the direction we were going and left excited for the next meeting. We then continued towards the lecture hall to listen to a valuable lecture on community and importance of inclusive designs. After our lunch break, we gathered to discuss the client meeting further with our tutor and started paving our way towards the first few designs.

Week 3 - 03/03/2026

Today we presented and reviewed the site analysis we have been developing since our last meeting. We have each developed an understanding of our chosen sites in smaller groups and were enthusiastic to hear about each other’s work today.

For each site, we went through analysis of traffic routes, congestion points and important crossing areas. It was pivotal to gain an understanding of the potential weak points in the existing site before moving into the design stage of the project. This is beneficial in our process as safety and travel routes are at the forefront of this project. We also discussed what each of the schools and wider community had access to and, in contrast, what each could be wanting. These included things such as availability to green spaces, playground equipment and communal meeting spaces. Now that we have identified these elements we can confidently move forward in the design process to developing site specific interventions. Each site is unique and poses an exciting opportunity for a community space we look forward to working on.

Before the next session we have arranged for a second meeting with our collaborators to organise community engagement meetings with the schools relevant to this project. This will be an opportunity for us to refine the community opinion of the sites in person, rather than relying solely on our initial desktop studies. We look forward to expanding the depth of this project through these conversations.

Shaping the Project Framework & Design Direction
3 March 2026

In our third group session, we continued developing core project documents—including the Budget Proposal, Ethics Application, Project Timeline, and Risk Assessment—followed by collaborative research into relevant case studies. Through analysis and discussion, we began to shape our design approach and clarify the conceptual logic behind our proposal.
It was a focused and insightful meeting, moving us closer to a coherent and well-structured project foundation.

Hi my name is Milena Ereh,
I'm a First year architecture student at MSA. Previously i studied Art and design, maths and chemistry at A-Level. My current skills revolve around analogy drawing however I’m excited to learn more about digital techniques throughout this project. Outside of architecture i enjoy oil and watercolour painting as well as charcoal drawing. Sine high school I've had a passion for art surrounding nature and landscape that's only grown with my interest for architecture. I hope that working Moor Allerton Preparatory School in this project will help me understand the importance of the relationship between a community and nature better and how both can thrive unanimously.

03/03/2026

Today we brainstormed ideas on how to engage with the community at the garden ahead of our second site visit next weekend. We decided to collate precedents of water features which we will print and show the volunteers and members of the Salford Croquet Club who play on Saturday afternoons. We are planning on giving them coloured paper to vote for which ideas they like or dislike, allowing us to get a holistic idea on what design style is favoured before we start designing the water feature in the coming weeks, as well as allowing the community to have a say in the design process.

17/02/2026
Today was our second scheduled meeting. Starting with the poster we discussed the current design and suggested improvements to be made before the submission. We uploaded our project description, completed our first few blog posts and started to talk over our: project timeline, budget, risk assessment and ethics application. Finally we divided up the tasks for the next two weeks.

17/02/2026

This day was more about coming together after meeting with our collaborators to develop our ideas for the project and also to think about our project timeline and costs. We split up the tasks so that they were equally divided between all the group members for efficiency. We also worked together in brainstorming activities for the year 4 students, which allowed us to find similar precedents for inspiration and to use as a reference when communicating with our collaborators. Our structured approach for the day improved our overall productivity and created a strong sense of teamwork within the group.

Meeting 02 — 17/02/2026

On our second group meeting, we focused on further improving the poster and its supporting description. We discussed the overall look and its definition of United Didsbury church, including texture, layout decisions, and agreeing on clear titles that communicate the project direction.

Project direction
We then divided into smaller groups to cover the key project strands. This included developing the risk assessment, outlining ethical considerations, setting up the project timeline, and starting a basic budget framework so we can track deliverables and responsibilities more clearly moving forward.

This Monday, Group 5 took the initiative to visit the site in Macclesfield for the first time. After meeting with our collaborator, she guided us on a tour through the museum, walking us through each exhibition space and sharing her perspective on the current challenges the site faces. Seeing the space in person immediately helped us better understand some issues we had previously discussed. One challenge was that the exhibitions felt disconnected from one another in accessibility and theme. The access points between rooms were often unclear, which made navigation confusing and disrupted the overall visitor journey. We also observed that some areas felt cluttered, with displays competing for attention, while others were much more thought-out. The room with the looms and historic flooring, in particular, stood out for its thoughtful layout, demonstrating how impactful the space could be when designed with care. This contrast highlighted the potential for improvement across the rest of the museum. The layout itself was occasionally disorienting. For example, the first exhibition visitors encounter focuses on ancient Egypt, which feels unrelated to the museum’s core theme of silk. This raised questions about how the museum's narrative is introduced and whether the sequence of spaces could be restructured to create a clearer, more cohesive story, for example, by moving the initial access point and the cafe to the other side of the building. During the visit, we documented the space by taking measurements and photographs to support our later analysis and design work. This practical step felt important, as it gave us concrete information to refer back to when developing our design proposal. Overall, the visit was extremely valuable. Experiencing the museum firsthand gave us a much clearer understanding of both its strengths and its problem areas, and it helped ground our ideas for engagement and design in the realities of the space. The trip left us feeling better prepared for the next stage of the project.

18 Feb 2026 @ Mossley Community Centre

/ Site Visit
MArch 1 students visited Mossley Community Centre to spend time with the community and hear their thoughts, stories, and hopes for the space. Through conversations and careful observation, we began to understand how the centre is used and what truly matters to its users. We also took measurements and documented the existing conditions to support the next stage of our design development.