One more hurdle crossed

After having received the final drawings and calculations we contacted our landlords and met with the church. Father Morris gave us the green light to continue with the build and program in the builders. We supplied the drawing and calculations to the father and discussed the need to get the churches surveyors on board with the idea that this is not a commercial venture so that we should not be paying a rate that would amount to around 30% of our overall business costs. Once the meeting had been concluded we contacted Chris Clarke (one of the artists at T.H.I.S and started the ball rolling on redesigning the website to include all of the necessary elements for the residency and the new layout of both studio’s and web pages to bring our image up to speed. The rough deadline for its completion is the 1st of January as works on the Mezzanine are so far pushed back to the end of December due to unforeseen problems with the builders.

Tim will oversee communications with the builders and pressure them into committing to a fixed date around which we can then plan everything else from the de install and clear out to the documentations advertising and re installation of peoples studios.

I went away and re-costed the project based on two different elements. I joist or Posi joists. Its very difficult to get an exact price from simply surfing the net so this week I shall attempt to glean some quotes from several companies for each type of beam.

With 2 weeks away working followed by two weeks in Japan getting married I will now be taken out of the equation somewhat and with Frieze and other big art fares happing now and soon both Tim and I have been and will be a little side tracked over the next few weeks, so we really need the builders to commit to a solid date and then its all guns blazing……..

Progress

We have finalised the plans and they have been sent off to the engineers, we await their feedback. The studio members have all been brought up to date and informed of what lies ahead for us both as a group and individually as far as moving belongings and chipping in with cleaning, painting and general help.

Tim and me sat down and discussed the various options for the residency scheme and we went through several websites of studio groups in London who are doing aspirational things. We talked about the website being rejigged and updated together with possible links to institutions as far a field as Japan and as close to home as Ireland. We have since made tentative connections to people in the Tokyo art scene as well as giving a formal invite to a Southern Irish Arts organization/ studio group to plan and implement a studio swap.

This week we also started the slow clear out of debris/ detritus from the studios communal areas as well as some of the things that have been lingering in each of our studios for too long. Next we just need to convince the other artists to do the same thing.

Drawing up a new battle plan

They say that any battle plan never survives the first shot. I guess thats what we are discovering right now…but we are now at least winning the battle. We received a second quote form the mezzanine company detailing a mezzanine with fewer legs and therefore reducing the need or amount of platforms we would have to sink into the floor if indeed that is the way we decide to go. We will keep this in the background as our “C” option, as the cost of the steals and the foundation piles is now somewhat prohibitive. Tim Phillips sourced an engineer and contacted the builders, costing out a stud walled timber mezzanine based upon my initial plans and ideas. I put together some initial drawings and requirements to submit to the architect. We got the green light on the weight baring aspects and the load placed on the floor so we paid in advance for the architect to complete their drawing and send off to the engineers to complete the calculations. This came at a cost of £750 to deliver technical drawings and buildings regulation standard plans. We have since had two lots of drawings completed and I have had to make changes to each one. The next set will undoubtedly be the last draft as we have now ironed out problems concerning the roof joist and the studio layout together with the location of the stairwell. The useable space upstairs will be in the region of 1200sqft once we have taken the corridor and stairwell out of the equation. The timber fabricators have quoted in the region of £12,000 for the entire build including materials and labour. Once we have the technical drawings complete we will hammer this cost into a final amount.

So far we aim to do the build during the early Christmas period as the builder is free then and also the studios are very quiet. We will however have to move all of our things out of the studio so as to provide the best and quickest working environment for he builders. I will be onsite throughout to help out and oversee.

Men With Drills

The drilling began once I had taken all of the wooden blocks up the day before in the three areas selected by the mezzanine manufacturers. 3 cores needed to be taken in areas where loading would be significant as well as a cross section of locations around the hall to make sure that the slab did not change significantly in structure. The job was meant to take all day but only took until 2pm. The cores were taken away for testing but once they had arrived back at the drilling companies offices it was decided that testing was not necessary due to the samples being so poor. This is not the news we wanted to hear but was very kind and honest of the drilling company who saved us spending an unnecessary fee on the testing and reporting process. So we now have two options with regards to which direction we travel in, the first being to research the possibility of piling with a view to reducing the number of columns and therefor the number of piles. The second option is to start drawing up plans for a timber framed and weight baring stud wall cassette floor design. More images to follow. We will now speak with engineers about each idea and also get in touch with buildings regs people to find a pathway through this set back.

Getting to the core

I spoke with the mezzanine fabricators and they are forwarding new prices for a concrete core (only) test rather than the full concrete and pile test. We have now gone down in price from above £1200 to below £800 and I will deal with the testing company direct to save any additional handling fees from the mezzanine people. I have had several emails today from structural engineers and will be replying to them shortly with sketches plans and short briefs to see what services they might offer and what alternatives we can talk through. Who knows the concrete may be good enough for the timber build but not the steel? The timber version measuring a full 500 sqft larger than the steel mezzanine with weight loading stud walls, fire resistant mdf, fire retardant paint, I joist etc etc...

We continue.

To begin at the beginning…almost.

Firstly the background. If you want to know more about who we are then visit T.H.I.S, all the information is already therefor you to digest in your own time. We decided to build a mezzanine floor to increase our capital revenue stream by £1000 a month, money we could then pour back into the local/ arts community in the form of workshops residency schemes and publications etc. We submitted a funding proposal to A.C.E and we received an offer of £14,900. Now we just need to build the mezzanine… This blog will serve as both a diary for the day to project and also as a detailed report at the end of the three years at which point we will need to report back to the arts council. I will attempt to attach or link to our application so that anyone crazy enough to attempt a similar project can see where we went right and were we went wrong.

Where are we right now? I sent back the funding acceptance docs to the arts council and have since had the mezzanine engineers back on site to do a full survey. We will need to dig several bore holes to test the concrete slab for load baring before finishing the final plans and going into a fabrication stage. The bore holes will cost around £1200 to dig and test while the mezzanine will now have to be fire strengthened due to constant working access being required. As with all projects costs are already going up and while the A.C.E funding is going to cover the lions share we will now have to find another £4000 of private finance. We are working on this as we speak and remain very hopeful given the 3 month testing, fabrication and build time.

Electric and lighting points needed. We have surveyors who are willing to do any needed work on a pro-bono basis and I have a corporate law firm and conveyancing firm standing by to do the same if and when anything turns up that needs an opinion taking. The Church (our landlords) have so far asked their surveyors to take a lead and they have come back with a starting estimate cost of £2500. We will (once testing has taken place on the floor) be renegotiating this down to as close to £0 as possible as we already have surveyors who will do this for free. Today I spoke with engineers and asked for a break down of the bore costs and stipulated that we would not be paying £1200 if the first hole showed that the floor was completely unsuitable. If its too thin then why test or dig further holes? For now this is all that there is to report and I shall, as we go, introduce the people involved in the project as and when they appear but so far there is me - Steven Allbutt (Secretary and founder of T.H.I.S) and Tim Phillips (Director). More to follow.