How We Built: 10CR
20th April 2022
Our beautiful Shoreditch home was built by many hard-working hands and brains, and we wanted to take the chance to give a shout-out to all of the amazing collaborators who helped us on our journey.
Scarlet Crawley & Alice Vaughan, MASAJ Founders
When we made the decision to move to our new home in Shoreditch, we knew that our relocation represented an opportunity for us to build on our existing aesthetic and design principles - which we’ve spent years honing - to ensure that the ethos and atmosphere which we’d created at the Gossamer City Project studios was built on, not lost.
In line with our Manifesto, we also committed to do all in our power to make the build of our new site as environmentally responsible and sustainable as possible - not easy with a project of this scale, or our ambitious plans for what we wanted to create.
We also committed to reusing as many raw materials as possible from our former site, and chose specifically to partner with local, independent contractors, designers and makers in order to both reduce any negative footprint from the build, while supporting small businesses who like us, have struggled in the last year.
It’s also worth mentioning that all of the works that were undertaken on this site happened in less than 8 weeks, while we were still in a national lockdown due to the Coronavirus pandemic - making almost everything more challenging. We had to limit the number of people working on site at any given time, and our team had the extra considerations of face masks, increased hygiene practices and difficulties in sourcing building materials (thank you Brexit!).
And so, now that a year has passed since we first opened the doors of MASAJ at 10 Charlotte Road, we’d like to say a special thanks to all the wonderful humans who helped us to create our new home:
Kyra Wood - PFLUG Architects
From our first meeting, we knew that Kyra was the architect who best understood our needs for the space. Her commitment to creating a new home for MASAJ which embodied our existing design principles, whilst incorporating new materials and ideas felt seamless.
Kyra helped us to pull together all of our ideas for the space - designing clever ways for us to use the space to it’s full potential, while never compromising on the experience of our clients and team of therapists.
Matt Evans - Work Make Play
We’ve been lucky to have Matt on our team for some time - helping with various refurbs and upgrades on our site at Gossamer City Project - and so he was the ideal person to help us bring 10 Charlotte Road to life. Matt helped us to project manage the build, and his skills as a maker are matched by his design sensibilities and understanding of the MASAJ brand.
Matt’s commitment to helping us build our new home was invaluable, and we are so excited to see how his next projects develop!
Will Aubrey Jones + Team - Dogfish Studio
Every single piece of joinery which fills our new home (and there is ALOT of it) was hand-crafted and painstakingly installed by hand by Will and his talented team at Dogfish Studio. The gorgeous combination of ply, fitted with a Meranti edge banding is a grown-up nod to the set-up in our Gossamer City Project studios - and his team cleverly made use of as much of the raw materials from our former site as possible - up-cycling our Studio shelving into essential storage in the back-of-house area and shelving within the many cupboards and storage units you’ll find built into our new home.
The completed effect is simply breathtaking - the perfect combination of practicality, comfort and aesthetic.
Check out the Dogfish Studio Instagram for some behind-the scenes shots of the carpentry build.
Ellen Rose
Step into our new home and one of the first things which hits you is the soft but detailed tones of the walls - a specialist paint application curated and designed especially for MASAJ by the very talented Ellen Rose.
Ellen understood our vision for the space immediately, and understood our desire to translate the raw plaster walls of our studios at the Gossamer City Project into a lower-maintenance alternative - and the result is the stunning combination of tones and textures which Ellen and her collaborators created by meticulously by hand throughout the space.
Yiğit Gürcihan - Papa Display
Probably our most long-term collaborator - our friend Yiğit, Director of Hackney based vinyl graphics studio Papa Display is our go-to guy for all things vinyl. From our glorious window frontage, to the delicately applied vinyls which direct visitors around the space - we couldn’t recommend his brilliant work more highly if we tried.
A finally, HUGE thank you to everyone else whose energy was poured into our new Studios - our brilliant designer Sophie Bansal, our team of therapists who gave their time to help with a plethora of tasks - the carpenters and contractors, makers and designers and supporters who helped us to create the new home of MASAJ which we’ve long dreamed of.
What’s next, for our beautiful Shoreditch home? Watch this space!
Photography for this piece was created by our very talented collaborator, Jennifer Moyes.