Angela Xie
Welcome to Longitude Sound Bytes, where we bring innovative insights from around the world directly to you.

I am Angela Xie, a student at Rice University pursing a degree in Architecture.

Jessica Shi
I am Jessica Shi, also an Architecture student from Rice University.

Together we had the opportunity to speak with Hugh Broughton from Hugh Broughton Architects of London for this episode.

Angela
We were curious about the architecture and challenges of building research stations in Antarctica. There are over 70 research stations from 29 different nations. The British Halley VI station stood out to us because of its unique colorful and modular style.

Jessica
Hugh Broughton Architects developed this station, as well as many other stations in the polar regions.

Their work in Antarctica started when the Hugh Broughton Architects won a competition to redesign the Halley station of the British Antarctic Survey.

We started by asking Mr. Broughton about the competition, what was expected from the participants, and the key considerations they had to take into account when designing for such a special environment.

Enjoy listening!

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Hugh Broughton
The competition was run by the Royal Institute of British Architects. That was open to all architects and designers from around the world. It was launched in 2004 so quite a long time ago now. At the time of the launch, they put forward a proposal as to what kind of team they were looking for. And they said that they were looking for a large architectural practice with multidisciplinary experience who had lots of experience of working in extreme and remote locations and who was also very knowledgeable on principles of sustainability. And I remember there was an interview on National Radio In the UK, and the President of the RIBA and then head of the British Antarctic Survey were on the radio. And they were setting out all these criteria. And I was listening to it and I thought, Oh, my goodness, I can’t do a single one of those things. But they said that that morning, they were going to launch the competition and show some films about Antarctica. And I thought, that sounds really nice so I’m gonna go along and listen. And so, I went along and listened. And when I was there, I met an engineer, who I’d worked with before, and he said, oh, let’s team up. They had a really large company with offices all across the world. And it just happened that it was like the kind of combination that the British Antarctic Survey were looking for, large engineering practice who could bring lots of kind of global knowledge. And at that stage, young, younger and more innovative, but small-scale architectural practice, who would bring new ideas to the idea of living in Antarctica.

Angela
So, how much did you know about the environment in Antarctica at that time?

Hugh
So, when we started, I mean, you know, you can have some kind of appreciation of the cold, but many of the features of the site were pretty much unknown to us at the time. So, for example, at Halley Research Station, the temperature never goes below freezing. If they get windblown snow or even snow through precipitation, the snow level rises and rises, and it never melts. In addition, because it’s down on the coast, they get very high winds, because cold air drops from the main Antarctic Plateau, down towards the sea. And as it drops, it picks up in speed. So, you get these very high winds called Katabatic winds. Then the other kind of key feature of working at Halley is that it’s actually not on land. It’s on a floating ice. So, it’s where the ice is flowed off the main continent and is supported on the ocean. So, the site is moving all the time, because the ice is constantly flowing out to sea. Those three features in themselves were not something I’d ever come across before. So, we kind of like had to learn from scratch, all about the Antarctic environment and the extremes of weather. And then not only was there the climate, but there was also the remoteness. Halley is 14 days sailing from the nearest mainland port, either at Cape Town in South Africa or in the Falkland Islands. And also, it’s dark, for three months of the year, 105 days of the year, the sun doesn’t rise above the horizon. So there’s a big psychological stress for people working there. So, you know, we were finding out a lot about climate challenges, geographical challenges, logistics challenges, psychological challenges.

Jessica
That’s very interesting. And with that in mind, would you like to share about kind of the idea exploration process of your team? It’s always like the most interesting process and the architecture developments.

Hugh
Yeah, sure. So, one of the key principles of the project was that it needed to be able to be easily built in Antarctica, and also easily relocated. Because as I mentioned, the site is on a floating ice shelf and the ice is constantly flowing, a bit like water, but flowing out to sea. So, the site is quite dynamic. And at two extremes of the ice shelf, in one, it’s grounded on a rocky outcrop, and at the other, it’s grounded to the main Antarctic continent. That introduces stresses in the ice shelf. So, every now and then, giant cracks appear and large iceberg shear off.

There had been five versions of Halley research station built, and each one of them had been lost when the ice shelf had carved off as a giant iceberg. So, one of the key requirements of our brief was that we should design a building, which could be relocatable. So, if there was ever a risk of it disappearing on an iceberg, we will be able to move it in land to a safer location. So very Early on, in fact, we therefore came up with this concept of a repeating building module, which was elevated up on giant legs, and then supported on skis. So that it was modular so that it could be easily constructed. That modular so it could be small enough that it could be relocated, and then raised up on skis so that as the wind blows underneath, it stops snow from drifting around the buildings, and then supported on skis so that the modules could be towed each in turn, further inland. Those kind of three core concepts of modularity, elevation, and ski based structures sort of underpins the whole kind of design process.

And then we went through looking at all the sort of programmatic requirements. And planning those around the modules to come up with the ultimate sort of module size, which we worked out was around 1600 square feet. And within that, we could fit eight bedrooms, and then either some bathrooms or storage, and then everything kind of flowed from there. Then we started looking at labs, and we started looking at places for producing water and power and other operational areas, and everything kind of fitted rather neatly within the 1600 square foot modules. That became the kind of base building block of the whole kind of project. And the only time we needed to vary it was when we were looking at the design for the main living spaces. And for there, we needed dining space for the whole crew. And that could be up to 60 or 70 people in the summers. We needed to have dining space for them, we needed to have social space, place for them to watch TV, a whole sort of range of different recreational and sort of just like living type spaces. And for those, we couldn’t fit those into a standard module, we needed something quite a bit bigger. So for them, we invented a special double height, much larger module of around three and a half to 4000 square feet. So quite a bit bigger.

Angela
That’s very interesting. It has like, have a science fiction look. So, is the form of it or like the look driven mostly by this functional need and this need of being in this harsh environment? Or is there anything else that inspired the design?

Hugh
Obviously, the functional requirements come first. So, the ability to withstand the rising snow level, to be relocated, that drives the elevation and the ski bases. And the size, you know, of the building or the weight of the building became also important because they had to be pulled by bulldozers into a new site. And then we did when modeling and snow modeling to reduce the amount of snow drift that would build up around the buildings. But inevitably, there’s a kind of moment when you’re also developing the outside appearance. Yes, so we did look quite a bit at some of the kind of buildings in Star Wars for a few ideas and forms of inspiration.

Jessica
As we know, Antarctica is like such a harsh environment, but yet, many nations have built research stations there. And you have worked with the British, the Spanish, the Australian and the New Zealand teams. So why do you think is it so important to build like research bases and Antarctica?

Hugh
Well, a lot of the sort of systems which govern the Earth’s climate originate in the Antarctic. So, because of the kind of extremes of cold temperature, it sets up air currents that then drive marine currents that then determine how cold air and cold water moves around the planet. So, the weather systems that exist in the Antarctic, are central to weather systems, which exist all over the planet. So, understanding how they operate, and what the impact of climate change is on those systems is really important for understanding how the world is going to change as a result of climate change, and what we need to do in order to prevent some of those changes happening. So that’s why the research there is so important.

I mean, there is also a geopolitical angle to it as well. You know, everybody wants to be in Antarctica because everybody wants to understand what’s going to happen. Nobody wants to miss out on the knowledge of what’s going to happen. So, you know, that’s another reason why there are so many stations there. But I think, you know, the underlying reason for people being there is to understand, the sort of global Earth atmospheric systems, which are driving climate change.

Angela
That’s very interesting. So, talking about climate change, is there any considerations in the process of design that takes into consideration the impact on the environment in Antarctica?

Hugh
For sure, yeah. So obviously, in large part parts of Antarctica, the temperatures are rising. And in fact, on, I think it was on King George Island around two years ago, their maximum ever temperature in the Antarctic 18.5 degrees Celsius. So, you know, that’s the kind of temperature you’d expect in a very temperate kind of zone, not in the coldest place on Earth. So temperatures definitely around the Antarctic Peninsula in particular, are rising. And as a result, the kind of weather that’s taking place there is changing. So, you know, rain, for example, is now not uncommon in the Antarctic, whereas 50 years ago, it was almost unheard of. So, buildings need to be watertight, where previously they needed to be snow tight, or frost tight, but now they need to accommodate water running over the surface. Wind speeds are also changing in some places increasing, so they need to be more robust to deal with increased wind speeds. And then there’s also the risk of both sea level dropping, and also sea level rising. So now, whenever we’re looking at any of the coastal sites, we always work with the National Meteorological Office to try and gain some understanding of the behavior of sea level, to see whether the building is sitting in a safe enough position to account for 100 years of sea level rise, for example. So yeah, because it’s right at the kind of forefront, you know, of climate change in a way in the Antarctic, the changes are most severely felt in the Antarctic and the Arctic, it has a big impact on the way that the buildings are designed.

Jessica
Yeah, that is like a very thoughtful process of how to make the building actually, like resilient and adaptable to the changing conditions over time. And yeah,

Angela
I’m also kind of curious, so you mentioned earlier that you’re collaborating with an engineering company. Can you talk a little bit about how you cooperate with them?

Hugh
When we’re designing Antarctic research stations, it’s the engineering and the architecture are like totally hand in hand because you are so reliant on the engineering systems for your survival. So, whether that’s the robustness of the structure to withstand high wind speed, or whether it’s the resilience of the power generation systems to ensure that you’ve always got electricity. Because if you lose the electrical supply, then you probably will lose your ability to heat the building, and also your ability to produce water and treat sewage. So, making sure that we’ve got robustness in engineering systems that we’ve got redundancy in the engineering systems, and that we’ve got sufficient space to be able to adequately maintain them is really key to the whole successful operation of one of these research stations. So, you have to work very closely with the engineers to provide them with enough space to make sure you understand how all the systems work to in order to be able to design around those. So, and at the same time, you know, the more they work on these projects, the more they also have ideas about what is necessary to provide good space to support people’s physical and psychological wellbeing, whether that’s light, air quality, acoustic isolation, all the all these things, so there’s a lot of specialism that comes into the design process.

Jessica
With that, I’m just curious if there’s any surprising findings or like experiences during the development of the project?

Hugh
I guess there probably are, you know, just like you find what’s the thing that annoys people the most when they’re living in an Antarctic Station and you imagine it’s going to be the wind or the cold or something like that. And it isn’t. It’s people closing doors. They actually find the interruption to their sleep if somebody closing the door, and it just slams them, and they can hear it all the way down the corridor drives people completely mad. So, it’s kind of interesting, you know, just discovering that, actually, it’s very sort of normal human reactions to the environment, which drive people the most crazy. It’s not actually the cold or the wind, or the isolation. They come pretty well prepared for that. They’ve thought about it pretty hard. And then they get there and find it’s the normal things in life that still drive them crazy.

Angela
That’s very interesting. So during the process of design, did you get to work with some of the researchers that actually will live in this research station? Or do you just get to meet with them a little bit after you built the project?

Hugh
No, no, there’s the engagement with the people who live and work there. It is a really key part of the design process and we will do that right from the beginning, even before we come up with initial ideas, to find out what their requirements are, what are the things that make living in Antarctica positive experience, what are the negative experiences and so on, so that we can try to address as many of those in the design as we can. And you know, a key part of that is also visiting the sites of the existing stations to see them in operation, and taking lessons learned from those site visits and applying them to the designs of the new buildings.

Angela
Can you also tell us a little bit about how Halley ended up appearing in the movie “Where’d You Go, Bernadette?”

Hugh
Yeah, sure. So, so I don’t know if you’ve ever read that story. But the kind of basic premise of the story is that Bernadette is an architect who is kind of lost her way in life. And she is no longer inspired by the profession of architecture, or indeed, inspired by life as a whole. So, she decides to go on a tourist trip to Antarctica. When she’s there, she meets people who are running an Antarctic research station. And she tells them, she’s an architect, and they say, oh, we’ve got a big challenge, because we need to redesign our research station, please, can you help us? And so she rediscovers her kind of mojo by designing a research station on the back of her trip, her sort of tourist trip to Antarctica. So, as a result, the producers of the film got in touch with us and said, is there any way we could use your drawings and pretend that they were done by Cate Blanchett, who was the star of the movie? And so, we said, Yeah, fine. So, Cate Blanchett pretends to draw some sketches and they are actually the sketches that we did Halley VI.

Angela
That’s so interesting.

Jessica
As we also know, Hugh Broughton Architects also have a lot of beautiful projects on like art and culture, like heritage, commercial, education. And we’re kind of wondering if there’s like any lessons or takeaways, words, that’s like in harsh environments that could also be like applied on to like the mainstream architectural designs?

Hugh
Well, obviously, nowadays, there’s a strong environmental angle, which is always important in all projects. And I think some of these Antarctic projects are working at the sort of forefront of environmental sustainability. So, we try and cut down water usage, power usage, increase levels of air tightness, and insulation. So those are always good lessons to take to any project. But I think the main, sort of two areas are a concern for the occupants. So, you have to design very much around the requirements and the needs of the occupants. Now when we work on any project, we always really major in on engaging with those people who are going to use the projects to understand what their requirements are, so that we don’t end up with something that looks great on day one, but we end up with something that looks great for years and years afterwards.

And then the other area is just making sure that you understand how all the components fit together in terms of the construction, because when you’re designing in the Antarctic, if something goes wrong in terms of the construction, there’s very little opportunity to set it right, because there’s no hardware stores around the corner or anything like that. So, you’ve really got to test and prove that everything’s going to work well. And I think that same kind of attention to detail is what we bring also to the heritage projects.

But at the end of the day, they are kind of different. They are different areas. And they probably reflect different interests that we have within the practice. I guess that kind of concern for the individual and the end user is definitely a common theme between both project types and something which interests us a lot.

Angela
Can you tell us a little bit about what led you into the field of architecture?

Hugh
I don’t know. I guess it was just a little haphazard thing. I just used to enjoy drawing and then I discovered, oh that’s what architects are supposed to do, a lot of drawing. So, it seems like a fun career to get involved with. Then transpires that there are a lot of times that you don’t do drawing, you do drawing for a bit, and then you spend a lot of time just trying to make the projects actually happen.

Jessica
What would be some advices that you would give to like young architects or designers who was interested in working in like, either harsh environments or very specific fields?

Hugh
Yeah, ask every single question. Never be afraid to ask a foolish question, because there is no such thing. And always, when you think of an idea, try and think about what the reverse idea might be. So, try to turn everything around 180 degrees at least once, and to make sure that you’ve come up with the best solution.

Angela
Do you have any other really fun moments to share in your experience of working in Halley station and architecture in general?

Hugh
You know, it is a pretty unusual place to find yourself working as an architect. I never thought as an architect that in, in my job, I would end up you know, sitting amidst colonies of penguins, or watching whales out in the ocean, or visiting some of the incredible places that we’ve had to visit along the process of making these buildings. But I think that’s one of the great things about architecture, is that every now and then it takes you to really unusual places that you suddenly have to totally absorb yourself in and find out all about, and then you know everything about it. And then before you know it, you’re off to some other area of investigation to find out about it. So, it’s pretty varied like that. You know, that’s one of the great excitements of the profession.

Jessica
Yeah, I totally agree. Like one of the most amazing parts of architecture, it’s like, it has infinite possibilities. And it is exposing you to all sorts of different things that will amaze you.

Hugh
Never, never forget that the limits of a concept is only the limit of your own ideas. Just think of as many different ideas as you can and try them all out. There’ll never be a silly one.

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Jessica
We hope you enjoyed our episode! Please visit Longitude [dot] site for the transcript.

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