Re-Activating Craft, MA Material Futures: Central Saint Martins (October to December 2024). This is a challenge of discovery, connoisseurship, intervention and refinement. Explore and discover this craft from the inside out. Experience and explore skills and practices which you are not familiar with but which require a high level of training and refinement. Become a connoisseur of this craft. Infiltrate its world and become at one with its materials, experts and experiences. Engage with, visit, learn from and collaborate with expert crafters. Create an intervention that disrupts the traditional craft systems, that may change, challenge, revive, restore, rethink or develop this craft. Re-Activating Craft, MA Material Futures: Central Saint Martins (October to December 2024). This is a challenge of discovery, connoisseurship, intervention and refinement. Explore and discover this craft from the inside out. Experience and explore skills and practices which you are not familiar with but which require a high level of training and refinement. Become a connoisseur of this craft. Infiltrate its world and become at one with its materials, experts and experiences. Engage with, visit, learn from and collaborate with expert crafters. Create an intervention that disrupts the traditional craft systems, that may change, challenge, revive, restore, rethink or develop this craft. Re-Activating Craft, MA Material Futures: Central Saint Martins (October to December 2024). This is a challenge of discovery, connoisseurship, intervention and refinement. Explore and discover this craft from the inside out. Experience and explore skills and practices which you are not familiar with but which require a high level of training and refinement. Become a connoisseur of this craft. Infiltrate its world and become at one with its materials, experts and experiences. Engage with, visit, learn from and collaborate with expert crafters. Create an intervention that disrupts the traditional craft systems, that may change, challenge, revive, restore, rethink or develop this craft. Re-Activating Craft, MA Material Futures: Central Saint Martins (October to December 2024). This is a challenge of discovery, connoisseurship, intervention and refinement. Explore and discover this craft from the inside out. Experience and explore skills and practices which you are not familiar with but which require a high level of training and refinement. Become a connoisseur of this craft. Infiltrate its world and become at one with its materials, experts and experiences. Engage with, visit, learn from and collaborate with expert crafters. Create an intervention that disrupts the traditional craft systems, that may change, challenge, revive, restore, rethink or develop this craft. Re-Activating Craft, MA Material Futures: Central Saint Martins (October to December 2024). This is a challenge of discovery, connoisseurship, intervention and refinement. Explore and discover this craft from the inside out. Experience and explore skills and practices which you are not familiar with but which require a high level of training and refinement. Become a connoisseur of this craft. Infiltrate its world and become at one with its materials, experts and experiences. Engage with, visit, learn from and collaborate with expert crafters. Create an intervention that disrupts the traditional craft systems, that may change, challenge, revive, restore, rethink or develop this craft. Re-Activating Craft, MA Material Futures: Central Saint Martins (October to December 2024). This is a challenge of discovery, connoisseurship, intervention and refinement. Explore and discover this craft from the inside out. Experience and explore skills and practices which you are not familiar with but which require a high level of training and refinement. Become a connoisseur of this craft. Infiltrate its world and become at one with its materials, experts and experiences. Engage with, visit, learn from and collaborate with expert crafters. Create an intervention that disrupts the traditional craft systems, that may change, challenge, revive, restore, rethink or develop this craft.
Whitechapel Bell Foundry
The Whitechapel Bell Foundry, established in 1570 in London, was one of the oldest and most renowned bell-making establishments in the world. It produced iconic bells such as Big Ben and the Liberty Bell, becoming a symbol of British craftsmanship and heritage. Despite its illustrious history, the foundry faced challenges from declining demand for new bells, rising operational costs, and changing urban landscapes. In 2017, after over four centuries of continuous operation, the foundry closed its doors, leaving its historic site at the heart of a contentious debate over its preservation and future use. The fate of the foundry remains uncertain, with its facade still in disrepair and covered in graffiti.
Before designing The Clapper, I wanted to focus my project on finding another use for the Whitechapel Bell Foundry. Bells generate collective movement and awareness, resonating with symbolic and emotional power. I wanted to reimagine the bell in a symbolic way, proposing transitional or permanent uses for the abandoned foundry to enrich the neighborhood’s creative community.
“[...] neighborhood communities are in decline; this is partly due to decreasing engagement with once ubiquitous social gathering points such as religious services and partly due to funding being stripped from local services and amenities. [...] finding ways to connect with others has never been more important. [...] designers who seek to use material as a method of connection are engineering scenarios, locally and internationally, in which people can exchange and share knowledge and ideas and, particularly, pool their skills” (Kate Franklin & Caroline Till, 2018, p.110-111).
I began modeling the foundry both virtually in Rhino and physically using cardboard, based on a 3D scan of the building's facade and a ground floor plan I found online. Initially, I envisioned converting the building into a multidisciplinary makerspace, but my focus shifted to exploring ways of evoking its potential future through semiotics, using visual codes to suggest what could happen next. I also imagined modular installations that would provide a safe, transitional space for knowledge exchange and collaboration, allowing users to occupy the building while its future remained uncertain. However, after sharing my ideas, I realized that creating a project for the community without involving the community was a flawed approach. Struggling to materialize the concept at the intended scale, I ultimately decided to pivot toward designing The Clapper.
I still value the insights and knowledge I gained during this phase of my project. There’s a strong possibility I’ll revisit the Whitechapel Bell Foundry case in the future, as it offers an exciting opportunity to connect material and spatial design with architecture.
Inspiring work and useful resources included: 3D scan of the Whitechapel Bell Foundry Facade, artletch (2019); Whitechapel Bell Foundry ground-floor plan, Helen Jones (2016); inside photography of the Whitechapel Bell Foundry, Bryan Jones (2017): displayed above; The bells v the boutique hotel: the battle to save Britain’s oldest factory – podcast, Hettie O’Brien (2021); The Last Bell, Henri Stuart (2017); The London Bell Foundry, (2016); Radical Matter, Kate Franklin & Caroline Till (2018).
© Antoine Léger 2025