Structure and Space (Giles & Pike Architects)

Structure and Space traces the 35-year history of London-based practice Giles & Pike Architects, whose diverse body of work has consistently evolved around the “form follows function” logic of Louis Sullivan. This publication showcases a curated selection of the practice’s most celebrated projects including the Amerland Road House, the Weybridge House and Thurleigh Road House, and contains essays about the practice penned by acclaimed architectural historians and critics such as Dominic Bradbury and Paul Finch. Furthermore, Structure and Space shines a light on the unique story of Matt Giles and Tom Pike’s partnership, allowing the modernist principles informing their work to be discovered through generous full-spread photographs and plans as well as exclusive in-studio interviews. Beginning in the mid-1980s and stemming from Tom Pike’s initial involvement in designing architectural interiors for clients such as advertising agencies, film companies and fashion houses, the practice began making waves with its residential work in the 1990s and launched headlong into this sector following Matt Giles joining the practice in 2000. Since the millennium, Giles & Pike Architects has established an unassailable reputation for its expertise in producing clean-cut modernist schemes in the residential sector, building largely in London and occasionally outside the capital. Despite a 22-year age difference, both principals adopt a design aesthetic that stems from a shared Bauhaus-based education and a deep-seated investment in the modern movement and aesthetic. The work of Giles & Pike Architects follows a fundamental belief that good ideas for buildings are generated from a firm understanding of the brief and the programme for the building, rather than simply “designing for design's sake”.