Oliver Westgarth

A familiar face to those in the industry, Oliver Westgarth’s achievements were recognised when he was the winner of the Industry Professional of the Year award at the last Property and Construction awards in 2019.With the recent news of the demerger of CCD Architects, its former design director told us about his plans and ambitions for his new practice, StudiO Architecture + Design, and his journey to this point.

As design director at CCD, Oliver led his team on a range of highprofile community and arts projects, including the new ‘Children’s Library’, which is currently shortlisted for a RIBA design award; the complicated renovation of the Fermain Tower into boutique accommodation; and the recently completed Guille Allès ‘Story Tower’ project, which is proving popular not just for children’s storytelling but also as a wellbeing and meditation space in the heart of town.

Alongside those projects, he and his team have worked closely with a number of local third sector organisations seeking to bring about positive change in the island, including Art for Guernsey (particularly on their bid for the Tourism information Centre as an iconic art venue for Guernsey), community centre groups, the Soil Farm, the Literary Festival, the Sarah Groves Foundation and others. Those community projects are something the team certainly wants to continue to support, but exciting and visible as they are, the majority of their focus is on bespoke designled domestic buildings and houses.

“After more than a decade at CCD it’s a really thrilling time for me and the team – we’re enjoying the excitement of a start-up, whilst having the comfort of a skilled, tried and tested experienced team and lots of commissions. All of our clients have come with us and the market is currently busy so we have hit the ground running. It’s a good position to be in.

“There is a lot of potential in Guernsey and I have a number of exciting plans for the new studio, from its location to the services we’re offering.”

The new studio is called ‘StudiO Architecture + Design’. For Oliver

and his designers, it’s vital that the new studio has no particular set or prescribed style.

“StudiO’s design solutions are always unique and come from a very detailed focus on the client’s brief and an equally detailed understanding of the site or building. It is a considered and careful design process that leads to sensitive solutions to each brief, which are inevitably always as different as the individuals commissioning the project.

“Practically, this also tends to lead to a fairly straightforward planning process, even on projects that might otherwise appear risky. Whether you are looking at works to a protected building or a newbuild, I strongly believe that if you do the concept work correctly the system is set up to support you.”

The name of Oliver’s new practice may seem simple, but it’s very reflective of his ethos and what he wants it to offer. For him, the use of the word ‘studio’ is crucial.

“I regard us as an all-round creative studio. Solid architectural practice is, of course, our backbone but a studio has more creative, storytelling connotations to it. It’s how my colleagues and I undertake the design process so I want to promote and develop that further.”

Including ‘design’ in the business’s name is also no accident. Oliver and his design team have all trained and qualified as Chartered Architects, but say they consider themselves designers first and foremost, with their professional and technical knowledge supporting that.

“Architecture is about so much more than just buildings, it’s primarily about people and ‘story’. You can’t strip it down to mere professional or logical processes, nor the technicalities.

“Despite shelter being the most basic of human needs, architecture is utterly tied up with our psychology and philosophies. Of course you need the technical skills and the professional process to deliver it, but creativity is what brings the magic. I believe, and have seen, that everyone, without exception, appreciates it when they experience it.”

While good architecture and design and what it means is clearly a subject Oliver feels passionate about, he doesn’t prize aesthetics, or concepts, over practicality. In fact, his unusual background with a wealth of handson, practical experience has given him a thorough understanding of what is required technically, financially and logistically from projects.

“I didn’t take the straightforward route to qualifying as a Chartered Architect. Throughout and after my schooling in the UK I worked parttime jobs in the construction industry, usually as a bottom rung labourer, shoved into an attic space covered in fibreglass, up a scaffold with a kango or mixing concrete, and I loved it.

“After post school travels, I went to Oxford Brookes and completed a three year undergraduate degree in Architecture which began to open my eyes to the beauty and breadth of the profession, particularly in a design and conceptual sense. Once you’ve completed your degree you then need a minimum year in practice, usually as an intern, before returning to take a postgraduate qualification. However, the industry is notorious for taking more than its pound of flesh, and I wanted to be active and handson, not stuck in front of a screen or making tea”

After a helpful introduction from a local architect, Oliver met a man called Monty Ravenscroft, on a rainy day in a ‘greasy spoon’ café in South London, and a lifelong friendship was born.

ARCHITECTURE IS ABOUT SO MUCH MORE THAN JUST BUILDINGS, IT’S PRIMARILY ABOUT PEOPLE AND ‘STORY’

“Monty is a designer of some of the world’s best moving glazed elements in architecture, as such he had lots of very talented architect friends, who had helped him plan an innovative building, squeezed into a dead bit of land in Peckham.

“However, design detail was relatively light and Monty had no builder for the project and couldn’t afford anyone experienced or sane to get involved. So he employed me and I was grandly appointed foreman… my site office, at first, was quite literally a portaloo!”

The project caught the attention of Grand Designs, which featured the build. In fact, even after all these years, the project remains one of Kevin McCloud’s most memorable houses.

“It was an absolute baptism of fire for me. It took almost two years managing a large and motley crew of tradesmen, as well as physically building the house. I undertook much of the detailed design as we went, and it was all innovative and unusual. I loved the hands-on work and the camaraderie. I learned so much from Monty, the other more experienced architects in the background and the tradesman. It remains a milestone in my life, showing what’s possible against apparent odds and exposing me to the meeting of the conceptual and practical which is at the root of architecture.”

Once complete Oliver continued to run a small building team, mostly working on conservation projects across the UK, for friends or family, but a year or so later he ended up in Italy.

“I wanted to explore the other end of the spectrum and try something more corporate. I was still in my mid 20s and all options were open. One thing led to another and I moved to Rome, washed, shaved, threw on a sharp suit, jumped on a red Vespa and began a role as a commercial agent at CBRE, the world’s largest commercial real estate and investment agency. Rome was fantastic. I learnt Italian, loved life and remained happily for almost two years working on huge projects, from Warner Brothers’ HQ, to commercial cinemas, malls and hotels, but as time passed I realised I wanted to be much more up close and personal with the architecture.

“My one year in practice had now grown to over four when the opportunity cropped up to take me back in the direction I wanted. Work boots went back on and I reassembled some of the team, and we undertook a major extension and renovation of a protected farmhouse [Maison Frie au Four], in Guernsey this time. This was my first fully solo designed project which I also got to build, it was full of innovative details and the end result was very satisfying, although the challenges of trying to be both architect and contractor were clear, I was building by day and drafting by night and it took its toll.”

By the time the project was complete Oliver had decided it was time to complete the second stage of an architect’s formal qualifications and focus on the architecture over the building work. Now classified as a mature student, and itching to study, he went back to London and two years later left the University of Westminster with a postgraduate distinction. There he had studied within the acclaimed DS15 group, led by Professor Sean Griffiths (founding member of FAT) and Professor Kester Rattenbury (critic and architectural author).

“In DS15 I met and studied with some fascinating and creative thinkers in architecture, it represents another milestone for me in terms of my own development. A lot of my thinking around the process, from micro to macro, from a door detail to a citywide master plan, developed at this time.”

In the meantime, Oliver’s Maison Frie au Four project had caught CCD’s attention in Guernsey and he and his partner moved to Guernsey in 2010. He became a director of CCD in 2011, with a number of projects, including his own award-winning family home at Le Mont Saint, following over the past decade. Now, a new chapter opens with StudioO, with many more interesting projects no doubt to come.