UCL Pearl

“The human brain combines all our sensory input, to create our overall perception of the environment. Most of these sensory inputs are beyond our conscious awareness, and PEARL is the only place in the world that studies the symbiosis, synergy and synchronicity between the brain’s multi-sensorial perceptions and urban design, to comprehend how this connectivity works.” -- Professor Nick Tyler Humans act based on their perception of the world; this was the philosophy that drove the design of UCL’s one-of-a-kind research facility, PEARL–the Person Environment Activity Research Laboratory. The facility’s objective is to create a world where everyone can experience an improved quality of life through better design of the environment, using an evidence-based understanding of how people interact with it, for a more accessible and sustainable future. With a floor area of 4,000m2, a volume of 44,000m3, and at 10m high with 40m clear structural spans, the laboratory space was designed and engineered to house hugely varied research experiments. Also equipped with indoor ambient environments and sound systems, the laboratory can test the impact of environmental conditions, such as space, colour, lighting, smell, visibility, appearance, touch and sound on people’s behaviour and perception – bringing experiment conditions as close to real-life scenarios as possible. The laboratory interior is black, and the background sound level and reverberation are very low–core aspects of the building’s design–intended to remove people’s sense of ‘being in a building’. A series of gridded rigs, made from theatre-style trusses, are suspended from the primary steel structure, accommodating specialist lighting, speakers, other equipment props and cameras and sensors. To the NW corner is the ‘Groove’, a free-standing two-storey cross-laminated timber structure that houses the public entrance, community-facing facilities, workshops and highly flexible academic workspaces. Directly connected to the lab space is a workshop and maker space facility for small scale testing, prototyping and manufacturing of experiment equipment, and a sound preparation studio where the soundscapes for experiments can be researched and created. Externally, the building’s form and materials relate to the site’s industrial architectural heritage; crisp detailing and weathered steel provide a contemporary twist. The scalloped west facade references the roof form of its Grade II Listed neighbour, one of the first examples of shell concrete structure in the UK. 9m high, rusted steel panels fan out across the frontage, providing shading and signaling the entrance to PEARL. Perforations in the steel bring a sense of movement to the façade and let dappled light into the building. A triangular forecourt to the south-west of the building will enable some of PEARL’s larger experiments, providing space to store tube/train carriages while not being used in the lab, and a decommissioned aircraft fuselage. The client’s initial space brief required twice the area the budget could cover. Through a rigorous process of testing the brief against the site and cost plan, extensive stakeholder consultation and imaginative space planning, we introduced significant spatial efficiencies to reduce the overall building area from 10,329m2 to c. 5,800m2.