Showcase 2025 Student Spotlight: Charlie Hall
Student Spotlight featuring BArch Architecture student Charlie Hall and his project 'Fragments of Tomorrow'.
By Jon Duckworth | Published on 15 April 2025
Categories: Student Showcase; School of Architecture, Design and the Built Environment;
The Project
Fragments of Tomorrow assumes climate collapse not as a distant threat but as a condition of the present. The scheme creates a journey of revelation and contrast through the "fragments of tomorrow", seeking to immerse users in an experiential confrontation with environmental crisis, forcing users to navigate a landscape of transience and solastalgia.
Charlie describes the experience thus:
"Newark Castle, once a medieval stronghold, becomes a site of last refuge, a desperate attempt to construct a future in the ruins of the past. The project manifests as a museum, yet it is not merely a repository of loss. It is an active participant in its own narrative of decline, serving secondarily as a meteorological observatory wherein climate data can be retrieved and displayed live. This is a structure caught in aporia, both an archive of climate collapse and a part of its unfolding.
"From a distance, the bastion appears fortified, unyielding, absolute, destructively piercing the fabric of the site. Up close, this illusion dissolves; the structure is neither whole nor broken, neither ruin nor refuge. Space strains against the weight of responsibility, rupturing and shearing, allowing sunlight to carve exposure through shelter, allowing storms to trace paths through the building. The walls erode in real time.
"Spaces between reveal glimpses of what was. The landscape, untouched, framed by fissure. These views are ghosts of the present, memories of the future. Each moment of clarity is also a moment of mourning.
"As disaster breaches, the museum mutates. The disaster relief exhibition is no longer speculative, it is activated. The observer becomes the subject. Walls give way, creating refuge for those displaced by the very forces it sought to document.
"This is not a place of remembrance, nor of reconciliation. It does not promise salvation, or certainty. Fragments of Tomorrow is a palimpsest of collapse.
"A ruin still standing. A stronghold already falling.
"It is the last attempt at control in a world that has long since slipped beyond our grasp."
Charlie seeks to immerse users in an experiential confrontation with environmental crisis,.
The inspiration behind the project
It was Charlie's longstanding interest in meteorology that provided the impetus for this project. Charlie is fascinated by both the processes that govern meteorology and the profound ways it shapes community and culture. Through this exploration he became aware of what he sees as the UK's complacency in preparedness for climate change. It compelled him to design a building that not only responds to that crisis but engages with it.
Charlie says: "Conceptually, my work is rooted in deconstructivism, a branch of conceptualist architectural thinking that embraces fragmentation and instability often informed by many external influences layered on top of one another to create an abstraction of a place or an idea. Peter Eisenman’s technique of layering site "traces" informed my approach to abstraction, allowing Newark Castle's historical and environmental narratives to shape the design. Likewise, Daniel Libeskind's response to complex history and heritage assets set a precedent for how my project would represent climate collapse in a purposeful way at such an important site. Herzog and de Meuron’s Tate Modern, with its Turbine Hall and elevated walkways, directly influenced the spatial and experiential composition of my proposal.
"Beyond architecture, my work is informed by conceptual art and exhibition design. Olafur Eliasson's The Weather Project (2003) demonstrated how atmospheric conditions can be utilised to evoke emotional response, while Lebbeus Woods' speculative drawings challenged conventional notions of architecture, inspiring me to explore the limits of architectural permanence. These influences converge in a project that not only archives climate collapse but allows users to experience its unfolding in real time."
Conceptually, Charlie's work is rooted in deconstructivism.
The project experience
Charlie considers working on his project to have been equally challenging and rewarding.
"It’s very different to anything I’ve designed before and I have learned new things at every stage. It allowed me to think critically about architecture's role in climate crisis, not just as a form of shelter but as a tool for awareness and an object that can represent broader ideas found externally to architecture. Balancing concept with technical resolution was a particular challenge which has taught me how to translate abstract ideas into tangible spaces."
The project provided the challenge of translating abstract ideas into tangible spaces.
Being part of NTU
Charlie says: "It has been amazing to be surrounded by friends who love architecture. The passion of my peers and tutors has inspired me to continuously develop as a designer. Additionally I have been involved with many amazing opportunities and experiences that have kept me motivated in the subject. I have developed a broad range of skills that are highly transferrable across all aspects of my life. These include technical skills like learning how to use software and make models, research and critical thinking skills for academic writing and analysis, communication skills and techniques for presentation, and soft skills like confidence, teamwork and leadership. All of these can be applied outside of architecture, opening many doors for the future."
For Charlie, a memorable highlight came in his second year when his housing scheme (part of the Sites of Hybridity project) was selected, alongside 14 others, to be exhibited at ILKON, a contemporary art gallery in Ilkeston founded by RIBA President Elect Chris Williamson. "Setting up the exhibition was such a fun experience," says Charlie, "and incredibly rewarding!"
Charlie Hall - BArch (Hons) Architecture
Closing remarks
Charlie tells prospective Architecture students to explore as much as they can. "Each project presents so much opportunity to push boundaries and think outside of the box and the more you do this, the more rewarding it will be to look back on at the end. The challenging nature of the course is vastly outweighed by the number of opportunities and doors that it opens. There is never a dull moment because you are always learning, collaborating and creating."