Beth Elen Roberts

The Thames Estuary has been the final resting place for thousands of ships; caught out by storms, shifting sandbanks, and the guns of enemy fighters; the Kentish coast having the largest concentration of shipwrecks in the world.

This project was conceived as a space that connects the island back to the sea. It does this through reworking the existing building and the site to create the Thames Ship Lab; a space where wrecks are excavated from the seabed, and brought to the building to be analysed, researched and preserved. This material is contextualised in an exhibition, choreographed to correspond to each stage of the laboratory’s conservation processes.

In order to reinforce and expose the fragility of the existing building, both in its condition, but also how Sheppey, a swampy island, is constructed like Venice, atop timber piles, the main intervention takes the form of a deep excavation. The interior of the ruined church is dug down four stories deep. This move reinforces the archaeological dimensions of the lab’s work; with fragile artefacts re-submerged into the depths to be worked upon, alluding to the surrounding dockyard, once built upon the skeletal remains of decommissioned ship hulks.

As visitors enter the church, they are surprised to find that the ground falls away before them, revealing a four-storey vertical laboratory, animated with workers, technicians and exhibition-goers. The dynamism of this space is extended through the action of a crane, fixed to the roof, delivering artefacts from a new canal beside the building, allowing direct passage between site and sea.

The new laboratory enables visitors to learn from not just the island but also the sea that surrounds it, engaging them in a subterranean excavation of the unseen archaeology that is hidden all around them, a celebration of Sheppey’s rich and bountiful maritime history.

This short hand-drawn animation captures the journey taken by a shipwreck, salvaged from the Kentish coast into the Thames Ship Lab in Sheerness.

At the mouth of the Thames Estuary we find the new Thames Ship Lab on the Isle of Sheppey. This film, documents the design process, transforming the existing Dockyard Church into a new Maritime Archaeology lab.

*Awarded Best Film + Animation by the School of Architecture*
*Nominated for the Dean's Prize 2020*

A shallow pool of water and the skeletal keel of a salvaged boat sit beside the entrance to the building, a tantalising preview of the lab’s contents. A thin, cor-ten steel structure is bent above the path, to enhance the transition from a narrow space into the striking, hollowed out interior.

Upon entering the lab, a lift will plunge visitors into the depths of the atrium, where the public exhibition begins.

A canal will be constructed to connect the church directly to the sea, for the safe passage of boats and their findings to the lab, a crane transferring this material in and out of the building. Here, we see a shipwreck precariously strapped together, being delivered from a research vessel onto the site.

The second image, shows us the first floor of the church interior, where research laboratories overlook the vast atrium, a glass panelled roof casting natural light and dancing shadows into the vast, excavated space. This roof will open and close to receive and dispatch artefacts, and is designed to mimic the skeletal frame of a ship hulk.

Having entered the church, this is the first view to greet visitors. Standing on the viewing balcony, they are surprised to find that the ground falls away before them to reveal a large, excavated four-storey space. The central atrium will be served by a crane fixed to the roof, which will submerge material, delivered from the neighbouring canal deep into the lab to be worked upon. This space will be animated by hydraulic gangways and an adjustable roof.

In this instance, a crane is seen to be lowering a wreck cautiously into the void.

A technician surveys the laboratory from a viewing gallery beneath the magnificent chancel arch, the tower looming ominously beyond the glass panelled roof. The exhibition is designed to reveal the artefacts at their most vulnerable; unpolished, raw and tactile, some exhibited on the crates they were delivered on, suspended from rigging, or held together by ratchet straps, shown with the intention of exposing the delicate process of returning the material to its former condition.

In the second illustration, a young boy examines cannons suspended in vacuum-drying containers. The clean, back lit, glass lockers are a direct contrast to the building's industrial, steel insertion.

At the lowest viewing platform, from what could be described as the exhibition’s ‘sea-bed’, visitors survey the dramatic wreck, now submerged into the building, dripping, fragile and strapped to the steel columns, ready to be worked upon.

At the base of the lab, workers busily tend to desalination containers below the wreck, lit by industrial spotlights. This is a crucial stage of the conservation process, where artefacts are soaked in a chemical solution, stabilising the material and removing salt; a process that can take anywhere between a couple of months to a year.

The sound of the work undertaken; of machinery, tools, creaking wood and steel-capped boots on metal grates, will echo through the cavernous space, enhancing what could become a highly theatrical experience.

A split section of the building reveals an animated space, full of activity; from visitors surveying the wreck to research laboratories, archives, workshops, drawing spaces and suspended artefacts. Light streams into the atrium and activates the dark, excavated space.

At certain times, the glass-fronted labs will be projected onto, animating the space further with survey maps and drawings. On the right-hand side, we see the exposed canal with its water lapping against the exterior wall, providing direct contact between site and sea.