ADS2: National Park
Daisy Bendrey
Daisy graduated from Canterbury School of Architecture with a First Class Honours degree in 2017. Whilst at Canterbury she was given the opportunity to partake in the exchange programme and enjoyed half of her second year at the University of Technology, Sydney, Australia (UTS). After graduation Daisy moved back home to the West Country for a year to work with Stonewood Design, a young practice based in Bath. Whilst at Stonewood she was involved in numerous varied projects. Including a school, a garden museum and community housing. She also enjoyed leading the production of display models of all their key projects.
Her final project explores her own personal ties with the timber industry having grown up in constant close promimity to the family-run sawmill.
A Reinterpretation of Cookworthy Forest
The Rhythm of Forestry impact upon the form and character of neighbouring towns. The impact can be profound but also destructive - can we evolve a new relationship between town and forest that leaves a deliberate legacy?
Cookworthy forest, forming a chunk of Forestry Commission land is a working landscape with trees recently being felled (February 2020). Their remains, in the form of log piles and scarred landscapes are present everywhere. Cookworthy Forest is part of the West Devon Forest covering 1,826 acres of Public Forest Estate woodland between Holsworthy and Okehampton. Most of the forest is conifer plantation dominated by spruce, with numerous belts of broadleaves, scrub and open spaces running through. Taking aims laid out by a local initiative between 2001-2009 including identifying how woodlands contribute towards broader biodiversity the proposal looks to create a more biodiverse forest. Tree species are nursed by other tree species encouraging the development of further conversations between forests and timber industries enabling better grounding to predict tree trends. Through better understanding of planting methods a reduction in timber waste occurs allowing trees to be marketed fairly based on actual worth instead of market fluctuations.
Using the felled fields and local timber the proposal aims to build and develop a ‘wood village’ amongst the constraints of an industrial forest. The scheme also proposes a series of adaptable buildings which firstly help service the forest; a space where the trees can be stored and processed for later use. And secondly a space that can be successfully inhabited by the locals who now live amongst the trees. The first houses are erected where the trees have been felled. Eventually the site is cleared with a few more trees than usual left to allow the site to feel mature. The project takes inspiration from Ralph Erskine’s portrayal of forest living for industry workers in Jädraås near Sandviken, Sweden. The Cookworthy proposal places the houses on the periphery of the felled fields allowing a variation of views from the wild forest to the manicured community side offering a rural living framework that also utilises these felled fields.
