Stefanie Fischer
Practice: Burrell Foley Fischer LLP
Established: 1982
City: London
Country: United Kingdom
www.bff-architects.co.uk
[email protected]
Stefanie Fischer studied Architecture at the University of Cambridge, joined Burrell Foley Associates, a young emerging practice, as an associate in 1982, and became a partner in 1985.
Stefanie's expertise includes independent cinema design, and she has provided consultancy services to the British Film Institute and UK Film Council, contributed to a research project looking at the potential for digital cinema to provide access to film in under-serviced areas and designed Kino Hawkhurst, the first all-digital cinema in the UK.
She has worked on capital projects for national academies including The Royal Society, The Academy of Medical Sciences and Royal Academy of Engineering, involving the creative reuse of significant historic buildings.
She assists with training future generations of architects, acting as an employment mentor and as a professional and external examiner at a number of architectural schools, and has contributed to the work of national advisory committees.
Burrell Foley Fischer LLP
Scala Cinema & Arts Centre, Prestatyn
The Scala Cinema & Arts Centre project aims to help revitalise the town centre and provides access once again to film on a site with strong local memories of cinema-going. In addition to a 150-seat cinema, it provides access to new social and training facilities, exhibition spaces, meeting and training rooms and a flexible multi-use auditorium suited not only to cinema exhibition but performing arts, dance and exercise classes, fairs and markets.
| Do you think our profession is diverse enough? | Architecture, as a profession, suffers in the UK from the under representation of women architects and architects with ethnically diverse backgrounds. Schools advice, work-placement opportunities for school children in architects' offices, recruitment on merit, payment of a living wage to trainee architects, mentoring within offices to build up confidence and the management of architectural businesses to avoid a long-hours culture can all assist in widening access to architecture as a career and improving retention within the profession. |
| If you could change one thing in our profession, what would it be? | The spinelessness of Principals in architectural practice, who secure work on low fees irrespective of the impact on working practices, levels of remuneration, any sense of social responsibility or quality of design and services. The strength of a profession is collective values and shared knowledge and experience. |
| How have your clients and projects benefited from your involvement? | The practice works primarily for end-user clients, rather than speculative developers, who value good communication skills and a focus on client aspirations and requirements, which can significantly enhance engagement with the project and satisfaction with the completed building. The Crucible, for example, required close consultation throughout the brief formulation and design development with the different theatre departments, to ensure their complex needs were met, and with end users, major funders, access groups and Friends of the Crucible. |