Culture & Kombucha
The site of the proposal is in Northenden, Manchester. It is an access point to the River Mersey and a congregational space for the local community, with a playground and small existing café already established on the site. For this reason, my proposal aims to keep the site as a communal space for humans but one that also enhances the local economy in a socially and environmentally sustainable way.
My proposal is centred around the production of kombucha. It looks holistically into the process, creating spaces for each step and ensuring by-products are collected and composted or manufactured into sellable goods.
The factory is the main production space in which the kombucha itself is brewed. It is a private space, with large windows allowing members of the public the opportunity to watch and learn about the production process.
The greenhouse is a public space, that serves to grow flavourings for the kombucha, such as pineapple and guava.
The workshop enables the SCOBY (Symbiotic Culture of Bacteria and Yeast) by-product of the brewing process to be transformed into ‘leather’ goods to be sold or exhibited in the gallery. Windows create a threshold for people to observe the growing and drying of the SCOBY ‘leather’.
To increase biodiversity on the site and create habitats, an orchard has been planted with a wildflower meadow. The symbiotic nature of the landscape ensures that pollinators have a habitat, in turn, pollinating the orchard trees that produce fruit for the kombucha.
The proposal explores how natural materials can be combined to create a proposal with low embodied carbon. Solar panels and a heat pump (sourced by the river) support passive strategies to reduce the operational energy.
I enjoy making physical models, so have used this medium to explore and define certain details within the proposal.
