HAT Projects designs Hastings’ Jerwood Gallery

HAT Projects was appointed to the project about four years ago by Hastings Borough Council and the Jerwood Foundation, having worked with the foundation on early stages of developing the brief for the project.

Alongside housing artworks, the gallery space will also include a venue for the Jerwood Visual Arts programme, a charity initiative that supports emerging artists, and space for use from local schools, colleges and community groups.

HAT Projects is responsible for masterplanning the site and designing the gallery, though Tim Ronalds Architects is designing other spaces within the site, such as the public spaces, café and community facilities.

HAT is also designing the gallery signage, which takes on the identity and exhibition graphics created for the gallery by Rose Design.

The design ‘has grown out of a response to the particular requirements of the Jerwood Collection and the character of the site’, according to the gallery.

The gallery is split into collection galleries, containing seven rooms, and the large Foreshore gallery.

Hana Loftus, HAT Projects co-founder, says, ‘We tried to create a series of rooms which the client has nicknamed “grand domestic” in feel – it’s the feeling of a sequence of smaller rooms. These are contrasted with the exhibition space in the Foreshore gallery which is a much larger, more contemporary space.’

She adds, ‘The main thing we tired to bring through is that the visitor experience is a journey and an exploration.’

The Jerwood Gallery is due to open on 17 March.