Waiting room

An abandoned room, entirely coated in white paint, sits waiting to be destroyed. The location is the St Philip’s Building in London, which was signed off for demolition yesterday.

Designer Dominic Wilcox was tasked alongside a number of other illustrators, artists and designers to respond to the building in any way they wished in a quickly organised exhibition to mark the life of the St Philip’s Building.

Starting out its life as a workhouse infirmary for the poor in 1903, the building, which is owned by the London School of Economics, is being demolished to make way for new student facilities.

Wilcox thought up the design for the installation during a visit to the site and passing an abandoned, completely intact locked office. He says, ‘All the other rooms had been cleared out so I thought “that’s strange”, it sort of looked like it was waiting to die.’

Wilcox then set about covering everything in white paint, using spray to fill in the particularly tiny gaps. ‘I kept going back to the paint shop saying to myself “this will be the last pot”,’ he laughs.

The keys have been handed over the to the demolishers now but you can still explore the building by watching the film below.