hold
An architecture and research practice
working on access to space for
cultural and collective use.
London, 2024—
We work between people who have space and people who need it, exploring temporary occupation, lightweight spatial interventions and pathways to longer-term stewardship.
Is your WhatsApp popping off? Does your social life move from venue to venue? Are you part of a group that exists everywhere and nowhere at once?
Socialising today isn't as simple as going to the pub, and in many ways culture is better for it. People increasingly come together through networks, shared interests and identities that aren't tied to a permanent place. When those groups meet physically, they often do so in temporary, borrowed or meanwhile spaces.
Conventional architecture usually arrives once the site, client and brief already exist. Stakehold is interested in what happens before that — when a group is looking for somewhere to gather, access is being negotiated and the possibilities of a space are still open.
Through live projects and research, we are testing how short-term access can create opportunities for cultural activity now, and how, when the conditions are right, temporary occupation can help build a case for something more lasting.
Stakehold is at an early stage. This site is a working document — a note about what we are doing and what we are looking for, rather than a record of completed work.
The images above are from EASA Commons, Sheffield 2023. They are shown as evidence of prior experience rather than as Stakehold projects.
First live projects are currently in development.
Ridealgh
His work spans community-led development, cultural infrastructure and questions of access to land and space. Stakehold brings together research into community-owned pubs, experience organising EASA Commons and professional work in regeneration and civic infrastructure at Architecture 00.
The nature of cultural projects today means working with a broad range of people across different projects. Lots of people work freelance, bringing different skills in as and when they're needed, and that's increasingly just the reality of how cultural projects happen.
Stakehold will work in a similar way, building teams around particular spaces and projects rather than pretending to be a fixed multidisciplinary practice.