‘No longer viable’ TDO shuts its doors as founders start afresh

TDO Milestones

2010 Studio founded
2013 Forest Pond House, a plywood, glass and copper structure designed and built by the practice for £7,500, is shortlisted for the AJ Small Projects Award
2015 Work completes on a new-build house on Old Church Street, a narrow, mid-terraced plot on one of Chelsea’s oldest streets
2018  Wraps taken off TDO’s modular, factory-built Fab House in North Shields for developer Urban Splash, designed in collaboration with architect and TV presenter George Clarke
2020 Wins approval for first modular rooftop keyworker housing for developer Skyroom
2022 Completes adaptive reuse of redundant Southwark railway arches; the £460,000 Ewer Street scheme; and £340,000 Redcross Way project
2023 £20 mllion redevelopment and retrofit of Great Suffolk Yard in Southwark, south London, completes

Statement from Tom Lewith and Doug Hodgson

founding directors of New-works (and formerly founding directors of TDO)

As the AJ has reported in recent weeks, the profession is facing ‘difficult and uncertain times’. Our experience running TDO has led us to conclude that fundamental change is coming for all but the smallest and largest architecture practices, forcing the profession to move away from the prevalent all-services model towards specialism and collaboration.

We started TDO in 2010. Fourteen years on, with a portfolio of buildings of which we are incredibly proud, including Forest Pond House, Old Church Street, the Modern House offices, FAB House, Great Suffolk Yard and Low Line arches; and having grown our studio to a team of 15 at its largest, we are closing our all-services architectural practice.

We feel really fortunate to have worked with highly talented individuals, and for our projects to have been so well received.

We’ve been spurred on by the accolades, not least our selection in the AJ 40 under 40, which shone a light on our ambitions to be at the forefront of the next generation of architects embracing MMC, which we see as critical in addressing the climate crisis.

There’ve been too many occasions where our future hung in the balance

We feel that the financially precarious nature of all-services architecture practice is no longer viable or sustainable for smaller studios such as ours, as the world is now.

There have been too many occasions in the last few years where our future hung in the balance; where the studio was relying too heavily on a single client’s decision to proceed with a project, or a planning committee agreeing to grant consent.

It is a stressful way to run a business but seemingly not uncommon among peers and fellow practice founders whom we admire.

Ultimately the numbers will show the end of TDO has been brought about by a combination of projects stopping or experiencing delays, combined with the ongoing need to financially sustain a relatively expensive all-services operation.

We have proactively decided to close TDO and pursue a different model of practice with a new studio, New-works. Acting now has ensured our colleagues received full redundancy notice and pay, as well as allowing all of us the time to reach out to our professional networks to help secure their next jobs.

We’re tired by the ever increasing burden on architects

The whole process has energised us into making change. We feel tired by the confrontational, adversarial nature of getting buildings built; what feels like an ever increasing burden on architects; and the need to be an expert in more and more subjects, policies and regulations.

The demands on the profession have changed so much since we trained but the prevailing model of architectural practice is not evolving at the same pace. The intensifying climate crisis, the Building Safety Act, the advent of AI and the need to address a deepening mental health and wellbeing crisis in the profession is awakening us to a need to move away from the established model of all-services architectural practice towards specialisation.

In the future we see smaller, concept-focused practices leading project design through Stages 0-3+, with delivery practices taking over the lead design role through Stages 4-7. We believe it will be important for both concept and delivery practices to be involved throughout and share the role of the architect from start to finish: the early stage design can learn from the delivery architect’s knowledge, and the faithful delivery of the project benefits from the guardianship of the concept architect.

Practices specialising and collaborating is not in itself a new form of practice but we believe moving to this model will soon become inevitable for all smaller practices to ensure their future sustainability. And there is an opportunity to do this in a way that consciously improves wellbeing.

Under this new model of practice, New-works will be prioritising R&D and early stage design between Stages 0-3+. The delivery side of the business will be focused on a client-side advisory role, supporting the delivery architect’s role.

We have tested this model to varying degrees on some of our recent projects, including Greenwich High Road, the Low Line arches and in particular Great Suffolk Yard, where we enjoyed a successful collaboration with delivery architect Veretec working through a Stage 4 audit to accommodate a change to non-combustible façades.

Ewer Street - Low Line Arches

We see a mental health and wellbeing problem in the industry, created in part by all services practice. We are optimistic that specialisation will foster stronger interdisciplinary collaboration so that smaller architecture practices can be focused in their outputs, prioritising the physical and mental wellbeing of their teams, collaborators and clients in their day-to-day lives.

Our collaborators working on the delivery stages will free us to focus on R&D, ideas testing and continual professional development. At New-works this will include building our own smaller scale, crafted projects to ensure a continued engagement in the physical qualities of making.

We will be shortening the working day to a seven-hour day (10am-5pm), with an hour before and after for personal physical and mental wellbeing away from the desk and screens: exercise, meditation, gallery visits, meeting friends.

The morning will be dedicated to deep, focused work, the afternoon for emails and correspondence.

We believe this way of working will lead to greater quality control and better value for clients, more appropriately skilled teams, improved wellbeing and, ultimately, a healthier, more sustainable profession.