1998 onwards

In 1999 SPACE developed the new Bridget Riley Studios in Bow and took on additional floors across the road in Britannia Works, one of its long-standing studio sites. In 2001 it took on Deborah House, which provides 3 floors of studios in central Hackney. In 2010 Deborah House became the first building that SPACE bought.

Sara Lane Court in Hoxton was an innovative regeneration project started in 2002, converting a disused car park below council flats into two storeys of workshops specifically for designer makers, supporting the area’s traditions of fine woodwork and textiles. SPACE also benefits by leasing properties from the London Borough of Hackney at Eastway and at Stoke Newington Library. As SPACE studio buildings are all held on leasehold, they are increasingly under threat in a buoyant property market, as once hard to let properties have become desirable for loft conversions. The forthcoming Olympic Games in 2012, on a site neighbouring some of our studios, presents a new context and opportunity for studios in East London.

SPACE has constantly developed new strategies to support artists’ changing needs, which today include an increasingly digital and international art scene. In addition to core studio provision, SPACE today provides a wide range of support services for visual artists, art-related creative enterprises and communities local to SPACE buildings. These extensive programmes include Media Arts, Exhibitions at the Triangle, community-based Collaborations, Artists’ Professional Development and international residencies. The refurbishment of the Triangle building on Mare Street in May 2006 provided a substantial base for these activities in a vibrant networking centre for artists and local communities to meet and exchange.