The Box
- Client
- Plymouth City Council
- Services
- Wayfinding
- Sector
- Culture + Civic
- Location
- Architect: Atkins
Wayfinding that holds old and new in the same frame
The Box is Plymouth’s largest multi-disciplinary arts and heritage space. Designed by Atkins, the project fuses the 1907 Edwardian Baroque museum, the former Central Library, and the restored 1828 St Luke’s Church around a new public piazza. The development takes its name from the bold cubic extension that anchors the complex, a striking new volume suspended above street level, the “archive in the sky” that gives the building its instantly recognisable form. The building houses 13 galleries and exhibition spaces and a collection of approximately 2 million objects. Benoy was appointed to develop a wayfinding scheme that could navigate visitors through this layered mix of historic fabric and bold contemporary architecture.
7,117m²
The cube as organising principle
The geometry of the new extension became the conceptual anchor of the wayfinding design. An “invisible grid” derived from the building’s cubic form runs through the scheme, giving accent to key areas and creating a consistent spatial logic across the complex. Fret-cut signage allows visitors to see the heritage surfaces behind and the open spaces beyond, ensuring the wayfinding system remains transparent to the architecture, holding old and new in dialogue.
Material continuity
The sign family takes its cues directly from The Box’s material palette and façade, tailoring the wayfinding to a building where no two spaces read the same. The approach tells the story of the architecture as visitors move through it, from the terrazzo floors of the original Edwardian atrium to the contemporary extension, using material and form as navigational cues.
