David Hills's project developed in response to the material conditions of Dalston. The decay and abandonment of this inner city area inspired him to a forensic-like study of the actual conditions of the city fabric. His architecture situates itself between tabular rasa policies of total demolition and the preservation and conservation movement in a territory that prioritises
the present conditions of decay and seeks to work with them.
The anthropologist Mary Douglas's studies of purity and dirt armed him with the concept of dirt as 'matter out of place' - a cycle of changing values.
He made studies of patterns of dirt in Dalston alongside detailed investigations of rot. The project focused on the disused Maberly Chapel that was, fortuitously, once the headquarters for Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists.
David began to operate on the building, constructing a scaffolding frame off site onto which a number of elements from the original building were displaced in new changing relationships. From this he made a series of proposals for alterations to the hall that sought to speed up selective conditions of decay into new conditions of spectacle and life.
The work is an original contribution to contemporary architecture and urbanism carried out with great rigour and personal commitment.
