20 Gresham Street featured in Building Design: What Made This Project?
JRA’s refurbishment of 20 Gresham Street has been featured in Building Design’s What Made This Project? series, showcasing projects by finalists for the BD Interior Architect of the Year Award 2026, with JRA shortlisted in the Interior Design category.
The refurbishment transforms the existing building into a high-quality, future-ready workplace, retaining its original structure to reduce embodied carbon while introducing hospitality-led interiors that enhance the experience of the space for its users.
Featuring JRA Director David Magyar and Project Directors Andy Thomas and Rossella Faraci, the in-depth feature explores the design and specification challenges behind this transformation, highlighting JRA’s ‘minimum intervention, maximum impact’ approach to reuse and sustainable design.
As Rossella Faraci explained:
“Rather than seeing the retained elements as constraints, Faraci says the practice embraced the challenges and opportunities they presented, retaining the parts of the building that could contribute to its reimagining.”
The project demonstrates the value of working with what already exists, showing how considered design can breathe new life into an existing building while creating a high-quality, more sustainable workplace for the future.
