Arup is a global consultancy that addresses every aspect of the built environment, from initial planning and advisory services, through building design, structural engineering and a full range of specialist technical disciplines.

Currently, Arup is commissioned by and collaborating with CEG over their Southbank Leeds project, and as part of the annual Leeds Digital Festival, last week showcased some of their work with this, and also how they are adapting digital technology to assess the current status of the Temple Works structure.

In the historic setting of the Northern Monk, deep in the heart of Holbeck and the epicentre of the former industrial Leeds, Arup had set up a digital chocolate box of cutting edge technology, with Leeds people able to witness quite a few firsts in the application of equipment and the data collected. The Yorkshire Evening Post had highlighted this as one of the ten best events of the 2019 Leeds Digital Festival, and one most likely to get people talking. It didn’t disappoint.

‘Immersive Tech in the Built Environment’ demonstrated Arup’s work with CEG in three separate exhibits.

(Photo credit: Ruth Saxton)

Firstly, you could pick up a headset and join a virtual tour of the Grade I listed Temple Works building. With the critical health of the historic structure currently denying people any access inside or on the roof of the main building, this was a rare opportunity to explore the entirety of this delicate and refined legacy of the industrial revolution, including the iconic roof, internal structure, vast basement and the counting house. Through the amazing quality of the VR reproduction you could see for yourself the building’s current condition, while witnessing first-hand its history, scars and art. 

Here is a short video of me working my way around the Temple Works building with the aid of the incredible VR reproduction.

The ‘Temple Works, 3D Photogrammetry’ exhibit, as seen in the main header image above, was a model created by combining over 8,500 2D images taken using drone technology and processed by Christians Surveying, this allowed the user to explore every angle of the huge Temple Works building from their desktops.

Finally, ‘Southbank, Augmented Reality’ was a physical trip out into Southbank to view a model that placed the CEG:Southbank development directly in the street context, and allowed you to visualise the development first hand, overlaying the proposed structures directly onto a tablet screen view of the current Southbank landscape.

Once these insights had been experienced, there was also the chance to ‘drive’ around Leeds, through Arup’s digital model of Leeds city centre and to see how acoustic properties can be visualised in ground-breaking projects to support specialist buildings.

(Photo credit: Arup UK) 

Arup’s Immersive Tech event clearly demonstrates how CEG are working with partners who can offer the very best technological solutions to help progress Leeds’s Southbank, and reflects the thrill and anticipation of how digital technology is developing to offer real world imagining that can help drive key decision-making. The future is in safe hands. 

(Header image of Temple Works 3D Photogrammetry. Photo credit: Ruth Saxton)