A ventilated façade for the Potteries Museum & Art Gallery in Staffordshire

The Potteries Museum & Art Gallery is part of the Stoke-on-Trent Museums Service, established in 1911 by the federation of six pottery towns that make up Stoke-on-Trent, a city in Staffordshire with a rich industrial heritage. The museum boasts over a million objects in its stored collections, including an internationally renowned ceramics collection of more than 5,000 pieces. As Stoke-on-Trent is the historic heart of the British ceramics industry, the museum’s exhibitions chart the history of production and design in the sector, showcasing leading 18th- and 19th-century manufacturers such as Wedgwood, Spode and Minton.

Opened in September 2021, the extension to the Potteries Museum & Art Gallery has been named the Spitfire Gallery in honour of the RW388 Spitfire fighter plane, a symbol of engineering and design excellence, and its designer Reginald Joseph Mitchell, who was born and educated in Staffordshire.

The new extension was designed by architect Lisa Deering of Glancy Nicholls Architects, who selected porcelain stoneware for the external cladding. As well as delivering outstanding durability and long-term performance, the material is ideally suited to the industrial character of Stoke-on-Trent, the identity of the museum and the architectural language of the existing building.

The ventilated façade is a dry construction system in which cladding is attached to the building by mechanical fixings, creating a suitably sized cavity with insulating panels to allow for the upward flow of air. This design maintains healthy walls and ensures high levels of indoor comfort.

A total of 471 square metres of ventilated façade was clad with 60×120 cm porcelain stoneware slabs from the Marte collection by Casalgrande Padana, in the Botticino finish.

The collection is inspired by marble, and in particular by the compact beige limestone quarried in Botticino near Brescia.

Detailed design work carried out in collaboration with technical specialists ensured perfect synergy between the porcelain stoneware cladding – including the sloping surfaces and vertical partitions – and the architecture.

The name “The Potteries Museum and Art Gallery” was engraved onto eight ceramic slabs using precision waterjet cutting technology.