Today we look at one very cool grandpa who transformed his second garage into a unique education space for his grand kids and their friends.
Dr Oliver Nyquist has always had a love of the arts, science, maths. He worked all over the world as director of many international art galleries and museums. Since early this year he has decided to retire so he can help his children with child minding and be more involved in the education of his grand kids. After a lot of yellow childrens paint and glitter being applied to his Eames chairs and Persian carpets, Nyquist decided to turn his second garage into a dedicated kids education and play room with stunning success.
Dr Nyquist hired designer Pip Charcuterie from London Design studio Me&MoreMe to come up with the design concept for the space. The brief included creating a space that fostered a sense of fun and enjoyment for learning, a space that was light and bright with plenty of storage space and low bench spaces for working at. The space also had to be easily divided and separated from the rest of the garage to hide Nyquist’s collection of vintage motorcycles from little hands. This last problem was elegantly solved through the use of a large set of sliding doors running on Brio sliding door tracks. These doors slide into each other to virtually disappear when opened, yet close off the space perfectly when class in session.
The space works wonderfully well, with a large bright blue custom made set of cupboards running the length of the room to house all sorts of science experiments, books and art materials neatly and reduce the visible clutter. There is a custom made adjustable trestle table running the length of the room at a very child friendly 500mm high at the moment, which can be heightened as the children grow. There is also a one entire wall painted in chalkboard paint for the kids to draw, and solve maths problems on. A large skylight was added to the south side of the ceiling which gives plenty of natural light to the space.
All in all it’s a great addition to the house, turning a utility space into a beautiful space for learning and creating.
