James Parkinson BA(Hons)

James was educated at Framlingham College, Suffolk where his design skills were first identified and developed. In his final year he entered the regional finals of the Audi Young Designer of the Year competition, where he was a runner-up.

With a creative career in mind, he completed an Art Foundation Course at Colchester Institute, specialising in 3 dimensional design and ultimately model making, for which he gained a Distinction.

The next step in his education took him to Bournemouth, where at The Arts University College at (formally, The Arts Institute). He completed a BA(Hons) degree in Model Making for Design and Media. During his second year he spent four weeks doing freelance work with Network Model Makers, where he completed a design development model of Southampton University for NBBJ architects. This positive experience lead to him specialise in architectural model making. During his final year James returned to Network for a further week of freelance work. He also undertook a ‘student’ project, set by Diane Oates, head of model making at Foster and Partners, of the Swiss Re building and also built a model of ‘The Printing Factory’ in Slagelse, Denmark from plans supplied by Copenhagen based architects, Søren Robert Lund Architects.

Once his studies were complete, James then moved to London and joined Millennium Models, where he has worked on a range of projects, including the Ashford Designer Retail Outlet, for the Richard Rogers Partnership. This was for an exhibition in Madrid. Also models of 60-70St Mary Axe for Foggo Associates, on which he was responsible for all the offsites and The Royal Society of Arts sponsored Academy, in Sandwell, Tipton, on which he was project leader.

After leaving Millennium he decided to build his own studio and workshop, back in Suffolk, where he is now based.