Studio

The TDO team — photography by Mickey Lee

TDO is a creative architecture studio founded by Doug Hodgson and Tom Lewith in 2012 with fellow Bartlett graduate Owen Jones. The practice’s first built project, Forest Pond House (2012), a timber-framed meditation space and children’s den cantilevered over a garden pond, is emblematic of TDO’s approach: it is characterised by simple forms and self-finished materials, with a focus on environmental and social sustainability, and wellbeing.

Significant built works include: Old Church Street, an infill townhouse in Chelsea (2015); Fab House, low-cost modular terrace housing in North Shields, for Places for People and Urban Splash (2018); the headquarters for The Modern House, Southwark (2018); Low Line arches, the light-touch redevelopment and reuse of arches along the Low Line in Bankside and Bermondsey (2022); and Great Suffolk Yard, the redevelopment of industrial warehouse buildings in Southwark into a thriving new workspace (2023).

Current projects include new build and retrofit workspace and housing schemes. TDO is working on MMC developments across London. The practice is also currently working with sustainable development specialists Human Nature, establishing an MMC strategy for the redevelopment of the former Phoenix Industrial Estate in Lewes, East Sussex.

The practice featured in The Architecture Foundation’s New Architects 3 (2016) and more recently in the Architects’ Journal’s 40 under 40 - a showcase of architecture’s brightest up- and-coming talent (2020). 

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  • 2023 The Architects’ Journal: Retrofit Awards, Health and Community shortlist

  • 2022 New London Architecture Awards Shortlist

  • 2020 Architects’ Journal: 40 under 40, architecture’s brightest up-and-coming talent

  • 2019 Building Awards Offsite Project of the year: Smith’s Dock including Fab House

  • 2018 Housing Design Awards Shortlist

  • 2016 New Architects 3 – Britain’s best new practices, The Architecture Foundation

  • 2015 New London Architecture Awards Shortlist

  • 2015 World Architecture News Awards Longlist

  • 2015 RIBA London Awards Shortlist

  • 2013 RIBA South Awards Shortlist

  • 2013 AJ Small Projects Awards Shortlist

 

Doug Hodgson

Founding Director

BSc (Hons), DipArch, ARB, RIBA

Doug is a registered architect whose formal training first began at Central St Martins (1999-2000) and continued at The Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL (2000-7). Doug co-founded TDO in 2010.

Doug and his husband, Ross, spend their weekends either tending their allotment in Walthamstow or working on a long term renovation project in Walton-on-the-Naze, for their growing family.

In 2020 he was honoured to be named alongside co-founder Tom Lewith in The Architects’ Journal’s 40 under 40: celebrating the top young Architects in the UK, the next generation of boundary-pushing architectural designers and innovators.

Doug's experience of teaching Cambridge University undergraduates (2015–18) lead to strengthen his belief in working collaboratively and inclusively to engage in critical conversation at all stages of design. Understanding the importance of communication within the studio, with clients, the wider design team and other collaborators throughout the design process. Doug applies this skill to develop the subtlety in detail of TDO schemes from the earliest stages of concept design through to project completion.

 

Tom Lewith

Founding Director

BSc (Hons), MA RCA, ARB, RIBA

Tom is a registered architect who trained at The Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL (2000-3), and the Royal College of Art (2004-6). Tom co-founded TDO in 2010. 

Tom lives in Lewes where he spends his time paddleboarding with his family, and playing as much football as he can reasonably fit in.

Tom’s strength is in the early stages of concept design, and he believes in the importance of getting to the heart of a concept, then testing it through diagrams. This is an early checking point in all of TDO’s projects, forming a key part of the studio’s design process. Tom prioritises the practice’s client relationships and how TDO can add value through concept design.

Tom sits on The London Borough of Bromley’s Design Review Panel. In 2020 he was named alongside co-founder Doug Hodgson in The Architects’ Journal’s 40 under 40: the who’s who of the nation’s next generation of boundary-pushing designers and innovators.