London’s independently owned creative Post Production and VFX studio UNIT, are unveiling the news that after six years situated on Berners Mews in Noho, they are moving to a bespoke new 8 storey facility on Margaret Street, Fitzrovia, this May, complete with the expansion of four large grading suites.
Co Founders Adam and Amanda Luckwell have curated a high end, interior designed home complete with one off pieces of furniture, bold colour, art, and refined art deco touches – created to appeal to all their close working team and long term clients and allow for the expansion of their Scripted and Colour Departments.
The exciting move to Margaret Street signals the next chapter in the evolution of UNIT shortform (Commercials, Music Video, Direct-To-Brand, Broadcast ) and longform (Film and Episodic) history as they continue to create outstanding and award winning creative work.
UNIT’s key value is creative excellence. The company has been built from the ground up around that value – ensuring their cohesive approach delivers full creative solutions across VFX, Sound, Colour, Design, Offline and Online.
After the many recent artist and production hires the team wanted to build a new space where they could further excel, whilst also designing an environment in which clients can feel at home.
The new studio has taken over 6 months to bring to life and will feature stylish interiors, state of the art technical facilities, and reflect the changing nature of the industry with a mix of hybrid working and responding to their client needs. The new space gives maximum flexibility, which means collaboration on every project, regardless of its size or complexity, becomes seamless.
An open plan reception, relaxed working area, bar / cafe space with plants, colour and pattern will welcome people on arrival as they enter. This will enable UNIT to host industry collab events, team get togethers, training sessions, and bespoke client entertaining.
The lower ground floor will house MCR, QC and Open Studio working CG / Design areas.
The Colour department will be equipped with an expansion of Grading Suites – doubling the number to 4 large spacious Colour Suites with Sony BVM-HX310 monitors, complete with Baselight systems and Davinci Resolves featuring large sofa and client areas in each. Creative Director of Colour Denny Cooper leads the department across shortform with Dan Coles leading Colour across longform.
UNIT will now have numerous large, comfortable VFX Suites housing Flame, Flame Assist, Nuke and Nuke Studio. Fraser Cleland heads up the Flame and Nuke team.
The 3D offering will ensure Maya and Houdini, Real flow, Mudbox, Golem, Massive, Yeti and bespoke Systems. Creative Director of 3D Nuno Pereira leads the line-up of artists.
Creative Director of Design Tom Wansbrough-Jones heads up UNIT’s own in-house creative Design Studio, developed to concept, direct and execute work across its core design and animation capabilities using After Effects, Photoshop, Premier & Cinema 4D.
The 5.1 Commercials Sound Design offering will ensure a state-of-the-art Sound Studio led by Creative Director of Sound Jamie Thomas, offering creative audio and sound design, with voice over facilities, Protools Rigs and Protools assist station.
The vision has been to create a future focused space that promotes creativity, innovation and the sharing of ideas. A welcoming and inspiring destination for our clients to spend time, work and relax in an appropriately designed space. It is large enough to cater for any project but still ensures a boutique environment for every client’s individual needs,
It is the newest and one of the most technically advanced set-ups in London and with that the UNIT team are poised for an exciting next chapter – ensuring an environmentally sustainable and accessible facility.
UNIT’s latest creative highlights include recent Shortform projects: Sky Sport ‘Tennis’ for the release of their first ever channel dedicated to Tennis. Other highlights include Bumble, Dance With the Wind Short Film and Quickbooks ‘Boudica Call’. UNIT Film & TV highlights include the newly launched BBC series This Town by Peaky Blinders Steven Knight. The Tourist season 2, Grantchester, and VERA.
UNIT’s Co Founders Adam and Amanda Luckwell proudly reveal what this next chapter means to them: “The opening of our new home on Margaret Street is the culmination of years of evolution at UNIT. We have adapted to the post pandemic era and embraced hybrid working and the building is designed around that. It is the perfect environment to develop creativity; it offers the technology to work seamlessly in a remote workflow, as well as the comfort and location to work together physically – whichever route is best suited to our clients, our staff and the project at hand to get the most out of each and every one. We cannot wait to welcome our clients into the new space and collaborate with the very best the industry can offer”.
UNIT’s Managing Director Ian Luxford says of the move: “This really is a case of the right place, right time. Our beautiful Berners Mews studio was perfect for the pre-pandemic era. However, since 2020, the world and working lifestyles have changed drastically. We have embraced hybrid working at UNIT and so have so many of our clients. This move has given us the perfect opportunity to create a bespoke environment designed for the post-pandemic way of working and, importantly, the future. I cannot wait to invite you in for a cup of tea and show you around our new boutique home!”
