Support Peter Womersley's Architectural Legacy
Tracking progress in the Klein Studio’s post-Miller rejuvenation and other stories of renewal
The Bernat Klein Foundation bids to make the Klein Studio its home
The Bernat Klein Foundation, in coalition with Scottish Historic Building Trust and National Trust Scotland have today launched their bid to acquire and restore the Peter Womersley designed Bernat Klein Studio. With initial funding support secured from the National Lottery Heritage Fund for the initial acquisition, the coalition is also today launching an urgent fundraising campaign. It is estimated in a specialist condition survey commissioned as part of their discussion that the full cost of restoration could exceed £2.5 - £3 million.
Preserving Womersley supports the Bernat Klein Foundation’s bid to make the Bernat Klein Studio its home. If you have dreamed, as we have, of a credible opportunity to save this masterpiece, please get behind this effort with your public and financial support.
Full details are contained in these links:
Preserving Womersley, July 23, 2025
Preserving Womersley has been quiet on the Klein Studio for some time now. A combination of having no story to tell while at the same time knowing that this story has been building in strictest confidence has counselled us to bide our time. The time for the story to be told is now, in the hopes of clearing the way for the coalition’s successful acquisition.
The Bernat Klein Foundation has been working behind the scenes for two years with their coalition partners in pursuit of their intention to restore the Klein Studio as a public building dedicated to his legacy and work.
We know of the extensive due diligence, planning and preparatory funding work that has taken place over the last two years to realise this aim. BKF along with their coalition partners have at the invitation of and in collaboration with the current owner’s representatives, worked with them on this project, and with the support of various Scottish governmental, cultural and conservation organisations. This work is complete.
Raising awareness of Peter Womersley's architectural legacy on the Preserving Womersley website and in social media, it has always been our strong belief that the priority for the next owner must be to save and safeguard the building as a piece of Scottish cultural and creative heritage. We further believe that this is best done with a public-facing, widely accessible use focused on the Scottish design and architecture communities. Such an approach recognises the cultural significance of the building itself and the work of Peter Womersley and Bernat Klein.
The Bernat Klein Foundation’s is such an initiative.
We agree with the vision of the Klein Studio Coalition who respect the building’s original design intention, which was an inspired collaboration between Peter Womersley and Bernat Klein - two stars of the Scottish modernist design community.
New audiences continue to be inspired by Klein and Womersley. If successful in acquiring ownership of the Klein Studio in coalition with their partners, using the studio as the Bernat Klein Foundation’s home they will continue to share Klein’s work through workshops, residences and archive collections, while preserving for future generations this exquisite building. It will mean the building is once again able to fulfil its purpose while promoting Scottish Design and Architecture locally, nationally, and internationally.
James Colledge, Michael Smith, Helen Hurst, Lindsay Buchan Preserving Womersley. July, 2025.
A personal note to PW supporters and followers and all who have contacted us in the past week regarding the auction of the Klein Studio.
Preserving Womersley continues to support and promote Peter Womersley’s architectural legacy, determined as always to see this body of work preserved for future generations. We will be following the Klein Studio on its journey, which has been so dramatically reinvigorated, as we will other emerging stories such as the recent sale of Farnley Hey, Womersley’s first commission, and the proposed repurposing of the (as was) Midland Bank building in Huddersfield.
To those of you who know our work, the plight of the Klein Studio was the catalyst for these efforts.
The sudden and unexpected availability of the Studio for sale by auction, and the responses we are seeing, strongly support the idea that this building inspires the imagination of the many people who know it personally or know of it by reputation.
It’s a time for cautious optimism, guarded only by concern that the auction process opens such an important work to an uncertain outcome. With no time for proper due diligence, the development of a sound business plan, consideration of the planning process, funding requirements and so many more practical considerations, it runs the risk of prolonging the uncertainty that already exists for the structure as the current owner takes his leave and new owners grapple with the structure’s condition. The coalition led by the Bernat Klein Foundation, National Trust for Scotland and Scottish Historic Buildings Trust are already a long way down this road and in a position to make informed decisions.
One common theme in our inbox this past two weeks has been to ask for our advice, details about the building’s condition, our support; we have no ownership interest, no special access: in short, we cannot and will not provide any guidance to prospective bidders. Each one of you must live with the constraints and conditions laid down in the short timing of the sale and the information pack provided by the auctioneer. You must form your own judgement as to whether you can realise the ambitions of your vision in such circumstances, and consider the immense cultural significance of the property that bestows upon it an onerous custodial role for future generations.
The concern and care for the building’s future is obvious from the many messages we have received: from flights of fancy about living in a glass house, to projects in essence wishing for the same outcome that the Bernat Klein Foundation’s proposals already cover.
However, with the strength of two years of extensive technical study already in hand, its strong association with the Klein family and the Scottish design community, with an already successful business plan in place, and a solid vision for future growth, the surest route to securing the building’s future is to get behind the Bernat Klein Foundation’s coalition: give them the opportunity they deserve.
James Colledge, July 2025