A Metamorphosing Parliament proposes the temporary relocation of the Houses of Parliament to a brownfield site near the Royal Victoria Docks during its ten-year renovation. It challenges permanence in architecture by designing with, rather than against, decay. Using bacterial cellulose composites, the building is programmed to gradually degrade, enriching the soil and leaving behind a public park. As a manifesto, the government, just like the architecture, is reimagined as temporary, transformative, and regenerative.

The inflatable temporary organism emerges over a derelict building, retrofitted as a civic hub. This symbiosis symbolises the potential of adaptive reuse and reflects the shifting role of public space. The inflatable’s transparency exposes political processes, merging public and private in a gesture of democratic openness.

Spatial organisation flows from civic to political zones, forming a gradient of inclusion. Inflating these spaces becomes metaphor, deflating hierarchy and reshaping governance into something softer and more human. In embracing impermanence, the project offers not monumentality, but resonance. A building that in dissolving gives something back.