Community cheese caves x e5 bakehouse
This project reimagines cheese maturation as a communal and accessible practice. Affinage, the craft of maturing cheese, involves care steps like turning, brushing, washing, and managing temperature, humidity, and airflow to guide microbial life and develop flavour. This process usually takes place in cheese caves, either specially designed rooms or natural caves.
Inspired by communal bread ovens and urban allotments, this project introduces a communal cheese cave: a mobile maturation unit designed for E5 Bakehouse, a community bakery in Hackney, but adaptable for schools, shops, and events. It invites the public to take part in hands-on, experimental cheese care. Using a modified wine fridge and soakable terracotta tiles to maintain humidity, it enables community-aged cheese. By opening up access to tools, knowledge, and usually hidden environments, the communal cave rethinks microbial relationships, encourages shared food care, and aims to make artisan cheese consumption and the industry behind it more inclusive.
