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This research centre makes a bold and unusual statement. But that was exactly the brief: a beacon to attract top class ICT firms to come and partner university staff in a showpiece for the region, as well as for the university campus.
The university has shown considerable enterprise by commissioning a significant and high-quality building which rises to the challenge of its innovative brief. The brief has been carefully analysed, with the solution showing a thorough analytical response.
Opportunities presented by the spectacular site have been grasped in a positive and confident way, creating a landmark building for those travelling north on the M6 motorway.
The striking copper-clad exterior sits well in the landscape. This could have been done more cheaply but must be seen against the long-term value of such architectural presence.
The building is successful by offering the end users a flexible and effective facility that is built to last and economical to operate. The academic spaces are conventional in design approach, which is apt for the user but overall the solution is full of freshness and clarity of thinking.
Internally, the layout is about integration, with cellular spaces for faculty and team spaces for research as well as break-out areas to encourage mixing between graduates, students and commercial tenants.
The building rates highly, of course, for its use of ICT, including such esoteric elements as sensors and robotics embedded in walls, floors and ceilings.
So, the building itself acts as a laboratory by providing a variety of spaces that the occupiers are learning to use in new ways. It also has an excellent BREEAM score.
While success, like costs, must be judged over a long period, the fact that all but one of the business units were taken within three months of opening must be testimony to the effort and successful delivery which went into such a colourful and fresh approach.
The space and quality standards also now form the basis for Lancaster University estates procurement planning, and will set an example for other seats of learning and enterprise.
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Address South Drive, Lancaster University, Lancaster Client/owner/tenant/occupier Lancaster University Project manager Gardiner & Theobald Quantity surveyor Stephen Davies Associates Architect/interior designer FaulknerBrowns M&E engineer Hoare Lea Haden Young Structural engineer SKM Anthony Hunt Contractor HBG Construction Developer Development Securities Wrenbridge Land |
