University of the Arts London
Recently winning the Architecs Journal Building of the Year and
the Building Awards 2012 Public Building of the Year, University of
the Arts in London’s new campus for Central Saint Martins at King’s
Cross is a BREEAM ‘Excellent’ building and a feat of fair-faced
concrete.
The university’s brief was to provide an environmentally
sensitive building that minimised the impact on natural sources. To
achieve this they designed the three-storey building around an
internal street, with a translucent ETFE roof that maximises the
use of natural sunlight. As part of the university’s sustainable
energy strategy, concrete’s high thermal mass is used to cool the
building and keep it insulated. This has helped the building work
towards the BREEAM rating of ‘Excellent’.
The 32,000m2 campus has been designed by Stanton Williams for
5,000 students to use and juxtaposes the old and new by combining
the 19th Century Grade II listed Granary buildings and transit
sheds with a new 200m long building.
The new main building has a reinforced concrete frame structure
at 7.6m and used enough concrete to fill eight Olympic swimming
pools. To contrast the old buildings and gain architectural
expression of the structure the main fair-faced reinforced concrete
walls are 450mm thick and very solid.
The new University of the Arts London campus is one of the first
parts of the King’s Cross development to be completed. As such, it
not only provides Central Saint Martins with the flexible and
dynamic spaces that it needs to educate and develop the artists and
designers of the future, but also makes a firm statement of the
role of the Arts in the quarter, to which it will give critical
mass and energy.
Concrete was the material of choice for this project because it
was appropriate to the industrial ‘grain’ of the site and brought a
strong contrast with existing site materials, plus the ability to
create three dimensional sculptural form. The robustness and
self-finished aspect of the fair-faced concrete delivers visual
weight, strength and solidity whilst providing thermal performance
and energy efficiency.
Project team
Client: University of the Arts London
Architect: Stanton Williams
Engineer: Scott Wilson
Environmental / Services engineering: Atelier 10