University of Greenwich appoints Osborne

The University of Greenwich has appointed family-owned construction, property services and civil engineering firm Osborne for a £38 million project which includes creating its new campus library and facilities for teaching and research in architecture, design, construction and other academic areas at Stockwell Street.

The contractor will construct a four-storey, 15,500sq m new building for the University. It will include a library, lecture theatres, seminar spaces and digital studios as well as TV production studios, editing suites, a model-making workshop and animation studios. A gallery, cafe and retail space will be open to the community at ground floor level.

The project is within the Maritime Greenwich UNESCO World Heritage Site. Located atStockwell Street,Greenwich, South East London, the scheme will transform a spot within the World Heritage Site, which previously housed an office block and out-of-use petrol station.

The scheme has been designed to achieve a BREEAM Excellent rating. The new building will be topped with tiered flat roofs to form 14 individual intensive and extensive gardens. The concrete frame building structure beneath will feature a single-storey basement with contiguous piling.

Osborne was originally appointed to provide construction advice, supporting the development of the design within budget and carried out enabling works and an archaeological investigation to the value of £4 million. Construction of the new £38 million building is due to be complete in early 2014.

Peter Fotheringham, Head of Estates at the University of Greenwich, said: “This has been a challenging design process due to the planning restrictions and complexity of a site that sits within the Greenwich World Heritage Site. The early involvement of the Osborne team helped to establish methods of construction and the logistics of the site at an early stage and has been key to maintaining our programme throughout design development.”

“The building is very important to the University, setting a benchmark for our future aspirations and providing a learning environment that will challenge and stimulate our students. Working closely with Osborne and the Design Team we believe we will meet these expectations through a continuing collaborative effort.”

John Craig, Business Unit Leader of Osborne’s education team, said: “Osborne is delighted to have been selected by the University to deliver their new Stockwell Street facility. Working in a true partnership with the University we have a real opportunity – not only to create a sustainable, landmark building, but also to create an inspirational environment which and allows the students real time, first hand experience of the design and construction process.”

 Project team:

Client: TheUniversity of Greenwich

Main contractor: Osborne

Project Manager: Fanshawe

Architect: Heneghan Peng

Quantity Surveyor: Fanshawe

MEP consultants: Hoare Lea

Structural Engineers: Alan Baxter & Associates