Project: South Bristol Skills Academy

Client: City of Bristol College

Value: £23million

Contract: GC Works 1 – Design & Build

Duration: 82 Weeks

 

The South Bristol Skills Academy is an iconic 11,000 sq m four-storey building, with distinctive curved facades and curtain walling, forming a gateway into Hengrove Park.  The academy is a major part of the wider regeneration of south Bristol and a key component in the drive to improve standards of education and the levels of skills across the city.

At the heart of the building is the 'Winter Garden and terraces', a series of central interactive flexible spaces, which come together to create a vibrant hub for the college - a place to meet, work and socialise.  The reception area is a large open plan space encompassing the full height of the building, with feature glass walls.  The academy also incorporates teaching facilities, administration areas, a library, café and restaurant.   Administration areas include open plan offices, meeting rooms and seminar rooms.  Teaching facilities also include car and motorcycle workshop spaces with double height bays.  Transport links have been incorporated in the design with full facilities for cyclists including shower and changing facilities.   

During the design phase of this project we suggested the use of a steel, rather than concrete, structural frame for the academy.  This allowed the steel frame to be manufactured off-site, allowing the client’s programme targets to be achieved whilst maintaining on-site quality for a structure of complex curved geometry.  The project team has made use of prefabricated items i.e. concrete and timber panels, and pre-fabricated screens for internal use wherever possible.  In addition to the frame, the entire external skin of the building was fabricated off site - an amazing achievement for a building of such complexity, which achieved the client’s quality target for a bespoke, eye catching building.  The original design called for a Passivent cooling system; however, our design team have incorporated the use of climate beams, after having visited Sweden to see the system in action.  Climate beam technology provides comfortable thermal conditions with quiet and energy-efficient operation.   The project includes all associated external works including a large precast concrete car park, roads, drainage and hard and soft landscaped areas.  The project is designed to achieve BREAM “Very Good” rating.

 

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