The recent event included design team presentations from Allies and Morrison, Smith and Wallwork, Max Fordham and Munro Building Services, followed by a tour of the site and explanation of various building elements, details and services installations, currently under construction.
The St John’s College Grange Lane Design and Build development maximises the opportunity of a large, edge of City, site to create a new low energy, Passivhaus, student neighbourhood.
The accommodation, which will be used by both St John’s College and leased to neighbouring Colleges, employs a flexible townhouse typology that can be leased in various configurations to ensure the college accommodation can naturally adapt to changing needs over time.
The central lane embeds the neighbourhood within West Cambridge, connecting existing roads and creating new pedestrian and cycle routes that ensure students have easy access to amenities. Accessed off the lane are generous gardens around which the townhouses are clustered in terraces.
The scheme optimises MMC with CLT superstructures, which have been carefully designed to ensure the building fabric meets Passivhaus criteria. Externally the townhouses will sit comfortably within the West Cambridge Conservation Area, using timeless materials such as red brick, clay tile and reconstituted stone, to create buildings that age gracefully and improve with time.
