Last week, the British Council for Offices (BCO), held its very first virtual awards ceremonies, for its renowned regional awards.
We are delighted to announce that we won four awards:
- ‘Commercial Workplace’ in the Midlands and Central England region for 50/60 Station Road, for Brookgate with Grimshaw Architects.
- ‘Commercial Workplace’ in the London region for the Brunel Building, with Fletcher Priest Architects
- ‘Refurbished / Recycled Workplace’ for 160 Old Street, for GPE with ORMS architects
- ‘Innovation’ award, again for 160 Old Street, in conjunction with GPE
The widely respected awards recognise excellence in office space and provide public recognition for top quality design and functionality. With many entries across each region being scrutinised by the BCO judges, the diversity of the competition was testament to the strength of British office design and served to highlight clever design solutions that respect both people and the environment.
50/60 Station Road is one of the tallest and largest in Cambridge’s CB1 development. The nine-storey mixed-use building provides high quality commercial and retail space that houses some of the world’s leading companies such as Amazon, Samsung and WeWork.
The BCO judges “felt unanimously that this state-of-the-art development in the city’s bustling technology quarter exudes quality, offering a spectacular welcome for those arriving at Cambridge Railway Station”. The judges also praised the buildings demonstration of “a clear focus on the health and wellbeing of its occupiers” and the “showering of daylight across the office space.”
We provided multi-disciplinary design services throughout all design phases, including development of the energy strategy. The scheme incorporates high performance façades, developed to reduce co2 emissions and improve energy efficiency. Highly effective engineering systems were designed to enhance seasonal operating efficiencies and to decrease the overall consumption of energy, with an achievement of 32% reduction in CO2 emissions compared to Part L.
In the London region, 160 Old Street scooped two awards, not only recognising its significant transformation from its previous use as a Royal Mail Building, but also acknowledging the development’s level of innovation.
The BCO judges commended “an exceptional workspace crafted with vision and innovation”, and were “struck by the transformation of this space”. The judges also celebrated the use of an innovative smart building app, which allows users to control the light and temperature of their personal workstations, as well as providing notifications about the latest local events and activities.
The project also features strong sustainability credentials, with a significant amount of the original building’s embodied carbon able to be retained in the transformation.
All these projects are now automatically entered into the BCO National Awards, which are due to be announced at a virtual ceremony on the 26th January 2021. Our fingers are crossed!
