Jesus College Planning Approval

April 2015

We have won planning and listed building consent for the first phase of a significant development for Jesus College, Cambridge.

The West Court development includes the sensitive refurbishment and extension of a Grade II Listed building to provide research facilities, offices, social spaces and accommodation. A new café pavilion and basement bar extends the building’s north elevation and provides a prominent link to the rest of the College.

A 1970s building closes the courtyard to Jesus Lane and will be refaced, refurbished and converted to provide a lecture theatre with research facilities and two floors of academic accommodation. Linking the two existing buildings, a new entrance building houses conference facilities and serves the lecture theatre, research spaces and an exhibition room. It will provide access to future phases of the development including a new purpose-built auditorium, formal courtyard and nursery along with storage, archive and sports facilities.

The Master of Jesus College, Professor Ian White, said “We are excited by the opportunity the West Court development brings to take the facilities we can offer to students, alumni and the wider world to a new level of excellence.”

Athletes Occupy Olympic Housing

August 2012

In the run up to the London Olympics, the Athletes’ Village housing block N15, is now occupied with athletes’ preparing for the games. Niall McLaughlin Architects have designed the external skin of the housing block on a ‘chassis’ designed by Glen Howells. The facade samples fragments of the Elgin Marbles, scanned from the British Museum and converted into 3D pre-cast panels depicting galloping horses from the Parthenon Frieze.

Niall McLaughlin commented on the practice’s approach to the unusual commission in Building Design. ‘I was very interested in the principle of the facade being delaminated from the building’s core form. Usually it’s something one tries to swim against to retain a sense of ‘authenticity’, but here we decided to embrace it….I like the idea of setting Ruskin’s conception of the craftsman against the absolute Taylorism of the construction process. Through digital reproduction, these deracinated stones are now doubly lost.’ (Building Design 27.01.2012)