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City of Westminster College

This is a project by Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects and it is located at London, United Kingdom. Project's program: College campus. There are eighteen images for City of Westminster College.

: © schmidt hammer lassen architects

Project details

Project name: City of Westminster College
Location: London, United Kingdom
Program: College campus
Area: Project area: 24,000 m2
Year: Competition: 2006, 1st prize • Construction: 2008–2010
More details: Construction cost: £ 70 Million
Client: City of Westminster College
Project by: Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects
Team: Landscape Architect: schmidt hammer lassen architects
Others: Engineer: Buro Happold • Main Contractor: McLaren Construction Ltd • Other Consultants: Knight Frank LLP, Stace LLP

Project images

Designer's statement

Embracing diversity:

The new flagship Campus for City of Westminster College by schmidt hammer lassen architects is designed to support new ways of teaching and learning. The 24,000m2 College, won in a competition in 2006, provides much greater amounts of open learning spaces than typical colleges in the UK and holds state-of-the-art facilities for both students and staff. The building is designed to embrace interaction and diversity and allow students to learn from each other, both formally and informally.

“The learning spaces of City of Westminster College are adaptable and flexible so that, in addition to the integrated technology, the students’ development is supported by the diverse architectural spaces of the very building they are in. It is a design which encourages new ways of teaching and learning,” says Founding Partner of schmidt hammer lassen architects, Mr Morten Schmidt.

The College is located in the heart of Central London at Paddington Green on the site of its previous building, an inefficient and failing 1960s block. The building has been designed from the inside-out, responding to the needs of the diverse groups who use the College, as well as taking into account the sensitive local context. It appears as a clean-cut, modern building with a distinct Scandinavian heritage. The building’s simple geometric forms rotate around a terraced atrium, creating a unifying yet flexible organisation.

“The respective floor plans surrounding the atrium have visual connections from one floor to the other, making the atrium a dynamic centre and the heart of the College,” says Partner at schmidt hammer lassen architects Mr Kim Holst Jensen, and he continues: “The large atrium, which on some floors extends all the way to the façade, enhances the relationship between the inside and the outside. It offers light-filled, open and inclusive spaces which encourage the interaction between students.”

To support connectivity with the local community, most public functions – including an exhibition area, a theatre and a café – are located adjacent to the main entrance before the security turnstiles. The choice of colours for the building is inspired by its context and by the change of the seasons, whilst the light timber panels lining the interior form a contrast to the exposed concrete surfaces and underline the Scandinavian design heritage.

The building is designed to be sustainable and energy efficient and the overall scheme will have a low maintenance liability, significantly reducing the building’s lifespan costs and carbon footprint.

Project background:

The competition brief was for the new City of Westminster College Campus to be an iconic building supporting a shared sense of identity and vision within the College while reaching out to the city and the greater community it serves. Therefore, encouraging diversity of users as well as spaces is the essence of the project. The brief stressed that the primary goal of the new build was to function as a flagship campus. It needed to be an aspirational building with state-of-the-art facilities that would emulate real-life work environments. The facilities and spaces would not only provide the students with excellent academic and vocational skills, but also inspire them. The building also had to support the College’s new approach to teaching and learning, which stresses the importance of learning outside the classroom walls. On a practical level, the client’s motivation for building a new campus was to gather most of the curriculum areas and departments that were spread out over five separate centres under one roof, in a new and modern facility, as the old premises offered insufficient space and needed renovation work.