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FIRST LOOK
22 November 2023
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Source: Avanti Architects
Source: Avanti Architects
Source: Avanti Architects
Source: Avanti Architects
Source: Avanti Architects
The development in Sydenham, south-east London, provides 26 homes for families with temporary housing needs and six assisted living units as well as a specialist school
The housing consists of a standalone seven-storey housing block facing on to Mayow Road in Sydenham. To the rear of this sits the supported living cluster, which accesses a more secluded courtyard adjacent to the green space of Mayow Park.
Directly across the road from the housing, sits the 93-place special-needs secondary school, which caters for pupils with severe learning difficulties and autism. Its entrance front is car-free and set back from the street behind a landscaped area. A minibus drop-off and pick-up point is integrated to one side, with further external spaces designed to offer a range of play, sensory and therapeutic activities.
The housing block is faced in brick, accented by brick coursing and a projecting brick motif crown, and has large inset corner balconies.
The school, in contrast, is lower in height and features a lightweight metal cladding façade. This is composed of standing seam zinc-coated panels with fibre cement boards as infill, accented with setbacks, perimeter planting and a regular rhythm of ventilation louvres.
In a quiet part of Sydenham, Avanti Architects has successfully delivered a flagship urban renewal project to support council services and meet the needs of vulnerable communities. The masterplan includes a new SEND (special educational needs and disabilities) school which caters for 93 pupils extending the relationship that Avanti began with Greenvale School in 2004 while a seven-storey residential block accommodating 26 homes for families with temporary housing needs, together with six supported living apartments for young adults with special needs, addresses acute housing needs not adequately met by the open market.
Avanti worked closely with council officers and stakeholders laying the ground for the project by initially providing strategic advice to deliver business cases for all the SEND schools in the borough and scoping of three council sites for residential development. The masterplan at Mayow Road uniquely brings both these public provisions together into a single locale to ensure wider urban renewal.
The special needs secondary school caters for pupils with severe learning difficulties and autism. Avanti fulfilled the key aspiration of the client to deliver an exemplary learning environment that meets the stringent access needs of pupils and facilitates tailored programmes for older cohorts around life skills and work training. Avanti’s site strategy delivers on this core aim through a low-lying building with a compact form that ensures good connectivity and ease of movement.
The new school fits tightly into the local setting and delivers strong townscape qualities. Avanti set the building back from the street to respect the established building line and create a sense of retreat for pupils from traffic and pollution. The school frontage and entrance are car-free and publicly accessible, creating an extension of the public realm. By eliminating both perceptual and physical barriers, the design provides a powerful visual statement regarding the school’s seamless integration within the wider community.
This strategy relegates the complex and secure minibus drop-off and pick-up arrangements to the building’s side flank. A continuous and integrated canopy extends the building into its environs and provides the necessary shelter for pupils as they arrive and depart. The remaining external spaces provide for a range of play, sensory and therapeutic activities, reinforcing a buffer to the site’s other boundaries.
With the residential block, Avanti met the client’s aspiration to provide an exemplary and inclusive form of development, with supported living forming part of the ensemble. The building achieves this objective with a quiet and grounded classical elegance. At the rear, the proximity of Mayow Park provides a sympathetic context for a quiet secluded courtyard for the supported living cluster.
The two buildings face each other along Mayow Road. Avanti adopted a range of high-quality materials to harmonise with the local surroundings. Red hues are incorporated into two very different forms of construction. The school, which is lower in height, features lightweight metal cladding, while the taller residential block is faced in brick. The school facade is composed of standing seam zinc-coated panels with fibre cement boards as infill which are accented with setbacks, perimeter planting and a regular rhythm of ventilation louvres.
In contrast, the residential block is characterised by generous corner inset balconies and storey height bands of vertical brick coursing. A decorative projecting brick motif crowns the building where it meets the sky. Selective detailing allows the two structures to reference one another. For example, full-height glazing and deep canopies are treated consistently across both buildings. The extensive use of metal fins on the main school frontage is also reflected in the lower levels of the residential block.
While the two projects have been managed for different wings of Lewisham Council, Avanti has ensured the masterplan and design approach elevates the overall ensemble, effectively conveying a sense of civic purpose and the project’s mission to deliver social provision for a diverse group of community users. Environmental sustainability and high energy performance are also achieved through compliance with the London plan and BREEAM Excellent standards.
Amir Ramezani, director, Avanti Architects
The new Mayow Road temporary and specialist housing and Greenvale School are truly positive additions to Mayow Road delivering genuinely affordable homes and brand-new education space. It has been a pleasure to work with Avanti Architects on both projects, from the pre-application stage where contextually sensitive, high-quality designs were drawn up, and architectural quality secured through planning and construction phases.
Michael Forrester, head of development management, housing, regeneration and public realm directorate, Lewisham Council
We are delighted with our new building! It is clear to us that the built environment has had a positive impact on our young people and the way they use the building is a pleasure to see. They clearly appreciate the space and the wonderful facilities we have at our new Mayow Road site.
Aaron Collins, deputy headteacher, Greenvale School
Source:Avanti Architects
Start on site 2021 (housing and school)
Completion date 2023 (housing); 2022 (school)
Gross internal floor area 3,305m2 (housing); 2,500m2 (school)
Form of contract or procurement route Single-stage design and build (housing); two-stage design and build (school)
Construction cost £11 million (housing); £9 million (school)
Architect Avanti Architects (housing/school)
Client London Borough of Lewisham (housing); London Borough of Lewisham / Greenvale School (school)
Structural engineer Tully De’Ath (housing); Campbell Reith (school)
Civil engineer Tully De’Ath (housing)
M&E consultant MEP Calford Seaden (housing); MEP Van Zyl (school)
Quantity surveyor and employers agent Calford Seaden (housing); Bailey Garner (school)
Sustainability consultant Stroma (school)
Landscape consultant The Environment Partnership/Liz Lake Associates (housing); Avanti Architects (school)
Acoustic and fire consultant Cahill Design (housing)
Principal designer Baily Garner (school
Approved building inspector Lewisham Building Control (housing/school)
Main contractor Higgins (housing); Osborne (school)
CAD software used AutoCAD/Revit (housing/school)
On-site energy generation 20% (housing)
Annual mains water consumption 38m3/occupant (housing)
Airtightness at 50pa 3m3/h.m2 (housing); 3m3/h.m2 (school)
Heating and hot water load 69 kwh/m2/yr (housing); 61kwh/m2/yr (school)
Overall area-weighted u-value 0.15w/m2k (housing); 0.18w/m2k (school)
Design life 60 years (housing/school)
Embodied / whole-life carbon Not calculated (housing/school)
Annual CO2 emissions 10.5KgCO2eq/m2 (housing); 17KgCO2eq/m2 (school)
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