Southern Campus
- location:
- Winchester
- client:
- Winchester College
- role:
- Architecture
- sector:
- Education
- status:
- On Site
The modernisation of Winchester College’s Southern Campus
Following an invited competition in summer 2015, Design Engine were appointed to develop a masterplan for the proposed modernisation of Winchester College’s Southern Campus. Planning was granted in 2017 and the new support services building opened in January 2021, followed by the extension and refurbishment of the Design Technology Building in February 2022. The first phase of the sports centre opened in September 2024.
The Southern Campus is located between the sports ground on Kingsgate Park and the tennis courts on Norman Road. It is the focus of the School’s indoor sports facilities, and includes the PE Centre, swimming pool, rifle range and squash courts. In addition, the Design & Technology department sits between the sports complex and Kingsgate Road. Although many of the current buildings are of substantial size, they are largely hidden from surrounding public roads and the wider landscape.
The key factor in the decision to modernise is the age of the PE Centre, which is now over 50 years old. In that time pupil numbers at the school have grown and the indoor sports facilities are today used at maximum capacity. The School educates around 700 pupils, all of whom live during term-time in the eleven boarding houses spread across the College Campus. The limited space available is now restricting pupils’ access to the sporting programme and with it access for the wider community. The layout of and access to the swimming pool also presents long-term maintenance and safety difficulties and the building is thermally inefficient.
The current sports facilities have been be replaced with modern buildings on a similar footprint. The Design & Technology Department also on the site has been modernised and extended enabling various support services to be consolidated into a single new facility.
The College felt it was important that any replacement building not only provides the necessary facilities for the future, but is also housed in a contemporary high quality building both in terms of design and materials. Design Engine have, in a collaborative and supportive way, delivered such a building.
Simeon Cox, Winchester College Works Bursar
Design Approach
Design Team
- project manager:
- Selway Joyce
- structural engineer:
- Arup
- quantity surveyor:
- McNaughts
- landscape consultant:
- LUC (Land Use Consultants)
- planning consultant:
- Adams Hendry Consulting
The modernisation of Winchester College’s Southern Campus includes a new state-of-the-art Sports Centre, a refurbished and extended Design and Technology Department and Support Services Building.
To reflect the character of the historic northern campus, the development uses strong horizontal boundary walls that integrates into the new buildings. These walls also define interlocking courtyards and larger playing fields. The buildings also pick up on the way in which historically the silhouette of pitched roofs, spires and chimneys breaks these horizontal datums. This is referenced in the complex geometry of the roof forms intended to break up the silhouette from all angles when viewed in the round.
Extensive analysis of the southern campus context and topography was used to develop an architecture that is appropriate in scale and context to this unique site. Whilst modern in style, Design Engine has drawn inspiration from the past in both form and materiality, to create a building that is sympathetic to its context.
Conventionally, new proposals of this nature are often designed as a unified sports centre ‘under one roof’, however it was felt that this would be an inappropriate response to this unique site. It was therefore proposed that the Physical Education Centre be broken into three separate ‘pavilions’ comprising the swimming pool, sports hall, and the fitness suite.
The project is an ideal opportunity to allow the qualities that exist throughout Winchester College to migrate down Kingsgate Road, creating a beautiful new addition to their campus.
Richard Jobson, Director of Design Engine
The College’s campus is characterised by two types of building; in general the larger, more public buildings feature flint walls, while the domestic buildings, especially along Kingsgate Road, are constructred from red brickwork. This hierarchical palette of materials is reflected tonally in the grey brick of the sports centre and the red brick of the ancillary support buildings. The buildings are enhanced with patterned brick bonds, flint detailing and stone features.
The final phase of the project currently under construction is the new swimming pool, which is enclosed by a unique folded roof design comprised of ten folding cross laminated timber ‘darts’. It is one of the largest folded roof structures in Europe, and the completion of this phase is anticipated later this year.
