City College Norwich Construction Skills Hub
A new £4.4M teaching building for City College Norwich, helping to bridge the significant skills gap currently facing the construction industry.
The new £4.4M Construction Skills Hub at City College Norwich provides much-needed specialist workshop space for teaching, with a specific focus on electrical engineering and plumbing.
This new 1,200 m² two-storey building will enable the college to meet the growing demand for places on its T-Level construction courses, and in turn help to bridge the significant skills gap currently facing the industry. The college currently provides 84% of the construction training for 16-19 year olds in the greater Norwich area, and is also the primary provider of practical construction skills for the county
The Construction Skills Hub will initially play a key role in training the next generation of electricians and plumbers, two of the trades where there is a pressing demand for skilled workers.
The new education building is situated next to the college’s bricklaying and carpentry and joinery workshops on its Ipswich Road campus. This helps to provide a better connection between the existing Construction Skills buildings and the Digi-Tech Factory.
The site had a 1.3m level change from front to back, requiring the finished floor level to be set between the level difference from the front of the building to the back, aligning the new building with adjacent structures and ensuring its height and massing sat comfortably within the campus context. This intervention creates an elevated entrance which provides the students with a real sense of arrival into the new building, and gives students an attractive space to gather in a newly landscaped courtyard to the front of the building.
Large format windows at ground level and the prominent first floor corner frame views out of the workshop towards other campus buildings, and views in to the spaces as well as welcoming generous amounts of natural light into the workshop spaces.
It is envisaged that the skills taught in the new building will change over time. Therefore, the Construction Skills Hub has been designed for maximum flexibility so that its workshops can be reconfigured for teaching different construction disciplines in the future as industry needs change.
Each floor of the Construction Skills Hub is divided into two large workshops, with the ground-floor workshops currently dedicated to plumbing training and the first-floor workshops designated for electrical training.
The workshops are separated by a central room which provides a base for the technicians and separate, safe storage space for specialist equipment and for students’ work. Each workshop is lined with 10 bays for practical work, alongside generously sized work benches situated in the centre of each room.
Simple yet effective materials were used for the new building, including a robust block brick at the ground floor level and an insulated metal cladding at first floor. Low-cost design interventions were then introduced to add character to the simple building, for example, the contrasting framed windows.
Supporting the governments targets on sustainability and net zero carbon emissions, the state-of-the-art facility features 70 solar panels harnessing renewable energy, high-performance glazing for optimal thermal insulation and natural light, and air
source heat pumps for efficient climate control. Enhanced insulation and excellent air tightness minimise heat loss, while LED lighting throughout the building offers energy savings and longevity.
The Construction Skills Hub was made possible thanks to a £4M investment from the Department for Education’s Post-16 Capacity Fund.
Client testimonial
"The LSI Architects team have done a fantastic job of making our vision for the building into a reality and we are already seeing the impact that the new facilities are having for existing and new electrical engineering students now undertaking their practical training."
Matt Poll Director of Estates and Facilities, City College Norwich