Client: Building Research EstablishmentConstruction value: £2.9 millionCompletion: 1996

The brief called for a landmark building at the heart of the campus, providing 1,350 square metres of office space plus seminar facilities combining high architectural standards with innovations in energy efficient environmental design. The project received a BREEAM (Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method) ‘Excellent’ rating, achieving the highest score recorded at the time.

The offices were designed to a performance specification devised as part of the Energy Efficient Office of the Future project, a collaboration between the Building Research Establishment and industry to investigate the parameters of comfortable and healthy, low energy workplaces for the 21st century. The building was seen as an experimental structure designed to use approximately 30% less energy than current best practice. The specification set stringent targets for energy consumption and was developed wider environmental concerns such as recycling.

Features include:

wave form exposed structural concrete slab. This assists the control of peak summer -temperatures in the lower two levels by virtue of its thermal mass and incorporates multiple ventilation paths within it which allow for cellular offices without compromising cross-ventilationfloor slabs cooled by ground water from boreholes -highly glazed facades with variable external louvres to control solar gain, glare and act -as light shelvesautomatically controlled natural ventilation -stack ventilation with solar and fan assistance to complement cross-ventilation strategy -first UK installation of T5 high efficiency fluorescent lighting by Philips with fully -addressable controls occupant override of automatic controls -

In addition to meeting stringent low energy targets, the project was intended to develop wider environmental concerns:

96% of the material from demolition of the redundant workshops on site was recycled -first UK use of recycled aggregate for concrete superstructure -recycled brickwork with lime mortar used where design permitted -internally, screeds are made from recycled power station gypsum and wood block -floors are recycled from County Hall in London.

AwardsRIBA Award 1998 -Design Council Millennium Product 1998 -British Institute of Architectural -

Technologists’ Open Award for Technical Excellence1997

The New Environmental Office Building Research Establishment Garston

Contractor: John Sisk & SonsProject Manager: BWA Project ServicesEnvironmental Engineers: Max Fordham LLPStructural Engineer: Buro HappoldLandscape Consultants: Nicholas Pearson AssociatesQuantity Surveyor: Turner and TownsendCDM: Symonds Travers MorganPhotographs: © Dennis Gilbert/VIEW Pictures

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Ground floor plan 1 Entrance Lobby 2 Open plan office 3 Cellular office 4 Foyer 5 Exhibition area 6 Seminar room 7 Projection room 8 Green room 9 Plant10 Lift11 Kitchen

Office cross-section1 Stack ventilation for hot still conditions2 High level BMS controlled ventilation3 Night time purge through slab4 Cross-ventilation bypass over cellular offices5 Cellular office single sided ventilation6 Corridor cross over zone7 Low level manually operated windows8 High level motorised windows9 Motorised external glass shading louvres

Floor construction1 Philips T5 high efficiency luminaries with integrated BMS control sensors2 Heated/cooled screed (using borehole cooling source)3 Raised access floor for flexible servicing4 Cross ventilation duct through floor5 Wave form pre-cast concrete ceiling with in situ concrete topping

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