The Planning consent arrived this morning for this fantastic new house in Hook Norton. This is a lovely edge of village scheme with a substantial new detached house in a traditional style with an double storey oak framed rear gable to the rear. The design also includes an out-building incorporating garaging, garden store and a home office and gym – the popularity of which has increased dramatically post Covid and with the rise of flexible home working. We are always keen to speak with potential clients who are considering a new out-building and home office at their property.
Month: March 2022
Rejuvenating Existing Schools
Transforming existing primary schools: A large part of our Practices’ work involves improving and transforming learning spaces in schools for Academy Trusts. The aim here is to make existing schools buildings work harder, to maximise opportunities for learning and to create spaces for children that are both inspiring and functional.
Thinking Buildings are the Architects for the GLF Academy Trust at a local primary school in Banbury, for a significant project to replace a temporary classroom block with a new extension. The existing school building required extensive refurbishment too, adding a circulation route as well as upgrading and transforming existing classrooms. It is common to find cramped and poorly laid out classrooms as a result of post war era teaching trends for open plan learning, with smaller pockets of private space. The classrooms and resources spaces have been remodelled and opened out making them much more flexible and efficient. This has made an enormous difference to the school with staff commenting on how big the classrooms now feel. The executive head teacher said ” The school looks and feels AMAZING!!!!! We are so thrilled, thank you to everyone”
Thinking Buildings are experts at analysing and providing solutions to improve existing Primary Schools, and we are involved in numerous projects and feasibility studies to expand or improve existing school accommodation. Please do get in touch if your school would benefit from our involvement.
Listed Care Home Expansion
Our work is spread across many building types and uses. We often work with listed buildings, which can be private homes, schools, and in this case a care home.
We’re currently working with a Derbyshire care home provider to develop plans for a new wing to this existing Grade II Listed building. The building is a very nice example of a late 19th-century Derbyshire private country home in a parkland setting.
Working with Listed structures brings challenges in terms of developing a design for modern use while being appropriate to the setting. This development ensures the long-term viability of the site, secures the ongoing use of the building as a care home, and as a consequence the maintenance of the historic structure. Providing additional bedrooms will make the site more sustainable and bring much-needed revenue which will, in turn, be invested back into the building and site.
More updates to follow.
(Image: M Craven)
Contemporary Update to Post War Home
The best part of the job is when you get really positive feedback and happy clients:
“Thank you for all your help, we really do appreciate it and have no doubts that our choice in architects has been the correct one”
The client’s project involves extending and transforming a tired and slightly awkward looking post war house into a stylish modern family home…we are a few weeks away from a planning application. We will update as the project progresses and as we add a little more polish to the final design and visuals.
Secondary Education Science Centre
Thinking Buildings have been working with Spencer Academies Trust and John Port Spencer Academy since 2018. We have helped develop a comprehensive Premise Development Plan (PDP) looking at expansion of the school to 2,100 11-16 pupils and 400 Post 16 students.
The site is complex, spread over a large area with many buildings as is more common to a university or college campus. The majority of the buildings are standalone and date from the mid 1960’s to early 2000’s. The expansion plans have been developed in a phased approach to lessen the burden on the school as construction work is carried out. Two phases have been completed so far, an extension to the leisure centre car park and reconfiguration of the art blocks to form additional teaching spaces.
Further phases are an expansion to the post 16 building, which we shared at the end of last year, and the science building which can be seen here. These two phases are currently being considered by South Derbyshire District Council under a reserved matters application.
