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Imperial College Princes Gardens

Location

London, UK

Client

Oxford University

Gross Floor Area m²

31,500

Status

Completed

The new-build Halls of Residence and Study Facilities for Imperial College London at Prince’s Gardens were undertaken by KPF under the direction of design partner Fred Pilbrow.

The majority of the college’s South Kensington student accommodation was provided in listed but failing 1960s buildings, which provided substandard accommodation, were inaccessible for disabled users and had reached a poor state of repair. The buildings failed therefore to support the college’s need to attract and safely accommodate the highest calibre of students.

Fred Pilbrow’s masterplan restored the original scale and coherence of Prince’s Gardens. The solution demonstrated that more rooms, of a higher quality, could be provided in an alternately structured building; one in which redistributed massing had the potential to heal this important public space. The new facilities with active ground floor frontages, public terraces, and tightly controlled vehicular access activate the square. The garden was additionally restored to its original conception.

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