Storey’s Field Centre & Eddington Nursery

Mears Group Gold Award Winner 2018

Commercial & Leisure Winner

Location: Cambridge
Architect: MUMA
Client/Owner: University of Cambridge
Structural Engineer: Aecom
Main Contractor: Farrans Construction Ltd
Joinery: C W Fields, M Borley & Sons Joinery Ltd
Glulam Structure: n’H International Ltd
Spiral Stair: Spiral UK Ltd, David Gilbert Joinery Ltd
Cedar Shingle Supplier: Marley Eternit
Wood Supplier: Brooks Bros, D F Richards, James Latham
Wood Species: American white ash, Canadian western red cedar, European oak, spruce

The 100-place nursery is arranged around three sides of a landscaped courtyard. On the fourth side, is the civic scaled community centre including a 180-seat main hall. The principle rooms are lined in oak panelling. The main hall, influenced by the dining halls and chapels of Cambridge colleges, uses an exposed, articulated timber structure. The slender spruce glulam portal frames spring from the oak panelled base and pass in front of a backdrop of ash veneered panelling; the tones of the timber gradually lightening up the height of the space. A structural ceiling of layered ash joists, battens and veneered plywood conceals air extract routes for the hall’s passive ventilation strategy. The hall provides a venue for a range of activities and its acoustics can be adjusted to suit. At the west end, an ash spiral stair is a sculptural element wrapped by a curved veneered ash plywood balustrade. The nursery’s turret roofed classrooms are clad in western red cedar as are the soffits to the covered nursery cloister.