The company was started from scratch in 1993 with the specific brief of looking for new ways to develop student accommodation, and although the number of schemes it undertakes is not large - it averages between two and three developments a year - their significance, in housebuilding terms, is massive.
The company is currently putting the finishing touches to a development in Great Dover Street, south London. It’s a 450-room hostel for London School of Economics students and sits hard by an even larger building which it completed two years ago.
The greatest innovation on site is the use of concrete panelised construction techniques. Berkeley College Homes has used such systems before but on this site they have made a number of refinements from which they are reaping dividends. Rather than buying-in an off-the-peg system, Berkeley has worked closely with panel fabricator, Bell & Webster, to produce a product which is designed to minimise finishing tasks. Walls are delivered to site with a finish so smooth it only needs a coat of paint. Window reveals aren’t square but are splayed back so they let in more light and there are no edges to finish.
Running services around such a solid concrete structure erodes time saved in construction. So service ducting has been designed into the building fabric and there isn’t a pipe, drain or cable in the entire building that can’t be accessed. Individual study bedrooms are clustered onto landings in groups of six or seven - each cluster having a communal kitchen space. All rooms are accessed from a central corridor and this corridor doubles as a service duct.
While cable ducts run horizontally along corridors, plumbing and drainage runs drop vertically through all seven floors. Each study bedroom has an en-suite shower room which backs onto the corridor. Located in an angle between the shower room and the corridor is the riser area in which all the plumbing components including the cistern are housed. The riser is accessed from a service door in the corridor. Shower rooms are raised off the main floor and are partitioned from the bedroom using metal studwork.
With each development Berkeley has refined the process so that what they now do mirrors closely the fast-track approach of commercial building, which leaves standard housebuilding in the dark ages.
The hostel is also breaking new ground in financing. Purchased by registered social landlord North British Housing Association it will be leased to the LSE. NBHA will take on the facilities management, including running the student bar - reckoned to be a first for a housing association.
Source
Building Homes
