Contractor says nearly half of scheme built using its offsite method

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Laing O’Rourke has finished work on the Francis Crick Institute in Kings Cross five years after former London mayor Boris Johnson gave it the green light.

The firm’s project director said close to 45% of the 980,000 sq ft building had been manufactured offsite through its Design for Manufacturing Assembly (DfMA) facility which is based at Steetley in Derbyshire.

The institute’s 1,500 plus staff, including 1,250 scientists involved in biomedical research, will start to move into their new home within the next month.

The founding partners – Medical Research Council, Cancer Research UK, Wellcome Trust, University College London, Imperial College London and King’s College London – have invested £650m in establishing the institute.

The project team on the development also included architects HOK as the lead architect on the scheme, as well as PLP. Other consultants working on the development included structural engineer AKT II, project manager Arup and cost consultant Turner & Townsend.