Bournemouth Borough Council: Pure Town Planning are pleased to have secured full planning permission and listed building consent for major redevelopment works at the Lansdowne Campus of the Bournemouth and Poole College.

The scheme aims to vastly improve the student experience and efficiency of the campus by replacing aging and unfit buildings with new purpose built accommodation, by upgrading existing buildings and creating a new landscaped car-free central courtyard. The scheme was designed by Winchester-based architects ArchitecturePLB with landscape proposals by UBU Design.

 

Overview of the proposal. All images courtesy of ArchitecturePLB

The Lansdowne campus contains no fewer than three listed buildings which are linked to and surrounded by a complex of further buildings of varying ages. Around ten years ago a controversial consent was granted for the demolition of everything on site except for the three listed buildings themselves and the erection of a large three storey building threaded between them. But the promised Government funding for that scheme was withdrawn at the last minute and since then the College has had to repair, refurbish and make do with the buildings it had.

 

Proposed Christchurch Road street scene showing the new Escoffier Restaurant building

This new proposal seeks a phased approach to upgrading the campus which is more modest but nonetheless still ambitious in scope. The main features of the proposal are:

  • the demolition of several single storey buildings erected around half a century ago as “temporary” accommodation,
  • the erection of two new contemporary buildings: a two-storey building fronting Christchurch Road which will provide the new home for the College’s renowned Escoffier Restaurant; and a three-storey building centrally located on the site with new student refectory and teaching accommodation,
  • the over-cladding and refurbishing of an existing building known as T-block – in line with other recent over-cladding works on the site,
  • a new entrance foyer into the rear of C-block (known locally as the old girl’s school) which together with the new three-storey building will open onto:
  • a new central landscaped courtyard – for the first time the College will have a car-free enclosed green amenity space in the tradition of the quadrangle.
Before and after: left an aerial photo showing the current centre of the site; right a plan showing the proposed car-free courtyard

Planning permission and listed building consent were granted by Bournemouth Borough Council under delegated powers following extensive and detailed discussion and consultation with planning officers, conservation and urban design officers. The main aims were to secure the best possible development for the College and the wider town whilst ensuring the listed buildings were fully respected and enhanced by the proposals.

Proposed new three-storey building housing student refectory

The Bournemouth and Poole College is a near-neighbour of Pure Town Planning headquarters and we very much look forward to seeing the first phase of works on this very exciting campus development.

This is the latest success for Pure Town Planning in a series of tricky large-scale proposals involving listed buildings following our work on the Parkstone Water Tower scheme  – and there are more we are working on. If you have ambitious plans involving a listed building, why not contact Pure Town Planning to find out how we might assist in negotiating the best possible development?