Christopher Thomas Court
RIBA Town and Country South West Conservation Award 2009 – Highly Commended
Civic Trust Award 2010 Conservation and Sustainability
AWW was appointed by Jephson Housing Association for the redevelopment of the existing derelict Grade II listed buildings that form part of the Old Soap Works in Bristol City Centre. The development provides 54 new affordable mixed tenure apartments in a complex of four buildings. Works consisted of repairing and converting the two rare Bristol Byzantium 19th century Grade II listed buildings and adding two new six storey timber frame structures within the confined existing site boundary.
The development provides high quality living accommodation set within a city centre urban location, the works have brought the building and grounds back into active use, rescuing a key historical building and securing its long term future. The new-build aspect of this development was constructed using off-site pre-fabricated modular construction providing a better thermal performance when compared with traditional construction methods, helping to deliver a more energy efficient design.
“The philosophy behind the repair and conservation of the existing buildings was to preserve as much of the remaining historic fabric as possible whilst opening up the blocked up elements of the elevations and restoring the historical details to their original appearance. The key factor to make the scheme feasible relied upon the ability to add new elements to the site and provide a viable capacity which would enable the historical elements to be preserved. This has been achieved and the new elements were designed with a mass and appearance to complement the existing townscape and we used materials that reference back to the original structures to provide an industrial feel.”