ARU PETERBOROUGH
A FUTURE WE CAN ALL BE PROUD OF
Read more about ARU Peterborough's stunning new Lab building; a sustainable and inspiring place for students to learn.
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ARU Peterborough's new lab building is a state-of-the-art facility that enables the University to offer a new and improved curriculum, as well as space for future research.
The Lab, which is situated adjacent to the existing University House building on Bishop’s Road in the city, will support students and apprentices studying mainly in STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) fields. This will increase skills in the city and region, supporting local growth and investment.
The building includes a microbiology lab, tissue culture lab, a range of engineering workshops and other high quality teaching spaces. The Living Lab element will feature exhibits and events and will aim to inspire people into learning more about STEM, including through ARU Peterborough’s curriculum and courses. It will also link with local libraries, museums and arts venues to create a cultural hub for the city and region.
Click to watch the film
✅ Delivered on time and budget
✅ 10/10 customer satisfaction
✅ BREEAM Excellent
✅ 258.2tCO2e saved against the RIBA 3 model
✅ £74.1 million social value investment
✅ 45 new jobs created
✅ 240 apprentices weeks achieved
Customer ARU Peterborough, Peterborough City Council, Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority
Framework Pagabo
Client PM Mace
Contractor Morgan Sindall
Architect MCW
Structural Engineer Smith & Wallwork
M&E Engineer CPW
Landscape LUC
Nestled in beautifully landscaped rain gardens, and linking neatly to the first two buildings on the campus, The Lab is the centrepiece of Peterborough's expanding University Quarter.
Photo credit: MCW - Philip Vile
It is the people that are the focus of this University and great design, centred around the student experience, enhances what those people can achieve.
That experience starts from before you enter the building, as the publicly accessible and high quality external landscape, interconnects the new building with the rest of the campus providing spaces for people and nature.
The buildings striking sawtooth roof is the first thing you notice as you approach from Bishop's Road. The crafted forms give the building a distinctive look and provide large clerestory windows that bring light and ventilation into the upper floor classrooms as part of the environmental strategy. Inside, the spacious quality height feels almost ecclesiastical, in a subtle nod to the nearby Cathedral.
My favourite part of the building is the saw tooth roof. Inside we have these cathedral like ceilings, which are quite exceptional. It's beautiful. I love what it gives us inside as well as outside.
The two storey, 2500m2 building accommodates a range of different spaces including general teaching, social learning spaces, offices and specialist teaching spaces including a Cat 2 laboratory and engineering workshops.
We've got some really amazing lab facilities, which allows us to expand our teaching. It's the first time we've had a category two lab in the city. The building also includes the living lab and this means we can collaborate with industry, our expert researchers and also with the public, really trying to solve some of the tricky problems in society.
The Living Lab is housed in a double height golden box and provides a flexible space for learning and collaboration with local industry and researchers.
The lab not only helps transform the curriculum offer at the University and spearhead new research with industry, but it now delivers a campus experience for students and welcomes the public into its open setting, creating a landmark building for the city to be proud of.
People are really core to what we do, but buildings are important, because you spend a lot of your time within them. Having a high-quality environment around you makes such a difference. This new building has lots of natural materials, brings in lots of light and it has a wonderful new rain garden. Our staff love the scale of it and our students are so excited by it. So, we’re inspiring the future and creating new opportunities by having this phase three building, which is a really transformative, phenomenal building.
Making a positive impact on the environment and the community were key targets for the University.
Watch Principal Ross Renton explain why sustainability and social value were just as important as the construction itself.
Taking a fabric first approach to design, this BREEAM Excellent building was literally built with sustainability at its core.
To showcase the beauty and sustainability of the building's mass timber frame, the Cross Laminated Timber (CLT) and Glulam elements have been left exposed wherever possible, hereby minimising the need for additional finishes.
Click to watch the timber frame time-lapse
During construction, the project took part in Morgan Sindall's 10 tonne challenge - a challenge which focuses the team on saving at least 10 tonnes of carbon by changing the design, materials or method of working.
Compared against the RIBA 3 model, the team saved 258.2tCO2e. This was achieved in part by changing the cladding types from stainless steel to PPC aluminium, using GGBS in the concrete mix and raising the building's floor level to reduce the amount of muck away on the scheme.
The project also has two large air source heat pumps and a solar panels on the roof to generate electricity for the building to run on.
Mass timber frame
BREEAM Excellent
258.2t carbon saved from RIBA stage 3 to RIBA stage 5
89t carbon saved during construction
Air source heat pumps
Solar panels
Landscaped attenuation basins
The future impact is really important, so having a building that's sustainable is really, really important to us, and to our students. Having something that's environmentally sustainable has been a great experience for us, but we're also constantly learning. We did well on our phase one, we did even better on phase two, phase three really is pushing the boundary, and we'll push even further in our future developments - it's absolutely the right thing to do.
Leaving every community in a better place than we found it, is really important to our teams. Making sure we deliver investment, way beyond the build is a key part of this.
In total, the project delivered £74.1 million of social value impact locally.
This is calculated through Loop - a market-leading software that forecasts, monitors and evaluates the entire life-cycle of a projects social value impact.
During the scheme, the team created 45 new jobs, 16 work experience placements and 240 apprentice weeks.
In addition, 433 pupils were inspired through 22 STEM based events, whilst the team donated 290 volunteer hours and £4,062 to community and charity events.
The project had an an onsite Knowledge Quad (a separate community and education room next to the site) and viewing platform, which helped provide a more inclusive and immersive experience for students and visitors alike.
We've been really pleased with the community outreach and we've had lots of people coming to learn on site, so the knowledge quad has been important. There's been students working on site from our courses, but also people from our local colleges, and that really says a lot - it says we're investing in the city and we're building something that's so meaningful.
I think it's incredibly important to have a good customer experience. The whole process has been professional and collaborative. The team has been really easy to work with, so it’s been a pleasure. They understood what we were trying to do early on and you have carried that with you, which has been crucial. I have done this twice before, so it’s been really refreshing to have this experience.
Photo credit
MCW - Philip Vile
