The new steel-framed
leisure centre takes
shape
Steel design stacks up
Structural steelwork has provided the required efficient
design and column-free spaces for a new leisure centre and an
academy in east London. Martin Cooper reports.
Forming part of a multi-millionpound
scheme that will transform
a large swathe of land bordering
Shoreditch Park in east London,
the construction of a new leisure centre
and an academy are providing proof that
steel construction does stack-up when an
efficient design is required.
Both buildings are using a steel-framed
design to accommodate numerous facilities
within a constrained footprint. The leisure
centre has a variety of column-free areas,
some of which are double-height and tripleheight
zones, each positioned on top or
adjacent to each other, like a collection of
different sized boxes.
“The leisure centre is replacing an
existing facility and is being built on land
previously occupied by tennis courts. It was
important the new centre did not exceed
the available footprint and encroach into
the adjacent park,” explains Morgan Sindall
Construction Project Director Lee Askey.
“The best option was to employ a design
where the numerous sport and leisure
facilities were stacked-up within the
building.”
Meanwhile, on an adjacent plot, a similar
design philosophy has been employed for
the City of London Academy Shoreditch
Park (see box).
The four-storey 11,500m2 leisure centre’s
design includes a triple-height colonnade,
which runs along the main façade. It will
usher customers into the facility’s entrance
foyer. The ground floor will also house the
centre’s wet area that consists of a six-lane,
25m-long main pool, 20m-long learner
pool, a toddlers’ pool and a leisure water
pool with a flume. There are also changing
rooms and a crèche.
This floor level is where the building’s
steel frame starts, as it is sat atop a concrete
basement that houses the pool’s associated
plant equipment.
The majority of the ground floor facilities
are housed in large column-free areas that
have different floor-to-ceiling heights,
which do not align with the floors above.
Consequently, the first and second floors do
not cover the entire structure’s footprint as
Leisure/Education
FACT FILE
Britannia Leisure Centre and City of London Academy Shoreditch Park
Main client: Hackney Council
Architect for Britannia Leisure Centre: FaulknerBrowns
Architect for City of London Academy: Fielden Clegg Bradley Studios
Main contractor: Morgan Sindall Construction
Structural engineer: BuroHappold Engineering
Steelwork contractor: Severfield
Steel tonnage: 2,200t
The leisure centre
contains a number of
open-plan column-free
areas on each floor.
16 NSC
Apr 20
/Construction
/Braced_frames
/Leisure_buildings
/Design
/Facades_and_interfaces
/Leisure_buildings#Ability_to_span_long_distances