Look at the roof of the sports centre that LCE Architects has
designed for Little Venice in north London, and you will
immediately understand why it has been hailed as exceptionally
eco-friendly. Both the roof areas – the higher one a shallow barrel
and the lower one flat, are green roofs, with sedum blankets. And
protruding from all that green are both Sunpipes, to enhance the
lighting internally, and Windcatchers to minimise the need for air
conditioning. And there are also some solar thermal panels, to
assist with the supply of hot water.
But if you thought that this quick glance told
you all you needed to know about the
building, you would be wrong. The
environmental story is more sophisticated
than that, and there are other tales to tell as
well – not least the unusual nature of the
building’s function. Under the Big Lottery
Fund’s New Opportunities Fund, there was
budget available to put into the provision of
sports facilities for schools. Westminster
Council, unusually, decided to use all this
provision for one building, providing a sports
centre for all the schools that needed it –
mostly primary schools – in one place.
This makes sense for a crowded and well
connected borough, where all the primary
schools would have access to the site. The
resulting building has been designed to be
very hard working, since out of hours it serves
the community as well.
The project went through a complex period
of development, as it had to contend not only
with planning issues – it is in a conservation
area – but also with fluctuating funding.
What did not change, though, was a
commitment to a green agenda, driven both
by the client and the architect – a desire to
use materials that were sourced as sustainably
as possible, and to minimise the energy usage
of the building.
The building is steel framed, and clad in a mixture
of Finnforest’s Thermowood and aluminium. The
architect did consider using a timber structure,
but came up against several obstacles. But the
deciding factor was that a timber frame would
have been deeper, and the planners had placed
height restrictions on the building.
Indeed, a great deal of effort went into making
the building as unobtrusive as possible.
Already set on a slope, the building is partly
set into the ground, to diminish its apparent
bulk, and a berm was created around part of
it. This meant that the amount of material
imported to/ taken away from the site could
be minimised.
The building is in two parts, split by a stair
beneath a translucent polycarbonate strip
which brings light in and shows intriguing
shadows of the trees beyond to those using it.
The central spine of the stair is of in situ
concrete, cast at the same time as the
foundations, and with some circular holes in it
to allow light to travel through and to make
more of a feature. It curves round at the top,
to follow the line of the balustrade.
To mark the disjunction between the two parts
of the buliding, the architect has brought the
Thermowood cladding used on the exterior
inside. Hewitt choose Thermowood, a Finnish
softwood which has been made more durable
(and darker) by heat treatment, because he
wanted a low-maintenance finish. ‘The closest
competitors were cedar and larch,’ he said, ‘but
to get the quality of wood that we wanted we
would have had to import it at least from
Siberia.’ Lower quality timber would have
needed a surface treatment, which Hewitt
wanted to avoid. Another benefit of
Thermowood is that, although it greys with time,
it does so less dramatically than cedar does.
Nevertheless, Hewitt chose the deep grey
colour of the other main cladding material, the
aluminium, so that it would look good both
with the new timber and with ageing tone. In
addition it makes reference to the grey colour
that appears in the peeling bark of London
plane trees. Aluminium can divide opinion in
terms of its sustainability, because of the very
high amount of energy used in its extraction.
Light was an important issue in the building.
While minimising artificial lighting was desirable,
direct sunlight is unpopular in sports halls,
because glare and shadows can interfere with
play. LCE has put some windows into the dance
studio, one long one at very low level to allow
the dancers’ feet to cast shadows, and another
high vertical strip. But most of the light comes in
the form of Sunpipes, positioned on the roof,
which bring in a very even background light.
Changing rooms are also without windows, in
this case a security consideration, to prevent
children trying to break out or break in.
Another concern is ventilation, and LCE has
used windcatchers, which create a flow across
them and so draw up stale air, to ventilate the
larger spaces. Some of these have small PV
panels, to power them on very still days. The
green roof itself, an extensive sedum system
from Bauder that should need little
management, is a winner on several counts.
The building sits on the edge of a park, and the
green roof, coupled with the grassing of the
berm, makes it seem like a continuation of the
park, particularly when viewed from the taller
buildings that overlook it. It also helps with
water management, reducing run off. And it
helps with air cooling and removal of dust.
Another benefit is in terms of acoustic
insulation, both helping to prevent noise coming
into the building, and noise from exuberant
sports players affecting the neighbourhood.
Exuberance may be unavoidable, but the design
team has thought hard about ways to prevent
real bad behaviour. The layout is such that the
receptionist can see almost all areas. Finishes in
the changing rooms are deliberately high-quality
and ‘adult’ to discourage vandalism. And this
quality of finish goes throughout the building,
with lino floors, and carefully mismatched birch
ply panels in the main sports hall.
Although this is a centre primarily for children,
with adults using it out of hours the architect
has deliberately eschewed kiddie bright
colours, which can so quickly come to feel
patronising. Instead, the users of this building
will enjoy top sporting facilities, in a building
with strong environmental credentials that is
set to embed itself firmly in the community
