Site officially opened by Scotland’s First Minister
International multi-disciplinary engineering practice Buro Happold is helping to transform Aberdeen’s city centre, providing a broad scope of engineering services for a mixed-use development.
Located parallel to Union Street in the heart of Aberdeen and owned by Scottish-based developer Hazledene, works to build office accommodation and a medium-rise hotel have just gone on site. A ‘sod-cutting’ ceremony took place last week, where Scotland’s First Minister, the Rt. Hon. Alex Salmond MSP, symbolically broke the turf to enable construction to proceed.
The office block and hotel are being built by main contractor Miller Construction on a brownfield site, where various low-rise developments including a service station have already been demolished.
Richard Murphy Architects won a competition to design the new buildings, and the winning scheme includes the creation of semi-public courtyards at the heart of the site. “We were very keen to establish a new public space for the city, rather than just a closed commercial development,” explained lead architect Richard Murphy.
Buro Happold is helping to regenerate Aberdeen with the £42m scheme
The ‘IQ’ scheme, worth £42m, is split between a commercial office development and a 180+ bedroom Park Inn Hotel, for the Rezidor hotel group. The hotel will rise to seven storeys, with all the associated modern services provision, a three-storey basement car park, and a total floor area of 13,000m2. It will include a restaurant with seating for over a hundred guests, as well as a bar, fitness suite and five flexible meeting rooms spread over 320m2.
The offices will consist of high quality open plan office space over six levels. A ground floor entrance will open into a full height atrium space with a number of upper floors opening onto external balconies.
“Aberdeen is Scotland’s third city, and Buro Happold is proud to be aiding in its regeneration,” said Andrew Burrell, the practice’s project leader on the scheme. “The development is of an appropriate scale for the surrounding streetscape and will certainly prove a valuable addition to the town centre.”
Buro Happold is providing structural, ground, infrastructure, fire and inclusive design engineering
“Particular challenges include the construction of a three storey underground car park on a constrained site with highly variable soil conditions,” explained Burrell. “The office and hotel buildings are different in their use but have similar structural systems, with the aim to maximise the available floor space and numbers of bedrooms. Fire engineering principles were also applied to make efficiencies within the building and minimise fire protection requirements.”
Mark Shaw, chief executive at Hazledene Group Ltd, commented: “Naturally we’re delighted that the First Minister officially marked the start of this important project. The enduring success of Scotland's oil industry means that Aberdeen is one of the best places in the world to do business at the moment. Demand for hotel accommodation and for high quality offices in Aberdeen continues to outstrip supply, and we have confidence this will continue in the long term, despite less favourable economic conditions elsewhere.
“Both the quality of space and the environmental credentials have already attracted substantial interest from prospective tenants, which is fantastic given that the ‘IQ’ site is not due for completion until March 2010. We have the opportunity to develop one of the last remaining substantial city centre sites in Aberdeen and are using that opportunity to set a new standard of quality.”
Project team:
Client: Hazeldene (Strawberrybank) Ltd
Architect: Richard Murphy Architects
Buro Happold services: Structural, ground, infrastructure, fire and inclusive design engineering.
Main contractor: Miller Construction Ltd
Ends
Note to Editors:
Buro Happold
Press office and practice information at www.burohappold.com
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For more information, please contact:
Jenni O’Connor
PR Officer
Tel +44 (0)1225 320600 ext. 2937
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Email jenni.o’connor@burohappold.com
Buro Happold is a multi-disciplinary international practice of consulting engineers established in 1976. We now employ over 1,700 staff in 21 offices worldwide, and our aim is to produce high quality engineering design in concept, in detail and in execution, on time, to programme and delivering excellent value for money. Our distinctive culture and ethos is still based on the same principles of care, value and elegance that were established when the practice was founded.
We offer structural, building services, civil, infrastructure and façade engineering, as well as a broad range of specialist consultancy services including sustainability, ground and environmental engineering, fire and security design, health and safety management, inclusive and urban design, project management, and specialist CAD and computer simulation provision.