Learning curve

Growing up in the run-down Birmingham suburb of Moseley, children have a harder start in life than most. The area and its surroundings have suffered a serious decline over the past few decades, property has fallen into disrepair and problems with crime, drugs and prostitution are commonplace. Roughly 25% of the population is out of work and most local parents have no experience of higher education. So when construction of a new sixth form college was announced, something special was required, with pupil safety and top-class learning facilities a fundamental requirement.

Central to the design for Joseph Chamberlain Sixth Form College is a distinctive crescent-shaped classroom block, which encloses the site to provide a protective courtyard space for staff and pupils to meet without having to leave the premises. Built using a traditional concrete frame and clad with handmade Dutch brick and lime mortar, the college will make a bold statement in this run-down area. But for HBG, the brickwork presented a huge headache and throughout the second design phase construction manager Steve Roome tried to persuade the architect to respecify.

‘We must have proposed 300 types of brick,’ he says. ‘Lime mortar has a low cement content and it’s prone to cracking at low temperatures. We explained why it wasn’t the right thing to do, we consulted with manufacturers but the architects wouldn’t back down.’

The original college building was constructed in the 1960s and sits just a few hundred yards away. It has been very successful, having recently gained national recognition by becoming the only Beacon College (an initiative to celebrate learning providers who deliver outstanding teaching and learning) in Birmingham and one of only two in the West Midlands. About 95% of its 1,300 students are Muslim and most live locally.

Lynne Morris is the college principal and she’s the driving force behind the new scheme. Having sweated over it for nine years it’s very much her baby. She is also a prominent figure in UK education and sits on the board of Partnership for Schools, which oversees the Building Schools for the Future programme.

‘The existing college is in a bad state of repair, so I wanted a building that could accommodate new and existing students,’ she admits. ‘It had to combine spaces for reflection and learning and state-of-the-art IT equipment in an environment designed to transform post-16 education in the centre of Birmingham.’

Architect Nicolas Hare’s design responds to several important factors: the building’s perched on a significant site on a hill overlooking the city centre so they wanted a high-quality landmark the community could be proud of. It’s also surrounded by busy roads and right next to a traffic island, so features to protect classrooms from noise and pollution were vital.

The result is the brick-clad three-storey Colosseum-like semi-circular classroom block which follows the site perimeter road, and connects to blocks containing a library, cafeterias, a sports hall and other services. Its total self-containment means pupils do not have to leave college for the entire day. They attend lessons in the classroom block or in specially designed open learning areas, and spend breaks socialising in either the inner courtyard or the main ‘safe’ courtyard space created by the enclosing classroom block.

HBG actually won the construction tender over seven years ago when the building was due to go up near a housing area, but planning issues related to use of the land for recreation scuppered the start of work. Several redesigns later and HBG was back to work in January 2007, this time on a site across the road.

It’s a two-stage design-and-build contract with HBG involved very early on to help fit everything into the 78-week timeframe. ‘Finally the industry’s woken up to the fact that the builders, not the property developers, clients or architects, actually do the building,’ says Roome.

A gold medal winner in our 2006 Construction Manager of the Year Awards for his work on nearby Matthew Boulton College, Roome says he has transferred many of the skills learned there to Joseph Chamberlain.

Construction materials were carefully selected to help the building achieve a ‘very good’ BREEAM sustainability rating (see panel on page 24) as well as create a visual contrast between the robust and protective exterior aspect and the light and spacious interior.

The building’s use of traditional construction techniques is uncharacteristic. Most new colleges are steel framed to cut costs and speed up construction, but Joseph Chamberlain’s crescent design lent itself to an in-situ concrete frame.

The principal is very influential in the community - she’ll find out if anyone’s upset

Steve Roome

‘The client also wanted 325mm solid concrete slabs to improve acoustics, increase thermal mass and increase general robustness,’ says Roome.

Textured buff bricks were laid on the exterior to create deep reveals in the roadside elevation (see detail, page 22) – apart from creating a robust aesthetic they will help to insulate the structure from traffic noise. ‘There was nothing predominant colour-wise in the local context, so we went for buff bricks, which make the elevation less overpowering,’ says lead architect David Lowe.

The deep reveals in the elevation raised costs but they were considered appropriate to the building and surroundings. ‘The bricks are hand made and imported from Holland and we chose lime mortar because it’s more flexible than cement,’ says Lowe.

‘It also meant we could remove vertical movement joints in the elevation, which would break up the continuity.’

‘At HBG we were very sceptical,’ says Roome. ‘The bricks posed a problem because they are relatively slow to lay and brickies trained to work with them are few and far between.’

If the project was to be completed in time, it meant taking the façade off the critical path so the rest of the building work could continue unhampered. To do this, the inner skin was clad with a structural framing system (SFS) comprising a series of metal studs faced with continuous cement-faced board. Using SFS instead of blockwork, the structure was soon made watertight, enabling work on the outer brickwork skin to continue.

Wintry conditions posed the most significant problem, however. Lime mortar has a high water content and had to be covered with sacking at night to prevent cracking. High winds and rain also blasted the site and have now delayed work by about five weeks, but Roome is confident he can make the July 4 completion date. A hold-up on a project like this can prove costly: apart from having to a suspend work until the following term, it could also incur damages of up to £50,000 a week. When CM visited the site, bricklaying firm Advanced Brickwork was still hard at it but should have completed the façade by the time you read this.

Elsewhere on the project, problems installing the raised floor have imposed a four to six-week delay until underfloor services are fully installed and signed off. ‘It means we’ll have more going on simultaneously towards the end,’ says Roome. ‘But from a safety point of view there was no way round it – we can’t work on other aspects without floors down.’

Once construction work on Joseph Chamberlain is completed, HBG will have just six weeks to install loose furniture and get Information and Communication Technologies systems online, which gives the college just two weeks to settle in for the start of term.

With an education project like this it seems appropriate to ask Roome what he’s learned building his second college. ‘These jobs are all about relationships. Your relationship with the principal is paramount as she leads things – it’s almost like you’re building her house. It’s also a very long relationship, which on this job has lasted over seven years, so be prepared to listen.

‘The principal’s also very influential in the community, so if you’re building in the community, you’ve also got to become part of the community – she’ll soon find out if anyone’s upset. If you can make all that work you’re more likely to win similar jobs in future.’

It’s good advice and HBG is already preparing for another Midlands college job at Sutton Coldfield. The contractor’s efforts in Moseley have also been acknowledged by the Considerate Constructors Scheme, which awarded it an exemplary 37 out of 40.

As far as the brick cladding’s concerned, Roome’s had a change of heart: ‘I was sceptical at first, but despite the minor weather delays – which affected all aspects of the project – I’d definitely use it again.’  cm