LSE director to head up design forum

The director of estates at the London School of Economics has been appointed as the new chair of the Higher Education Design Quality Forum.

Julian Robinson (pictured) has been in charge of a number of high-profile schemes the university has been building recently including a £123m scheme Mace is working at its Aldwych campus in the middle of London.

Designed by Rogers Stirk Harbour & Partners, it is the university’s largest construction scheme for more than 70 years.

Robinson oversaw the delivery of the £25m Saw Swee Hock Student Centre at the LSE, designed by Irish practice O’Donnell + Tuomey and completed by Osborne back in 2014, while earlier this summer the LSE was given the green light for a £140m redevelopment of the former London home of Cancer Research UK by Westminster city council.

The project will see the current building near the Royal Courts of Justice at 44 Lincoln’s Inn Fields demolished and replaced by a new 10-storey building.

Kier, Laing O’Rourke, Mace, Sir Robert McAlpine and Skanska are all understood to be in the running for the job.

The forum Robinson is now chairing exists to promote excellence in the creation of university campuses, buildings and facilities.

Serving under Robinson as deputy chairs will be Ian Goodfellow, a partner at architect Penoyre & Prasad and Trevor Wills, who is director of estates and capital projects at Plymouth University.