Inland Revenue Centre Amenity Building, Nottingham, Bridge, Nottingham

Summary

Amenity centre built between 1993 and 1994 to designs by Michael Hopkins & Partners, as part of the Inland Revenue Centre.

Description

Amenity centre built between 1993 and 1994 to designs by Michael Hopkins & Partners, as part of the Inland Revenue Centre.

MATERIALS: a building of steel, concrete and glass construction, under a tented fabric roof supported on steel masts.

PLAN: the building is essentially rectangular in plan, although with curved sides. It is entered from its southern end, which is accessed from the central boulevard which runs through the Inland Revenue site.

EXTERIOR: the building is characterised by the tensile fabric structure, supported on steel masts, which provides its roof covering. The central section of the tented roof covers the majority of the building, and is hung from four masts, two at each end. There are secondary, lower sections of tented roof which cover each side of the building. The fabric roof is punctuated by glazing between the main roof and side roofs, and in the main roof itself.

The structure of the building beneath comprises of steel framed glazed walls and concrete floors; the structure of the first floor is largely exposed and overhangs the ground floor, outside of which it is supported on piloti at intervals. To the sides, the ground floor elevation is largely solid with high level windows, while the first floor is glazed.

The main entrance to the building is in its southern elevation, in a projecting, glazed entrance lobby with rotating doors. On each side elevation there are flights of stairs which give direct access to the first floors.

INTERIOR: the main entrance opens into a reception area, behind which is the central games court in a full-height space open to the roof. The court itself has a sprung timber floor with glazed barriers around it. It is surrounded by walkways on each side; at the reception end there are twin stairs which give access to the first floor walkways. At ground floor level, there are service rooms and facilities down each side, with a larger space at the rear end which was originally used as a creche.

When viewed from the games court, the first floor is fully enclosed with glazing, and the steel masts which support the roof structure are visible throughout. Around the first floor are some kitchen and staff restaurant facilities as well as open communal areas.

History

Nottingham in 1990 had relatively few office jobs, and house prices were among the lowest in England. The then government introduced a programme of moving public servants out of London, and the Inland Revenue announced its intention to create 2,000 administrative jobs in the city. It identified a site for new buildings on the western part of the goods yards, and the Percy Thomas Partnership produced a scheme to be realised by a 'design-and-build' contract. When Nottingham's planning committee questioned the scheme, the Inland Revenue brought in David Allford of YRM to make amendments. The footprint of the new scheme was given approval in 1991, but the City Council declared the design unsuitable for the location close to Nottingham Castle.

Following this, the government's first open competition for thirty years took place, conducted by the RIBA with Colin Stansfield Smith as head of an assessment team comprising two architects, Sir Philip Powell and Terry Farrell, along with James O'Hare, a representative of the Inland Revenue. By January 1992, of 134 applications, schemes by Arup Associates, Demetri Porphyrios, Michael Hopkins & Partners, the Richard Rogers Partnership and Evans & Shalev had been shortlisted. In late February, Michael Hopkins & Partners were declared the winners.

Within the long, rectangular site Hopkins arranged six main blocks on either side of a central road through the site, with secondary roads crossing between the blocks at right angles aligned to give views of Nottingham Castle. Roads were to be lined with trees and parking bays, and there was to be a central social centre with a tented roof, a feature that had become Hopkins's signature following the success of the practice's Schlumberger building in Cambridge (Grade II*) and the rebuilding of the Mound Stand at Lord's cricket ground. The office blocks could be built in phases, or some offered to other tenants should the Inland Revenue be reorganised. The Architects' Journal noted that the finalists all attempted to 'tame' their modernist credentials, either in their choice of materials or to meet the brief's demand for energy efficiency and naturally ventilated offices. Ove Arup & Partners were the structural and service engineers.

Work began on site in May 1993 but incorporated some foundations installed in April 1991 when the Percy Thomas scheme had won its outline approval. Moreover, a large amount of construction had begun off-site from February 1993. Speed of construction was important to make up the time lost by the abandonment of the first scheme and to reduce the costs incurred by the Inland Revenue, already renting offices for staff who had moved to Nottingham.

The design consciously reflected the style of the Victorian warehouses in the surrounding area, including those which the complex replaced. The lead partner for the development was William Taylor, born and raised locally, who understood Nottingham's architectural traditions. Taylor looked to carefully match the local red brick and found that the closest in colour and texture still being manufactured came from Barrow-in-Furness; the semi-engineering, low-porosity bricks were even of traditional imperial size.

All the non-office elements of the scheme were gathered in a tented structure that appears larger from the castle ramparts than close-to, since it is end-on to the axial boulevard. It is a development of the larger but relatively simple roof at Hopkins’s research centre for Schlumberger at Cambridge. The tent here is hung from four great masts, while its edges and those of smaller canopies round the sides are propped on more slender struts. Whereas Schlumberger contrives to look like a single great covering over the staff area and testing station, at Nottingham the arcs of canvas are combined with large areas of glazing over the top of the games court and between smaller canopies to the side, making for more natural light and a greater sophistication of form. By comparison, Schlumberger appears two-dimensional rather than three. At the centre of the Nottingham building is a games court with a sprung timber floor, with a reception area at the front and a creche at the rear. It is surrounded by two stories of accommodation, the upper floor devoted to a staff bar, cafeteria and restaurant. The first phase of Schlumberger (with the tented roof) is single storey, whereas the structure below the roof at Nottingham is more like Hopkins’s offices of concrete and steel for Solid State at Begbroke, Oxfordshire (1986-8), or the second phase of Schlumberger (1990-2).

The Inland Revenue Centre was completed in late-1994. In 1995 it won the Brick Award for the best commercial and industrial building of the year, followed in 1996 by a Concrete Society Certificate of Excellence and a 'highly commended' in awards for the Green Building of the Year, and in 1997 by a Civic Trust Energy Conservation Award.

Reasons for Listing

The Amenity Building at the Inland Revenue Centre, of 1993-1995 by Michael Hopkins & Partners, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* for its high quality design, with elements of High-Tech, and the use of the oversailing tensile fabric roof which the practice had also used elsewhere;
* for the degree of survival, which demonstrates the sustainability of the original design and its flexibility.

Historic interest:

* as a major work of the 1990s by one of Britain's foremost contemporary architects;
* as an example of a large-scale development following a rare public design competition;
* as a prominent example of a welfare building provided for employees at a large-scale office development.

External Links

Historic England Listing

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