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Planning boost for contentious Níall Mclaughlin Oxford student scheme
In a report to councillors ahead of a planning committee meeting next week, principal planner Sarah de la Coze recommended approval for the Stirling Prize-winning practice’s proposals for the site next to the Grade II-listed Gee’s Restaurant in Banbury Road.
Níall McLaughlin Architects submitted an application last year to develop the plot in north Oxford to create student digs, a mixed-use pavilion and a departmental building for the newly created South-east Asian Studies Centre (SASC).
The scheme, for the University of Oxford and Hertford College, is less than half a mile away from the practice’s Univ North project – an expansion of University College Oxford.
The latest proposals are to convert a detached villa on Banbury Road from academic to residential use, as well as constructing six new blocks.
The pavilion would feature a reading room, recreation room and common room, while a new academic building for SASC would provide teaching and study spaces alongside support facilities.
Historic England said the proposals would cause ‘a modest degree of harm’ to the setting of Gee’s Restaurant, ‘eroding the historical villa garden setting and replacing it with built form’. Although this harm would be less than substantial, it said ‘considerable weight’ should be given to conserving heritage assets.
The Victorian Society objected to the scheme, citing harm to the significance of the North Oxford Victorian Suburb Conservation Area. And local group the Victorian Group of the Oxfordshire Architectural and Historical Society went further, describing the proposals as ‘grotesque overdevelopment’ and ‘destructive desecration’.
But planning officers concluded that the project’s benefits would outweigh any harm and said there was a ‘significant material consideration in favour of the proposal’ as it conformed with the ‘overall aims and objectives’ of the National Planning Policy Framework.
Niall McLaughlin Architects claimed the 2022 RIBA Stirling Prize with its ‘sophisticated’ new library at Cambridge’s Magdalene College.
Architect’s view
Through their collective ownership of the site, the client has come together as a collaboration between Hertford College, the Oxford School of Global and Area Studies (OSGA), Kellogg College and Reuben College to develop a proposal to create a vibrant community of academic, residential and student facilities for graduates, staff and the wider community.
The proposed development will provide six new graduate accommodation buildings as well as converting the existing villas at 43-45 Banbury Road into student rooms. Also proposed are a range of common use and social spaces contained within the Hertford College Pavilion, and new departmental buildings for the South-east Asian Studies Centre (SASC). The proposed buildings will be set within an extensive series of reinvigorated garden spaces designed by Kim Wilkie.
The project is a rare opportunity to enhance the provision on the site with a scheme that is heavily inspired and enriched by the neighbouring North Oxford Victorian Suburb Conservation Area’s residential context. The proposed development provides the colleges with a valuable chance to unify a varied set of buildings and functions through the implementation of a landscape-led scheme.
The proposals provide a valuable chance to unify a varied set of buildings and functions
Buildings are arranged across the site sympathetic to the scale and characteristics of the existing context of tall brick villas and mature trees. The proposed blocks have been carefully placed to frame these assets in a manner that continues the historic concept of ‘villas and gardens’, with each accommodation building positioned behind a pair of existing villas.
Where buildings are located along the street frontages, their scale and positioning reference the rhythm of villas in the neighbourhood. Their orientation aligns with the street, and their footprints complete the perimeter of the site while allowing for visual connections into the centre of the site through gaps.
The proposal seeks to retain the majority of the site’s large mature specimen trees, and enhance their setting. This is proposed through the removal of low-quality tree planting and the formation of new landscapes. A series of garden courts, lawns and squares provide a verdant block interior, around which new trees and buildings are arranged.
The programme further influences the positioning of buildings within the site boundary to establish key adjacencies. Academic uses are located towards the south of the site, in close proximity to the existing faculty buildings along Bevington Road.
Early sketch of Hertford College Pavilion common room
Project data
Location Oxford
Local authority Oxford City Council
Type of project Academic building, student accommodation, and study and social spaces
Client Oxford University and Hertford College
Architect Níall McLaughlin Architects
Landscape architect Kim Wilkie
Planning consultant Carter Jonas
Structural engineer Smith & Wallwork
M&E consultant Max Fordham
Sustainability consultant Max Fordham
Quantity surveyor Gleeds
Project manager CPC Project Services
Heritage consultant Donald Insall Associates
Principal designer Bureau Veritas
Gross internal floor area 12,250m²
Form of contract and/or procurement To be confirmed
Annual CO2 emissions To be confirmed
Total cost To be confirmed
