Robinson College
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College entrance is complete with drawbridge and portcullis
Martin Charles Download Original
New student college for the University of Cambridge, consisting of student accommodation, chapel and teaching facilities
The masterplan was originally meant to house 600 students, but site restrictions meant that first-stage designs accommodated 350 students.
Although the original proposal was a ribbon of building to extend around three sides of the site, the present college constitutes about two-thirds of that plan. Compared to the other competition entries the design was more densely arranged and concentrated on an U-shaped wing built up to six storeys on its interior and stepping down to three storeys around the perimeter facing the road.
The study bedrooms themselves are grouped around open staircases and a stepped section provides external gallery access and alternative escape routes, thereby dispensing with the need for internal corridors.
The complex is largely built from plum-coloured handmade Dorset stocks and decorated with a rich variety of brick details-V-shaped brick piers (containing copper down-pipes) corbelled door surrounds and so on. Beneath this non-load bearing brick skin, the building is mainly of concrete frame construction. The college chapel contains stained glass windows by John Piper.
Data
- Begun: Apr 1977
- Completed: Oct 1980
- Floor area: 20,257m2
- Sectors: Education, Residential
- Total cost: £7.6M
- Funding: David Robinson
- Tender date: Mar 1977
- Procurement: 1963 JCT Private Edition with quantities, fluctuations not included
- Address: Grange Road, Cambridge, CB3 9AN, United Kingdom
Professional Team 
- Architect: Gillespie, Kidd and Coia
- Project architect: John Piper
- Client: The Trustees of the Robinson Charitable Trust in conjunction with the Trustees of Robinson College
- Main contractor: The Joint Venture (Johnson & Bailey Ltd and William Sindall Ltd)
- Quantity surveyor: Davis Belfield and Everest
- Landscape consultant: J. St Bodfan Gruffyd
- Structural engineer: Arup
- M&E engineer: Osar Faber and Partners
Suppliers
- Facing brick: Swanage Brick and Tile Co Ltd
- Hardwood strip flooring: Phoenix Floors Ltd
- Metal windows: Gardner Alumin Ltd