Ashcroft International Business School
Subscribe now to instantly view this image
Subscribe to the Architects’ Journal (AJ) for instant access to the AJ Buildings Library, an online database of nearly 2,000 exemplar buildings in photographs, plans, elevations and details.
Already a subscriber? Sign in
Curved wall of the auditorium
Edmund Sumner (website) Download Original
Five-storey teaching block, with glazed bio-climatic double wall, as part of the ongoing masterplan for Anglia Ruskin University
The Ashcroft business school has a totally glazed, bio-climatic southerly double-layer facade and stepped-plan. The largely-glazed wall to the north take advantage of the best views and is set between bookends of staircases and risers clad in grey terracotta rainscreen.
The ground floor is mainly offices, the first and second are teaching spaces, the third is for staff and the top floor is open-plan with a roof terrace, for large formal meetings or business events.
The building is linked to the Queen’s Building (designed by ECD) by a glazed box providing an entrance area for both buildings. The entrance area is set beneath the 150-seat auditorium, with the rake of the floor soffit rising overhead.
Bridges link the Ashcroft’s teaching-level corridors (floors one and two) through the entrance area to the first floor of the Queen’s building and into the Sawyer’s building beyond. From this elevated route, within the entrance, other bridges branch off to the front and back levels of the raked auditorium.
Data
- Begun: Nov 2001
- Completed: 2003
- Floor area: 4,384m2
- Sector: Education
- Total cost: £6.4M
- Tender date: Mar 2001
- Procurement: Amended JCT98 with Contractor's Design
- Address: Bishop Hall Lane, Chelmsford, CM1 1SQ, United Kingdom
Professional Team 
- Architect: Wilkinson Eyre Architects
- Client: Anglia Ruskin University
- Project manager: Mace Consulting
- Quantity surveyor: Gardiner & Theobald
- Services engineer: Atelier 10
- Structural engineer: Fulcrum Consulting/ WW
- Landscape architect: PRP Architects
- Acoustic consultant: Sandy Brown Associates
- Main contractor: William Verry
- Contractor's architect: Scott Brownrigg + Turner
Suppliers
- Precast concrete floors and stairs: TermoDeck
- Curtain walling and structural glazing: William Verry Glazing
- Stainless steel rainscreen: CA Group
- Terracotta rainscreen: James and Taylor
- Profiled glass: Reglit
AJBL Sponsor
Thrislington Cubicles
Builders of the worlds best toilet cubicles, vanity units, lockers and panels at our factory in the United Kingdom since the 1960s