Cambridge | March 2024

We are delighted that our project for St John’s College’s Dining Room, Bar and Café won the prestigious David Mackay Award for Engineering and Sustainability at the Greater Cambridge Design Awards last night.

The project also received a commendation in the Best Conservation, Alteration, or Extension of an Existing Building (over £2m construction cost) category.

Another of our projects, Mill House, was nominated in the Best New Building (under £2m construction costs) category.

Congratulations to all the winners, it is great to see the very high-quality projects that are being delivered in the city and around.

Cambridge | February 2024

We are delighted that our proposal for St John's College’s Postgraduate Accommodation on Portugal Street has been granted planning permission by Cambridge City Council.

Construction will be commencing in the Spring.

Cambridge | January 2024

We are very pleased to see two of our recently completed projects being shortlisted for the #GreaterCambridgeDesignAwards2024.

St John's College, Cambridge's Buttery dining room, bar and café and Mill House have been selected in the Best Conservation, Alteration, or Extension of an Existing Building (over £2m construction costs) and Best New Building (under £2m construction costs) categories, respectively.

Good luck to all the shortlisted projects.

The full list can be found here https://shorturl.at/mvIKU

Photos by Richard Fraser and Philip Vile

Cambridge | November 2023

We are delighted to announce that both ARU Peterborough University House and Mill House have been shortlisted for the Civic Trust Awards 2024.

The Civic Trust Awards celebrate aspects of the architectural and design merits of schemes in addition to sustainability credentials, accessibility, and the civic contribution, ensuring that each project has been designed with the needs of all users in mind.

Cambridge | November 2023

We are very pleased to announce that we have been selected as one of six architectural practices on University of Cambridge’s Estates Division Framework for major projects, and we look forward to continuing our work with them, and the other successful consultants over the coming years.

London | October 2023

We have won Building Design Higher Education Architect of the Year 2023!

We are really proud to have been chosen from a very strong list of contenders and have our work in the HE sector recognised.

A great big thank you to all our clients and collaborators who make the work we do together so rewarding.

Cambridge | October 2023

MCW have pleasure in announcing that Lien Geens, Paula Mejia-Wright and Hien Nguyen have been promoted to Associate Directors.

These promotions recognise the valuable contributions and leadership they have already brought to the practice – their energy and expertise will steer the practice forward into 2024 and beyond, as we continue to work with collaborators and clients and take on exciting new projects.

Join us in wishing them every success for the next chapter!

Cambridge | September 2023

On Tuesday, 12th September Magpas Air Ambulance staff, clinicians, former patients and supporters witnessed an important milestone in the charity’s history as HRH The Princess Royal opened the new charity airbase.

The lifesaving charity has been working to build its new home for the past six years: a purpose-built airbase, headquarters and training centre in Alconbury Weald, Cambridgeshire.

The building, designed by MCW architects and constructed by Lindum, includes a dedicated state-of-the-art training centre to train the next generation of pre-hospital emergency doctors and paramedics; is equipped for 24/7 operations with well-being and rest facilities for crew and clinicians; and has new community and patient facilities on site—including a new dedicated space for patients and their families to visit the charity and meet with the clinicians that treated them, away from the bustle of day-to-day operations.

To ensure it maximises renewable energy, the building has been designed with the approach of ‘be lean, be clean and be green’. This is achieved through integrated design measures such as solar shading and natural ventilation through louvres, and PV panels on the roof.

HRH The Princess Royal became Magpas Air Ambulance’s Patron after she visited the charity’s previous operations base in February 2020, and heard about the need for the service to find a new home. In 2021, the charity’s 50th year of operations, HRH launched the Future 50 Appeal aimed at raising the funding needed to complete the building. And in February of this year, HRH unveiled a cornerstone to mark the ongoing development of the project.

However, Tuesday’s visit from The Princess Royal is undoubtedly the most exciting yet as HRH opens the new base open for Magpas Air Ambulance to begin the process of moving their operations and lifesaving service to the state-of-the-art airbase and headquarters.

Find out more about the charity today at magpas.org.uk.

September 2023

Taking the vision of lead architects Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios forward, MCW architects led the delivery team with Bowmer and Kirkland Ltd.

The design unites the formerly dispersed departments under one roof, incorporating a variety of spaces from lecture theatres, performance studios, cinema to informal study and teaching spaces and academic studios.

The building features a distinctive fluted terracotta cladding in a warm red colour and a highly sculptural internal staircase detailed in larch winding through the central void. The project has been designed and constructed together with a multidisciplinary team of engineering specialists throughout Covid.

Cambridge | September 2023

St John's College, Cambridge new dining room has been shortlisted to the Wood Awards 2023 in the building category. We are delighted with the news!

Jim Greaves, Head of the Building Judges says:

“Selected from over ninety entries, this impressive shortlist reveals the best use of timber in construction today and demonstrates that wood truly is a material of continuous change and innovation."

We are looking forward to visiting the shortlist exhibition at the Gallery @ Oxo in London between 20th and 23th September.

Good luck to all the shortlisted buildings.

Peterborough | August 2023

We are delighted to share ARU Peterborough University House has been shortlisted for the #AJArchitectureAwards for Higher Education Project.

Thank you to Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority, Peterborough City Council and Anglia Ruskin University for the opportunity to work on this exciting transformational project.

You can take a virtual tour of University House: https://www.aru.ac.uk/student-life/life-on-campus/aru-peterborough-campus/facilities

Find out more about the AJ Architecture awards and shortlist: https://lnkd.in/eeAhyuAe

Cambridge | August 2023

Continuing our productive year, we're very happy to share some more good news on the awards front: Mill House, Newnham Road, Cambridge has been shortlisted by the AJArchitectureAwards 2023 in the Housing Project (up to £5 million) category.

Thank you to GCR CamProp for the opportunity to be involved in such a unique and challenging scheme, on this sensitive but pivotal site in the heart of Cambridge. We'd also like to extend our gratitude to our fellow consultants in working so collaboratively towards a successful and popular finished article.

It’s great to find ourselves amongst such an impressive assortment of finalists - good luck to you all. Winner revealed 22nd November…

If you're planning a city break in Cambridge soon - it'd be the perfect opportunity to visit. Stay in the airbnb or drop in for a quality coffee at Bean Theory and experience Mill House firsthand!

Peterborough | August 2023

The first CLT walls for the Living Lab, the third phase of ARU Peterborough, have arrived on site. The low embodied carbon building for the university has been designed by MCW with structural engineers Smith and Wallwork and building services engineers CPW, as part of a Mace-led multi-disciplinary team.

Morgan Sindall Construction and subcontractor KLH will assemble the superstructure consisting entirely of CLT and glulam rapidly within the next weeks. The building will open to students in September 2024.

Cambridge | August 2023

We are delighted that St John’s College new dining room, bar and café project has been shortlisted by Building Magazine Awards 2023 in the Retrofit Building of The Year category.

Congratulations to all other nominees https://building-awards.com/buildingawards23/en/page/shortlist

Photo by Richard Fraser

Cambridge | August 2023

It's been an exciting and productive year in the MCW office and we're thrilled to see that this has been reflected by our nomination in the Higher Education Architect of the Year category.

Check out the Building Design shortlist here: https://awards.bdonline.co.uk/2023/en/page/shortlist

Thanks to all our clients and co-consultants for their support.

Warwick | May 2023

"This building is shaped by the surrounding trees that define the site’s parkland character".

So say the RIBA judges of University of Warwick's new Faculty of Arts, which has just won a Regional Award, West Midlands and been named West Midlands Building of the Year.

Taking the vision of lead architects Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios forward, MCW architects led the delivery team with Bowmer and Kirkland Ltd.

The design unites the formerly-dispersed departments under one roof, incorporating a variety of spaces from lecture theatres, performance studios, cinema to informal study and teaching spaces and academic studios.

The building features a distinctive fluted terracotta cladding in a warm red colour and a highly sculptural internal staircase detailed in larch winding through the central void. The project has been designed and constructed together with a multidisciplinary team of engineering specialists throughout Covid.

Peterborough | May 2023

Thanks to Architects’ Journal for covering ARU Peterborough’s University House in the ‘First Look’ series: Architects' Journal First Look

Peterborough | May 2023

It's great to see University House featuring on the front cover of RIBAJ Products In Practice, as well as a deep dive into the project being presented within the issue.

Thank you for your visit Jan-Carlos Kucharek!

Peterborough | April 2023

We are delighted that the UK’s newest university, ARU Peterborough won the prestigious ‘University Impact Initiative of the Year’ at the AUDE annual conference last night.

Designed by MCW, the first teaching building, ‘University House’, welcomed its first students in September 2022 as part of a project delivered through a unique partnership between the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority (CPCA), Peterborough City Council (PCC) and Anglia Ruskin University (ARU). The Peterborough Innovation & Research Centre, also designed and delivered by MCW, was completed earlier this year and is ready for tenants to move in.

We are delighted to continue collaborating with ARU, PCC and CPCA on the second teaching building, which will incorporate a Living Lab and will provide additional, high-quality spaces for teaching and social learning.

Looking forward to the year ahead!

London | March 2023

Thanks to New London Architecture for publishing our contribution to the 'most important issue the New London Agenda should address'.

In it, Murdoch Cameron suggests that engagement at a micro level could help the quality of people's lives and make London a better place to live, work and visit.

Here's to the implementation!

Cambridge | January 2023

For the first time in its 500 year history St John’s College has its own café, serving the College community, as part of the project that we have been working on with the College since Summer 2019.

This has been a wonderfully rewarding and challenging project and we are very proud of the result – a product of a highly collaborative process with both our client and design team.

Alongside the café, a completely rebuilt buttery dining room enjoys generous daylight through a series of five large rooflights, supported by a dramatic oak structure. A diverse range of plants form a living wall along the whole length of the space, bringing colour, texture and a real sense of well-being.

A new bar completes the trio of interconnected spaces – an inclusive and welcoming space, always open for study and socialising.

The goal of the carefully-planned transformation was to provide the community not only with a comfortable place to gather to eat and drink – at the heart of College life for centuries – but to answer newer calls for different kinds of work spaces, less formal than a library but less distracting or potentially isolating than a student room.

We joined forces with our ‘old friends’ at Smith and Wallwork Structural Engineers to develop the concept of this free standing superstructure before engaging with family owned, Swiss specialist timber fabricators Blumer Lehman to complete the detailed design. The installation was undertaken by Eurban who were responsible for orchestrating the process of bringing all the component parts across the only site access- a narrow Grade I listed bridge.

More details about the project can be found on the project page.

Northampton | January 2023

We are delighted to announce that West Northamptonshire Council’s Planning Committee unanimously approved the St George’s Avenue Maidwell scheme last month.

Designed by MCW for Northampton Partnership Homes, the project will extend and refurbish the locally listed building that formed part of the former University of Northampton Avenue campus. Through a mix of retention and new build, the project will offer 66 much needed council homes with associated landscaping. The committee applauded the retention of a large proportion of the 1930’s Maidwell building, the newly created central courtyard at the heart of the scheme as well as the provision of a mixture of dwelling sizes ranging from 1-bed flats to 6-bed duplexes.

Cambridge | January 2023

Thank you to all our clients and fellow consultants for your support during our first 12 years of our practice.

Looking forward to many more.