Specialist facilities
a local retail and visitor attraction, and took plans to architectural concept stage, only for the conditions of the land purchase to change, ending another proposed move for the charity. With its central location and excellent transport links to the rest of the UK, as well as the charity’s established internal infrastructure of locally-based staff and vital volunteer network, Staffordshire was the charity’s preferred location, but with increasing pressure to move the charity to Greater London, including offers of land, and an ever-increasing supporter and beneficiary base in the capital, we were beginning to feel like we had exhausted all options in our hometown.
Then, an introduction to the development team at Keele University by a property developer and great supporter of the charity alerted us to a potential site which came with the added attraction of strategic links to the University. The Keele University Science and Innovation Park had been searching for the right external partner to kick-start development of the 36-acre site for several years, and, following exploratory meetings with several of the academic faculties, it became evident that the location and informal partnership with the University could be the solution we were looking for.
STEP 3: DESIGN ‘Form follows function’, and the CICC’s design was person-centred from the very beginning – based upon the practical experience of people visiting the building who had a wide
An artist’s impression of the new CICC building. By working closely with the architect, early concepts of a ‘dual-winged’ building which accommodated the internal courtyards were developed.
variety of accessibility needs; most poignantly, people with extensive and complicated sensory and emotional challenges. Throughout the design process we were passionate to provide the necessary security, accessibility, and functionality our services demanded, but within an atmosphere which evoked the opposite emotions experienced in the majority of hospitals, health centres, or clinics. From my early sketches, through the early consultation, and into the building’s general arrangements, we had the usability and functionality of spaces both now and in the future in mind. Each space underwent a critical analysis process to identify who would be using it when we moved in, but also who the users might be, and how it may be used
in five years’ time? This process, coupled with the appreciation that the charity employs a diverse team with varying accessibility requirements, meant that spaces which could have been easily categorised as ‘office’ or ‘administration’, and therefore receive a diminished attention to detail, actually underwent equal design scrutiny to the more ‘obvious’ spaces like our assessment suites.
STEP 4: FUNDING With an annual turnover of £5 m to £7 m, the prospect of an £18 m capital project was daunting, but for the charity to have the long- term success it needs in changing the lives of disabled children – and in particular those affected by autism – it was a calculated risk.
THE NETWORK
OCTOBER 2018 15
©C4 Consulting
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