building materials
within the budget of a charity. The material also needed to complement the 42 homes nearby. “Due to the expanse of roof, the high quality of the facing material, and the surrounding area; we needed a very-natural-looking material that was of a very high quality, durable, and fitted in with the modest building budget,” said Walker.
Only the best “We’d used Spanish slate on another development and, although it was slightly cheaper, it wouldn’t have been as good.”
A piece of home A
first in the UK for its innovative use of reconstituted slate in a modern interlocking roofing material; the BMI Redland Cambrian Slate combines traditional looks with durability and cost-effectiveness; and so provided the ideal solution for roofing Butterfly House, a new, sensitively- designed hospice in High Wycombe. The £4.8m development is the only palliative day hospice in South Buckinghamshire and cares for up to 800 people.
Owned by the South Bucks Community Hospice charity, the three- storey, 1,400sq m building is a centre of excellence for palliative care and the training of specialist personnel from around the world.
Back to nature Amanda Walker, director of DP Architects, which designed the hospice, said: “The roof looks fantastic and it’s cost-effective. The slate works well with the quality facing materials that we’ve used, it was quick to install on site, and it has all the appearance of natural slate.”
This, she explains, was crucial
The roof not only creates a domestic two-storey
appearance, but it also provides accommodation within the roof space
healthcaredm.co.uk 59
because the roof is one of the hospice’s most-distinctive features and a key element giving it the feel of a home rather than an institution.
“The main ethos for the hospice was
to create a place and space in which visitors could feel relaxed and at ease, with recognisable materials at a domestic scale,” said Walker. “The roof not only creates a domestic two-storey appearance, but it also provides accommodation within the roof space.” With slopes on different levels and planes, rooflights and two large dormer windows; the roof brings character to the building, but it also posed a challenge: roofing a very-large area
BMI Redland Cambrian Slate is manufactured with a thin leading edge and surface patterning taken from impressions of real natural slates. Its interlocking design features a unique three-point fixing which is secure on even the most-exposed sites. Proven on pitches as low as 15°, Cambrian Slate is available in three colours: Heather, Langdale Green and Slate Grey – with Slate Grey also available in a pre-weathered finish. And, at the time of its introduction, BMI Redland Cambrian Slate represented a pioneering approach to recycling and won the Queen’s Award for Technological Achievement for its use of slate waste in the manufacture of an attractive, high-quality, durable roofing material.
It was installed on site by Russell Roofing.
www.bmigroup.com
www.russell-roofing.co.uk www.dpa.com.sg
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61
