We are delighted to announce that our Passivhaus student accommodation project for King's College, Cambridge, is in the running for an award celebrating engineering excellence.

Cranmer Road Student Accommodation is one of four developments to be shortlisted for Project of the Year (non-domestic) in the CIBSE Building Performance Awards 2023 – the only awards in the industry that focus on measured performance outcomes.

The Project of the Year award celebrates buildings with high levels of user satisfaction and comfort and outstanding performance, recognising the hard work and dedication of the teams behind the project.

Cranmer Road Student Accommodation is an exemplary student housing project that showcases many of the approaches to sustainable and low-energy design that are essential to achieving net zero carbon.

The building achieves low operational carbon emissions by using only electricity, and relatively little of it. The low embodied carbon primary structure also helped it to achieve airtightness results three to four times better than the Passivhaus limit – more than 50 times better than building regulations require. The measured peak heating demand has been 20% lower than the Passivhaus limit.

Working alongside Allies and Morrison Architects, we provided MEP, Passivhaus, and acoustic services for the project which houses 59 graduate students in bedrooms across two modern buildings, designed to sit comfortably alongside the neighbouring arts and crafts villas.

The lessons learnt from Cranmer Road have been shared at the UK and international Passivhaus conferences and incorporated in the next generation of projects for King’s College at Croft Gardens.

We're proud of the passion and hard work of all members of our Practice, and extend our congratulations to all firms involved in the shortlisted projects.

The CIBSE Building Performance Awards 2023 winners will be announced on Wednesday 1 March 2023.