The Stephen A. Schwarzman Centre at the University of Oxford opens on the 13th October 2025

Sustainability was a key design principle, and the building is on track to achieve Passivhaus certification, making it the largest Passivhaus scheme in England and the only Passivhaus concert hall in the world.

We worked closely with the design team to bring together servicing solutions for the huge variety of functions, from the concert hall right down to individual academics' studies. The services strategy, designed to Passivhaus standards, ensured ultra-low energy use and resilience to climate change through demand-controlled ventilation with heat recovery and all-electric heat pump-based heating and cooling. 

Key features of the sustainable design include solar power generation installed on the roof, zero fossil fuel consumption within the building, and very high levels of insulation and airtightness to reduce the heating demand. Materials and equipment were chosen for longevity and performance, helping the building meet targets set by the university, and Passivhaus standards, for space heating demands and operational carbon emissions. 

For the high-performance acoustic design, we employed a box-in-box strategy and isolated floors to provide superior sound insulation for key rooms, including the theatre, cinema, music studios, music ensemble and practice rooms, and ultra-quiet linguistics and phonetics research facilities. We also provided 3D acoustic simulations of critical spaces, including the Great Hall atrium.

Our approach for lighting design was to identify the key spaces, such as the Main Entrance, Great Hall and Concert Venue, where we were able to integrate lighting into the architecture to enhance its impact, whilst elsewhere we employed a simple palette of high efficiency fittings, controlled in real time across the site, to deliver appropriate light levels with minimal energy consumption.