Providing spaces for art exhibitions and community events with an ancillary café and children’s day nursery, Sands Community Centre is a new multi-purpose building complex located a stone's throw from the Parson's Green conservation area.

The project restores and completely retrofits the 1903 Clancarty Lodge, adjoining it to the new additions. Together, in Sands End the old and new form the nucleus of a new community hub for the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, with the various building elements framing a courtyard at the centre of the site. The scheme features a number of rooms and spaces suitable for a variety of activities including social and educational functions, clubs, meetings and events.

Working alongside Mae Architects, we provided M&E Engineering and Lighting Design for the project.

The building was designed to have low environmental impact and utilises sustainably sourced CLT (cross laminated timber) throughout as the primary structure, lowering embodied carbon relative to more traditional construction methods. Focusing on flexibility and making sure each space can adapt to a dynamic programme of functions, simple and unobtrusive MEP services appropriate to their setting were implemented. Enhancing usability and maintainability, they simultaneously keep down cost due to high energy efficiency. The fabric and glazing strategy carefully balance winter passive solar gain with summer comfort, without resorting to complex cooling or shading devices. To that end, the main spaces within the building (main hall, cafe and nursery) are naturally ventilated, providing free cooling without air-conditioning plant.

 "In addition, and to preserve the clean lines of the CLT structure and architecture, the services within the building are distributed within a purpose-built and designed trench running within the ground floor slab. The sloping roof also provides an ideal location for a photovoltaic (PV) array, providing green electrical power to the building." - David Atkinson, Senior Engineer and Partner at Max Fordham

When designing the lighting, one challenge was to let the pure geometric forms of the architecture shine, and to complement the exposed natural materials. With this in mind, we’ve created lines of LED fittings, simple in colour and shape, and varied mountings and brightness to achieve uniformity with the steep sloped ceilings. A full LED system with daylight dimming throughout matches the energy efficiency aspirations of the whole project.

Electrical distribution routes have been carefully integrated within the build-up.

“This beautiful new centre will enhance people’s wellbeing across Sands End and south Fulham. It will be set up to ensure that it is truly for people of all backgrounds, and that residents are in the driving seat at the new community space in Hammersmith and Fulham.” - Cllr Andrew Jones, H&F Cabinet Member for the Economy and the Arts