Stortford Interiors (UK) in-house joinery division, Parkrose are delighted to announce the recent award of a substantial Joinery fit-out package at Victoria House, Bloomsbury for Wates Construction. The former building society headquarters is to be converted into central London’s biggest “office to labs” dedicated life sciences hub – it will be turned into 220,000 sq ft of “wet lab enabled” life science space, and will serve as the new home of the BioIndustry Association (“BIA”), the trade association for UK life sciences.
Victoria House is located in the heart of the Knowledge Quarter in London, boasting a neo-classical façade with internal Art Deco features. It was designed and constructed in the 1920s for its former owner-occupier the Liverpool Victoria building society and served as its as head office until 1996. It offers close proximity to several world-renowned universities, hospitals and medical research centres including University College London, GSK and Great Ormond Street Hospital. The cutting edge development will have customer wellbeing and sustainability at its core, with the project on track to achieve BREEAM ‘Excellent’ certification. The existing M&E infrastructure will be upgraded, including installing energy-efficient LED lighting and heat recovery throughout the air conditioning system.
The appointment will see Parkrose Joinery Business Unit deliver a comprehensive Joinery fit-out package. The package scope includes Internal Doorsets & Ironmongery, Timber Skirtings, Tea Points, Banquette Seating, Veneered Cubicle Fronts & IPS Modules, SGL Shower Cubicle Enclosures, Engineered Timber Parquet Flooring, Changing Lockers & Benches, Sanitaryware, FF&E and Signage. Further, it will enable the Parkrose team to again demonstrate its in-house design co-ordination capabilities, provide unique architectural solutions and deliver a major Joinery scheme to peerless quality parameters.
Steve Harvey (Operations Director) commented: ‘We are really looking forward to working with Wates on Central London’s largest office-to-life sciences conversion project, and consolidating an excellent trading relationship developed in London over the past twenty-plus years. Our scope is broad and we look forward to demonstrating our capabilities and collaborating closely with the project team’.
