(Aerial photograph courtesy of Bristol Drones Ltd)
From the start Aquila was a challenging project both in terms of achieving planning and then delivering such a large building on a city centre site constrained by significant transport and utility infrastructure.
The Covid pandemic also ‘hit’ part way through which created significant delivery challenges.
Without doubt the design quality and range of support provisions required to make a student accommodation scheme successfully have significantly increased over the last decade. The importance of creating spaces for social interaction were recognised early on in the development of Aquila with kitchen/dining and social spaces a priority.
The main challenge for developing in Bath is to ensure the design of the buildings fit within the varied cityscape. The design of Aquila Court was the culmination of significant and productive design dialogue between our architects, Stride Treglown, and the local planning authority.
Deep below the site lies a sewer carrying all of Bath’s waste water – we were very careful not to go near that with our foundations.
Around a third of a million bricks were used in the elevations, a significant number of which were hand made. The bricks were made in Birtley, Tyne and Wear.
Aquila Court is now home to students from over 30 different countries.
The added layer of quality inspections provided as part of the Premier Guarantee process was a significant addition to the project. It was a very straightforward process to engage with the team at Premier who were always very responsive.
The added layer of quality inspections provided as part of the Premier Guarantee process was a significant addition to the project. It was a very straightforward process to engage with the team at Premier who were always very responsive.
There are significant challenges ahead in the world of property and development with step changes in regulations addressing fire safety and energy efficiency, as well as increasing demand from occupiers and users for buildings to be sustainable in the broadest sense.
We at Eagle One are always looking forward to understand and foresee these changes to make sure our portfolio is positioned to address these requirements.
Changes in fire and energy efficiency regulations have required a significant increase in our knowledge base on such matters.
Clearly, the bricks and mortar retail landscape over the last two years has been challenging. Even prior to the pandemic we were moving forwards creating destination shopping with a wider range of offerings than purely shops to draw footfall. The success of this has shown with the rapid bounce back of visitors to our centres as restrictions have been lifted.