234 Bath Road Office Building

234 Bath Road is a dynamic new gateway building at the entrance to SEGRO’s Estate in Slough, the largest Trading Estate in Europe. It continues a great tradition of Office Buildings fronting the Great West Road which links London, Bath and Bristol in the west. The three-storey office building is located at the corner of the Bath and Leigh Roads and is the first building of a wider masterplan which draws office development into the site.

Sustainable Re-use of existing structures. The Western portion of the building re-uses the existing basement and pre tensioned concrete structural frame of two buildings that have been on side since the 1970’s and 1980’s. The existing office floor plate has been extended out to the new façade line and extruded a further 40m towards the new Eastern entrance at the corner of the site. The 15.8m wide office floors are punctured with two full-height atria creating attractive, energy-efficient, day-lit office space.

Lightweight structural extension and envelope. The extended accommodation is wrapped in a new light-weight structure comprising of a series of elegant full-height structural frames defined by tapered fins, plinths and parapets. The columns have been positioned outside of the floor plates to create flexible column free space internally. The main entrance is housed within an impressive 15m-high entry colonnade with a glazed reception area, creating a strong visual link to the surrounding urban context and optimising the building’s prominent corner location on the Bath Road. A café activates the ground level of the foyer space and provides a central social focal space for the group of office buildings along the Bath Road. Central to the design is a language of details and materials that, while maintaining robustness, civic scale and impact, delivers a building which is clean, crisp and light.

Architects: www.flanaganlawrence.com
Images: www.huftonandcrow.com