Woodland Quad

Location: Berkshire

Brick Manufacturers: Ibstock PLC / Non-UK

Brick Name: Himley Ebony Black 

Architect: MICA

Brickwork Contractor: JMR Brickwork Limited

Wellington College is a world leading co-educational independent day and boarding school. MICA were appointed to design a new 70-bed co-ed Sixth Form boarding house, a replacement Day House and an Energy Centre as part of the school's wider estates masterplan. The design arranges three contemporary buildings that sit within a verdant informal landscape and tree belt. The setting incorporates an existing parade ground, parking area and creates a new woodland quad space typology at the heart of the school.  

The buildings have been designed to avoid visual impact on the Grade II and II* setting of the historic South Front, therefore through the form, the location of windows and materiality are filtered through the tree canopies and understorey planting. Once inside the clearing, the buildings reveal themselves in modern forms that create an outdoor room and shapes routes through a new open collegiate space. 

The selection of brick as the principal material for the project was informed by the historic setting where red brick is dominant and used extensively across the campus. The choice of colour, tone and variation was in response to creating a very different type of character area for the school, but it was also informed by the location in which a heavily wooded landscape context required a recessive architectural sensibility. 

A contemporary design was applied to create a consistent brick palette across three buildings as part of a Woodland Quad landscape typology. The quad can be approached from opposing directions, one a daily parent drop-off to the day house with the arrival marked by a sculptural brick energy centre with a sloping roof and projecting chimney. From within the school there is access from the South Front terrace which is marked by a brick gable and serrated profiled facade of the boarding house. In between and linking the two buildings is the sweeping terrace of the boarding accommodation frontage and the vertical brick ribbed day house pavilion. All elements of the building's arrangements define a series of connected outdoor spaces for enjoyment and reflection. 

Brick detailing plays an important role in the design, by using bays to create pleasing proportions and groupings of brick used in long horizontal planes, or being turned vertically as stack bond elements. Large brick bladed bays capture inset windows and direct views towards the woodland beyond and shield visual impact to the historic setting. 

A hefty brick overhanging soffit announces the entrance to the quad from the day house entrance; this is topped by a ribbon of deep brick ribbing which contains a green roof terrace above a double height common room area. The common room is fully glazed but has a curtain of finely detailed brick fins that wrap around three elevations to work tonally and harmoniously with the pine tree setting. 

The brick facade encompasses a mass timber superstructure for both day house and boarding house, embracing a low embodied design approach with innovative technical detailing interfaces with the CLT, masonry support and brick specials.