Roehampton Library

Creagh’s offsite construction the perfect fit for Roehampton Library

The new world-class University of Roehampton Library is a 70,000 square foot, five-storey building, housing 350,000 books and 1,060 study spaces. The build was manufactured offsite using Creaghs fast track build system and precast components, consisting of all members of the precast frame, the plate flooring, precast stairs and façade.

The £34 million, state of the art building was built in the heart of Digby Stuart College, in the centre of the campus. Creagh Concrete were responsible for the design, manufacture, delivery and installation of all members of the precast architecturally exposed concrete frame with single and double height columns, plate flooring, precast beams and precast stairs. The facade is a lightweight steel frame system with weatherproof boarding and an outer precast brick-clad skin.

It is speed of construction that underlines the attractiveness of using precast concrete systems as a framing material. The amount of repetition suited the process, the project and the site. The cores were erected in five weeks and the frame took 13 weeks to install. The external cladding took another 10 weeks to complete.

Precast concrete frame and hybrid precast / insitu concrete Omnia flooring slabs have been used to create the frame for the new library. This meant closing around the building placing the slab and columns before the lightweight steel frame and window frames were fitted. Finally, the upper precast sections were placed. The largest panel weighed 14 tonnes. Installation time was an hour to erect a column and half-an-hour for the slabs.