More than 20,000 square metres of Fermacell board has been used in three different types of application within a superb new £10.75 leisure Centre complex built for Wychavon District Council in Worcestershire.
Evesham Leisure Centre’s facilities include a 25 metre swimming pool and a 12 metre studio pool. Both pools partition walls are lined with Fermacell Powerpanel H2O boards, which provide an ideal base for tiling and other wall finishes. In addition, 12.5mm Fermacell board has also been utilised as an external backing board for the building’s cladding, as well as on many of the interior walls.
The aesthetically pleasing building – designed by project architects Roberts Limbrick – features a dramatic green, copper clad curved entrance and climbing wall enclosure providing a unique, recognisable focus to the 4,500 m2 Centre, which has been developed to replace an outdated facility opened more than 30 years ago.
Peter Head, Project Manager with Wychavon District Council, commented: “The Centre opened to the public on the 7th September. Facilities within the old building had become rather tired – particularly the swimming pool and changing spaces.
“The new facilities are first class. Apart from a slightly wider main pool we have incorporated a studio pool, which has a moveable floor, and can be used for a wide range of activities including aqua aerobics, fit-swim sessions, parent and baby classes, disability groups and for youngsters learning to swim.”
“Most of the Centre’s upstairs internal walls are made from a combination of Fermacell and steel stud and the contractor was able to install them quickly. When Fermacell is fully prepared it provides a very good finish.”
Facilities
The main entrance to the Centre leads directly to the main foyer space which contains a dramatic climbing wall, reception and café with views directly into the pool area and up to the fitness suite above. The reception area leads to a multi purpose room providing facilities for dance, exercise classes, soft play and functions. The swimming pools, wet health suite, sports hall and changing facilities are also on this floor.
A large changing village with facilities for group and accessible changing leads to a 25m x 5-lane level deck Community Pool, a seperate12m x 7m level deck studio pool, with movable floor for flexibility of use and the wet health suite which includes two spa pools, a steam room and sauna. Spectator access to the main pool is provided direct from the café area. The sports hall provides 4 badminton courts and facilities for basketball, five-a-side football, gymnastics, dance and exhibitions) with associated storage and dry changing. The warm colour and high level birch cladding give the space a high quality and attractive feel and contrast with the blue
Granwood flooring.
Next to the reception, lift and stair access is provided to the first floor area which includes a fitness suite with space for up to 125 stations and three treatment rooms offering a range of beauty treatments. A large aerobics studio with storage is also provided, together with facilities for staff.
John McCabe, Project Manager or main contractor Galliford Try, commented: “We specified the use of Fermacell on this project. One of its strengths is that it is ideally suited to the environment being made from recycled materials and being 100% recyclable. Running along the ground and first floors are 16 feet radius walls comprising steel Protektor track and Fermacell.”
Peter Newth, Associate Director with Roberts Limbrick commented: “Externally, the building form was developed to provide an important, evocative community leisure building for Evesham, whilst respecting its important position. There are no immediate neighbouring buildings with which the building must relate and, therefore, the building elevations were designed to create a dynamic, exciting high quality and low maintenance building enclosure with materials selected with regard to durability and quality of appearance in the long term.
“We took particular care to make the activities visible throughout the building and there are opportunities to view into all the main spaces from the adjacent circulation.
“All spaces within the Centre are designed to be fully accessible to all and access to the main pool includes both hoist and stepped access. Ceiling mounted trackway hoists are also provided to two dedicated changing facilities.
“Many environmental features are incorporated include the use of CHP (with waste heat utilised to heat the swimming pools), automated lighting control and ventilation heat recovery. Light tubes through the roof provide natural lighting to many internal spaces and roof mounted ‘wind catchers’ provide natural ventilation to the sports hall.
“Internally Fermacell boards (with glued joints) were used by the contractor Galliford Try, for lightweight wall as these would achieve all the requirements for fire, acoustics and severe duty rating using a single board rather than using the many different combination of boards needed with other systems. This enabled partition walls to be constructed both rapidly and to the required standard providing a very high quality, robust finish throughout the first floor. A high standard of finish is provided throughout with a restrained but dateless colour palette of blues, white and natural timber.”
“Wall materials are a combination of glass, natural cedar, patinated copper standing seam cladding, polyester powder coated cladding and framing and local colour stock facing brick.
“It is capped by a polyester powder coated standing seam roof and fascias colour matched to the copper cladding. The external glazing to the pool hall, café and climbing area provides a highly visible ‘showcase’ of the internal facilities.”
The extensive parking facilities are to be landscaped to incorporate foraging routes for migratory bats and a new bat enclosure provides mitigation for habitat lost as a result of the demolition of the former depot buildings. Permeable block paving provides attenuated run off from the parking areas.
Fermacell’s Area Sales Manager (South West and West Midlands) David Prout commented: “This project clearly demonstrates the versatility of Fermacell boards. Not only can they be used on the creation of internal walls, but they are being increasingly recognised as a cost-effective weatherboard for vented and EPS rainscreen solutions.
“In addition, the Fermacell Powerpanel H2O boards are proving to be the ideal solution for wetroom applications including: bathrooms, hospitals, hotels, kitchens, leisure centres and, of course, swimming pools,” he concluded.
Project: Evesham Leisure Centre, Worcestershire
Architect: Roberts Limbrick Main
Contractors: Galliford Try.
