Breathing life back into this wonderful old brick built school building, the complete refurbishment and extension allows for a new generation of community use with its remodelling into a vibrant youth centre and innovation hub.
Fereday Pollard worked with the London Borough of Islington and Kier London, the councils design and build contractor to convert the former Penton Grove Primary School, an 1874 London School Board building, into a hub for the young people of Islington.
Working within a limited budget, the building was fully stripped out and refurbished with a complete new services installation, providing a café, art studios, a dance studio, gym, music recording facilities and a variety of multi-use spaces for education, training and counselling.
The original building and spaces are elegantly proportioned, and much of our design inputs focussed on working to retain the character of the building. In the main spaces there are no ceilings and the services, which are all exposed, are carefully co-ordinated with architectural features.
A dramatic glass atrium forms a new main entrance with a feature stair and lift providing full disabled access to all areas including a large roof terrace.
We worked closely with a group of young people and a variety of service providers and agencies at LB Islington to develop a striking and colourful interior design scheme that helps to identify the different areas and functions of the building.