Discovery Terrace

The building is a two-storey steel-framed structure with a total floor area of approximately 500m2.

The site slopes down by around ten metres from back to front, requiring the construction of gabion retaining walls beyond the building perimeter on two sides. The building uses the slope to provide two separate entrances – low level at the front and into the upper level at the back. Steel walkways bridge over the retaining walls to the rear doors.

The ground floor steelwork is constructed in a square grid, and the roof is formed with curved trusses consisting of square hollow sections. The columns are built off reinforced concrete pads founded on boulder clay.

The upper floor is constructed with a ‘Multideck’ composite slab spanning between the main beams running across the building. The floor is designed to accommodate an imposed loading of 3.5 kN/m2, including partitions.

The ground floor is formed with a 200mm deep ground-bearing concrete slab, thickened locally to accommodate point loads from secondary steel elements including water tank columns and stair supports.

The building is clad with smooth-faced Kingspan wall panels in a two-tone colour scheme, with Corus panels on the roof. The panels are supported on a secondary frame of Kingspan cladding rails and purlins.