UWS Hamilton Campus – ‘The Street’

The University of the West of Scotland (UWS) urgently needed to renew its Hamilton Campus. After our previous work with UWS on their Paisley Campus Student Hub, Graven worked on re-designing the ‘The Street’ area of the campus. As part of the newly re-designed campus, ‘The Street’ acts as a social and study space which links multiple pieces of the campus together.

The University’s new estates director was seeking innovative design solutions on how to offer students and staff a modern learning environment that differed from a traditional university campus, instead promoting open creative spaces for collaborative or individual working. This led to an existing large, shell & core office development evolving into a hugely flexible learning environment.

Lauren Li Porter, discussing her work on ‘The Street’ space, said this: 

“The Street’ at UWS Hamilton is a programmatically fluid space for study, socialising, information and presentation, with boldly coloured interventions conceived as pieces of ‘giant furniture’ functioning as information points, cafes and stages that draw attention towards the exaggerated height of the space whilst also creating points of refuge for quiet study or conversations”

“The geometry of the atrium’s architecture is emphasised with oversized suspended elements and graphic floor graphics that support a rotating programme of functions and presentations for the space.”

Graven thoroughly enjoyed working on this project and helping in create a vibrant and progressive space, eloquently linking the focal points of the newly designed campus. The creative mix of social spaces for collaboration sits alongside quiet spaces for study, with the ‘giant furniture’ acting as effective information and meeting points for people travelling through the vibrant campus.

The result is a facility which has established UWS as the ‘go-to’ University in Lanarkshire/central Scotland, with student feedback on the new campus proving very positive. Graven are looking forward to working on more projects developing the new, modern work space for corporate and academic spaces.