Wolfson Building At Somerville College

Wolfson Building at Somerville College

A residential block for students and staff with a ground floor meeting room, built 1966–7 by Arup Associates, architects and engineers.

The building is constructed of precast concrete with exposed columns and beams of smooth grey concrete, erected in six weeks. Between the projecting bay windows are precast concrete facing panels finished with Derbyshire spar aggregate. The ground floor is clad in brick.

The upper floors contain twenty undergraduate study bedrooms, three sets for Fellows, and two studies for tutors placed centrally within the block. Access to the upper floors is gained through two earlier brick buildings that flank the structure, which completes a large quadrangle. Concrete stairs on either side, reached via the earlier buildings, provide access to the service kitchens and bathrooms. The two exposed façades express the structural system and are dominated by projecting bay windows to each room. These windows are precast concrete with lead weathering and incorporate a precast concrete seat within. This creates considerable character, particularly as viewed from Walton Street to the rear.

Inside, the study bedrooms have dropped ceilings of British Columbian pine, built-in cupboards, and cork tile floors. The ground floor hall is panelled in British Columbian pine, floored with misanda, and includes a small stage platform.

The Wolfson Building is the third and smallest of three accommodation blocks designed by Arup Associates for Somerville College. It was among the firm's first commissions following its establishment as a distinct entity within Ove Arup and Partners in 1963. These buildings are part of a wider group of post-war university structures that explored sophisticated precasting techniques.

The design was pioneering in attempting to plan against loneliness in university accommodation. Large window seats and careful spatial planning encouraged self-expression within the small bedrooms, with one wall designated for work, one for cupboards, one for the bed, and another for the window seat. Philip Dowson and Peter Foggo, the principal architects, were unusual in being architects within an engineering firm; Foggo had trained initially as an engineer. Their approach synthesised architecture and engineering, with quality of finish, services, planning, and function conceived and executed as a whole.

This group of buildings pioneered the use of storey-height precast concrete cladding, a technique in which Britain was a world leader in the 1960s. The work is comparable only with similar buildings by Howell, Killick, Partridge and Amis. Despite its modest size, the building has a powerful visual presence, with assured and well-detailed elevations.