Winvic Construction Ltd, a leading main contractor that specialises in the design and delivery of private and public sector construction and civil engineering projects, has reached a significant milestone with its completion of Purpose Built Student Accommodation (PBSA) scheme Crown Place Nottingham – over 10,000 multi-room beds have now been successfully handed over to clients.
Images: Crown Place Nottingham, exterior
The total spans 29 projects and Winvic’s Director of Multi-room, Mark Jones, has taken the company’s sector turnover from £30 million in 2017 to £230 million. Winvic’s residential sector team has also expanded from 10 individuals to 130 during this time. Mindful of adapting to ever-changing market conditions, Winvic harnessed the strength found within its core values – The Winvic Way – and focused initial delivery on PBSA projects. Winvic capitalised on the Build-to-Rent (BTR) market boom and now 70 per cent of its Multi-room strategic focus is on BTR schemes.
Winvic delivered the first 235 rooms to Crown Student Living in time for the start of the 2023/4 academic year, another 109 in October and now all 426 student residences have been completed. A hybrid reinforced concrete frame approach has been used, meaning large portions of the frame have been pre-cast off site. Inside the six-storey building Winvic has constructed and fitted out 230 studios and 196 cluster flats, 300 sq ft of dining rooms and a 4,300 sq ft shared social spaces, including a gym and cinema, karaoke, games and ping pong rooms.
BIM Level 2 was utilised by Winvic to quickly identify and resolve package clashes and meet a tight two-year programme on a compact site, with main roads and a mosque to three boundaries. A brick slip cladding system has been utilised on the façade, with aged red bricks; the design complements the surrounding architecture, and the bricks closely match those used in the neighbouring former Nottingham tram depot.
Winvic’s site and social value teams collaborated throughout the project and S106 employment and skills conditions set out by the local authority were exceeded. Employment, training and on-site work experience placements were given to local people and Winvic team members volunteered at Stonebridge City Farm, which delivers skill learning opportunities to over 150 local residents each week, many of whom have mental health challenges or learning disabilities.
Mark Jones, Winvic’s Director of Multi-room, said: “This significant milestone of 10,000 beds completed by Winvic across 29 Purpose Built Student Accommodation, Build-to-Rent and hotel projects, plus our extraordinary growth in the sector over the last six years stands as a clear testament to our unwavering dedication to residential excellence and innovation.
“Crown Place Nottingham, which has just been handed over and takes us 280 beds over the momentous figure, is an excellent example of this. We have not only used digital design but also taken a hybrid approach to the concrete frame construction, whereby off-site casting has provided factory-controlled quality and enabled a faster programme. This is our first project for Crown Student Living and our second – Crown Place Birmingham – will be complete towards the end of 2025; our relationship has grown from strength to strength so I hope we can deliver more vibrant PBSA schemes in partnership in the coming years.”
Also contributing to Winvic’s total of 10,280 completed multi-room beds with handovers in October and November 2023 are the PLATFORM_ Build-to-Rent development in Sheffield and Corkfield in Edgbaston for client Patrizia. More information about the three projects can be found on page 16 of Winvic’s recently published Winvic Word online newsletter.
The six, seven and fourteen-storey steel-framed PLATFORM_ development contains 179 one-bedroom, 50 studios, 89 two-bedroom and 17 three-bedroom smart-tech enabled apartments, which all achieve EPC B. Winvic has also constructed and fitted out a 1,800 sq ft residents’ lounge, a 1,400 sq ft private dining room, a 1,250 sq ft gym and landscaped roof terraces on three levels as part of the BTR project. Two commercial spaces totalling 7,650 sq ft can also be found on the ground floor.
Alongside the creation of a new entrance plaza and improvements to the adjacent Edgbaston Stadium – home of Warwickshire County Cricket Club – and highways improvements to Edgbaston Road and Pershore Road, Winvic was appointed by Patrizia to deliver 189 one-bedroom, 169 two-bedroom and 17 three-bedroom apartments. Corkfield’s concrete-framed blocks reach five, seven, eight, 13 and 18 storeys. The BTR scheme also comprises 6,100 sq ft shared amenity spaces, an undercroft car park for 111 vehicles and 214 cycles, a 3,000 sq ft rooftop terrace, a 21,700 sq ft landscaped podium deck and five commercial units totalling 15,000 sq ft. A timelapse video of Corkfield’s construction can be found here.
Local authority S106 employment and skills requirements were also exceeded by Winvic on Sylvester Street and Corkfield.
Jones, who has also recently written a blog on the Winvic website about their achievement, continued: “Each of our projects are more than just buildings, they tell stories of precision, dedication, our commitment to safe and timely delivery and consideration to communities. The Winvic team members of course play the leading roles in these stories and we’re proud to have grown and nurtured a team that truly shares our vision and understands collaboration is crucial to success; from programme and operations to achieving sustainability goals to delivering social value activity that makes a difference to local people’s lives. I’d like to thank our team for their ongoing hard work and all our clients for putting their trust in Winvic to bring their residential visions to life.
“As we reflect on these achievements, we’re not just looking back; we’re looking forward with anticipation and excitement because with our drive, the best is yet to come.”
For more information on Winvic, the company’s latest project news and job vacancies please visit www.winvic.co.uk. Join Winvic on social media – visit X (formerly Twitter) @WinvicLtd – and LinkedIn.
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