Firm： Madoc Architecture

Type： Cultural › Cultural Center Gallery Educational › Library University Government + Health › Community Center Hospitality + Sport › Bar/Nightclub Restaurant Industrial › Research Facility Landscape + Planning › Masterplan

YEAR： 2009

SIZE： 10,000 sqft - 25,000 sqft

BUDGET： $10M - 50M

The Central Library at Imperial College was built in the late 1960s. Although a rooftop extension was added in the 1990s the building remained largely untouched for 40 years. The Learning Centre was the last, and largest, of four phases of much needed modernisation.

The three earlier phases created a seminar and conference facility, a centralised Library admin office, and the new Humanities Department.

The Learning Centre occupies the entire ground floor, and almost 7 metres of infilled colonnade along the Queen’s Lawn. This forward extension, along with the service tower acting as a porte-cochere to the front door, brings for the first time much needed animation and life to this important elevation.

The new reception, information and

admin areas form the hub around from which the new learning zones are accessed. The modern teaching of sciences demands increasingly co-operative efforts from its students. The south part of the plan is zoned into informal linked spaces within which groups of different sizes come together. Some spaces accommodate 2-3 people, others 30-40. The cafe forms an integral to this arrangement and is an important study area during the late night season before final exams.

In the North Block the 50-desk Wolfson computer study area provides private study desks as well as closed traditional

seminar and tutorial rooms.