Although the 104m x 40m precast concrete framed warehouse was structurally sound it was only 4.5m high at the eaves. Whilst adequate in the 1960s, this made the building unlettable today because a forklift truck could not be used within the building. The building needed to be at least 7.5m high.
The original precast concrete design relied on 4.5m high cantilevered columns for lateral stability. An elegant solution was devised to extend the columns in insitu concrete; re-use the main roof beams and by adding a horizontal steelwork wind girder in the roof and braced panels in the gables convert the building to a braced shed. New metal purlins, cladding rails, insulated cladding and doors completed the factory envelope. The offices were stripped back to their structural skeleton and a pitched roof added before recladding to modern standards. A new insitu reinforced concrete floor was used to overlay the existing work floor, as an economic alternative to the repair and the resurfacing of it with cementitious toppings or epoxies.
This project demonstrates that with careful thought there is considerable potential for economic upgrading of existing buildings without compromising the end specification. Conversion of this 30 year-old warehouse prompted immediate interest from potential occupiers. The overall cost of renewing the factory, offices and external works to modern standards was approximately two thirds of the cost of an equivalent new building.
