Karndean Commercial Partners with Oxford Brookes University for Student Accommodation

Richard Allen, sales director at Karndean Commercial said: “In an urban area with extreme pressure on rental housing like Oxford, having purpose built accommodation for students is a boon for the university and the wider community. We are proud to be involved with a project that is increasing the availability of much needed student accommodation whilst protecting the established woodland setting, retaining prize specimens and planting new trees to enhance the landscape.

“Our designs are all inspired by the wonderous beauty of nature and the precious woods and stones we source from around the world so we understand the benefits of connecting our living spaces to the healing power of the natural world and the need to minimise our impact on the environment.”

Named after Professor Sir Clive Booth, a former Vice-Chancellor of Oxford Brookes University, the new student village offers convenient contemporary accommodation with light filled study bedrooms and spacious communal kitchen and living spaces.

Jessie Turnbull, senior associate at MICA Architects, said: “The university was keen to construct high quality, low impact accommodation that would be a calm and secure place to live, offering students a living space where they can relax and bring their best selves to their studies.

“The site is positioned adjacent to Headington Hill Hall, a listed historic manor house, and positioned within the Hall’s arboretum so it was important that the new accommodation blocks would integrate into this landscape to create a woodland village. To enhance this feeling of connection with nature, each building has been named in honour of native trees.”

Self-contained apartments include between six and 11 study bedrooms, each with a compact ensuite, and a generously sized shared kitchen dining living room. Wider and shallower than frequently found for student accommodation and fitted with large windows that open for plenty of natural ventilation, the study bedrooms benefit from daylight that penetrates all the way to the back of the room, connecting the interior with its woodland surroundings.

The interior boasts a contemporary biophilic style that has been developed around the project’s key priorities of sustainability, practicality and wellbeing. Alongside a natural colour palette and furniture made from recycled materials, oak design flooring from Karndean Commercial’s Knight Tile range creates a warm and welcoming environment.

Jessie explained: “The university was very keen to use LVT throughout the accommodation as this would be easier to clean and would provide a modern vibe that appeals to both domestic and international students. Carpeted bedrooms are very much a British choice while hard floors are more usual in homes across Europe, Asia and the United States. Following consultation with a group of student ambassadors, we opted for the warm natural tones of Lime Washed Oak in the bedrooms and Rose Washed Oak with its slightly greyer hues in each living space to complement the duck egg blue kitchen units. The concrete frame construction called for a rigid core format, with its enhanced acoustic benefits and easier installation.

“The feedback we’ve had from students has been absolutely fantastic and, although it’s early days, the flooring is holding up really well.”

With sustainability a key consideration for the project, Morgan Sindall Construction’s CarboniCa tool was used to evaluate the construction’s holistic life cycle, collating embodied carbon and life cycle costing from each material’s Environmental Product Declaration (EPD). With a durable construction that ensures longevity, Karndean flooring contributes a lower overall life cycle carbon cost than other flooring options, as evidenced in its third party verified EPDs.

Karndean’s Knight Tile rigid core flooring, part of the Karndean Living collection, features a host of practical benefits including a waterproof, hygienic surface that’s easy to maintain, a durable 0.3mm wear layer and R10 slip resistance, while an integrated acoustic layer reduces impact noise transfer to rooms below by 19dB. With a click-locking mechanism, Knight Tile is easy to install over most hard subfloors and is suitable for any residential setting or light to moderate commercial use. Each floor comes with a lifetime residential or ten year commercial guarantee.

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