3 March 2022 By Fran Williams. Photography by Daniel Hopkinson

Walker Simpson Architects has completed the £3.3 million Bewsey and Dallam Hub in Cheshire, providing wellbeing services to Warrington’s community

Commissioned through the Delivering Wellbeing in Bewsey and Dallam Programme, the brief for the public hub called for a ‘beacon’ in the Cheshire town and was adopted as a key project in Warrington Borough Council’s Central 6 Masterplan.

The building provides studios, a swimming pool, library services, community spaces and a fitness gym. Finishes, furnishings and signage have all been selected to make the public facility dementia-friendly.

It sits next to an existing playground, playing fields and meadow, and faces the main road linking the Bewsey and Dallam neighbourhoods of Warrington. An entrance is accessed off a small landscaped public terrace.

The hub is set over three storeys. The ground floor accommodates a learner/hydrotherapy pool, changing facilities, social zone, digital wellbeing suite, community room and small library. The first floor cantilevers over the entrance to create shelter on the outdoor terrace and houses a fitness suite, changing facilities and multi-use room.

The second floor grows in height by contrast with a large window wrapping around a multipurpose studio space, kitchen and community store.

The scheme was a collaborative endeavour between Warrington Borough Council, resident champions, LiveWire Community Interest Company, Sport England and the regeneration arm of WBC Warrington +Co.

The challenge for project architects Bruno Mariz and Gavin Chan was to build a community leisure centre with a footprint of 17 x 29m. The building needed to accommodate a pool, studios, a library, meeting spaces and a community kitchen and to be fully accessible and dementia-friendly.

The solution is a stepped block with a single-storey Pool Hall alongside three storeys that stack up to provide a series of spaces that increase in height as you rise through the building. The interlocking volumes push the spaces together to enable the principal rooms to fit together within a simple form, as shown in the long section drawing below. The advantage of a small footprint is high visual connectivity between rooms, a light and airy environment, and easy orientation.

Like a Keep, the building creates a prominent landmark and a strong sense of place in the context of the adjacent low-rise buildings and housing. The compact form contains a broad range of public services available to the local community within a short walking distance.

Early concept work was shared to explain the design intent. This enabled meaningful engagement and considered dialogue with the multiple stakeholders to gain support for the project.

A fluctuating temperature operates on a weekly cycle in the swimming pool to suit the needs of both young learner classes and hydrotherapy sessions. The water temperature is cooler for young active learners and families and warmer for more sedate older and less mobile bathers and therapy sessions. Hoists and pods allow full mobility access: the individuals’ journey to and from the pool was assessed in detail and incorporated into the design from the outset.

This led to a range of spaces and routes including a changing places facility enabling full flat-bed use, ambulant changing, and group changing rooms. A compact changing facility was designed in collaboration with LiveWire, Warrington Disability Partnership and Sport England.

One of the challenges was to accommodate a broad range of technical needs at the same time as creating a cheerful environment. This was achieved using LiveWire colours and a sculpted ceiling with a large skylit coffer to house an array of acoustic baffles. Large windows provide visual links to the adjacent playground and viewing gallery with blinds for privacy as required. John Walker, director, Walker Simpson Architects

Bewsey and Dallam Neighbourhood Hub is a stunning building strategically placed in the heart of Warrington’s most in need community. The Hub is a beacon for health and wellbeing and emits an aura of opportunity for residents. Local residents, many of whom have never accessed health, wellbeing or fitness services before, are now attending and participating in the options on offer. The gym is popular throughout the day, as is the hybrid swimming-hydrotherapy pool which is used for children’s swimming lessons as well as for residents who require some kind of physical rehabilitation. The fabric of the build throughout is vibrant, energising and attractive, particularly in the library space. The hub has pragmatism built in, there are several rooms that can house our partners for drop in sessions that the community will benefit from. Locklynne Hall, health and wellbeing director, LiveWire and Culture Warrington

We’ve achieved our ambition to create a Community Hub which feels welcoming, inclusive and is actively used by local people. The Hub is a beacon project within a wider community-led regeneration programme which saw partnership investment in housing, green space and public realm. The location is ideal, right at the heart of our most deprived communities, tying in with existing local assets and providing an attractive visual focal point for the neighbourhood.

But most important is the quality of the facility – the design and décor is high standard, the inclusivity standards are the best in the borough and compete with the best in the country – this statement of quality and investment in place is crucial to local residents who have felt neglected in the past. We’re asking a lot from the building; it needs to flex to respond to individual and community needs and the offer we’re providing is multifaceted and integrated. There is no doubt it is delivering and will continue to adapt and mature as more community and professional partners engage. Eleanor Blackburn, head of inclusive growth and partnerships, Warrington Borough Council

Completion August 2021 Gross internal floor area 953m² Site area 2,821m² Form of contract Design and Build Construction cost £3.3 million Architect Walker Simpson Architects Client Warrington Borough Council Leisure operator LiveWire and Culture Warrington Project manager Baker Mallett with Warrington+Co Structural engineer MDA Wirral M&E consultant ECS Consultants Building Services QS Baker Mallett Principal designer Baker Mallett Landscape consultant Stephen Martlew Landscape Architecture Acoustic consultant Acoustic Design Technology Pool specialist FT Leisure Approved building inspector Warrington Borough Council Building Control Main contractor Whitfield and Brown (Developments) CAD software used Revit

Airtightness at 50Pa 5 m³/h.m² Elemental U-values Wall 0.23 W/m²K, floor 0.14 W/m²K, roof 0.2 W/m²K, windows and skylights 1.6 W/m²K Annual CO2 emissions Design-stage emissions are 10 per cent lower than Building Regulations

Tags Brick Cheshire Community centre Library Swimming pool Walker Simpson Architects Warrington

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