Walter Lilly was appointed under a Design and Build contract to undertake the strip out and refurbishment of four floors throughout the Sir Alexander Fleming (SAF) building, a live educational and research environment, at Imperial College London’s South Kensington campus.

With works concentrated throughout West Wing levels 1, 2, 3 and 6, the 3,000m2 project has delivered modern, sleek, and cutting-edge laboratories serving scientists and researchers from the Department of Infectious Diseases (DoID) who were relocating from their previous location at the St Mary’s Medical School building. In total, a mix of approximately 50 postgraduate and undergraduate students have also been accommodated within the new space.

Showcasing exemplar facilities tailored to Virology, Immunology of Infection, and Paediatric Infectious Disease research, the project included a combination of Containment Level 2 (CL2) and Containment Level 3 (CL3) laboratories and ancillary laboratory rooms, alongside optimum teaching, office and study provision to facilitate DoID’s important work. Specialist laboratory areas have also incorporated the construction and installation of a clean room, cold stores, bacterial culture rooms, microscope and imaging rooms, fume cupboards, microbiological safety cabinets, and autoclaves.

The College’s appointed design team, Saunders Boston Architects, Scotch Partners and Curtins was novated over to us to complete the RIBA Stage 5 design. All works were carried out within an occupied and live education campus with Business as Usual maintained for the College throughout.

Photography: Richard Fraser Photography