The Bartlett's Wates House to undergo a £12m refurbishment

Wates House, the current home of The Bartlett School of Architecture and The Bartlett School of Planning is set to undergo a £12m refurbishment, starting in July 2013.

The project is part of UCL’s broader Bloomsbury Masterplan and will allow The Bartlett to offer students a better experience. The Wates House project forms part of a larger faculty estates strategy, which seeks to improve and increase space to cater for students and staff at The Bartlett.

Over the past five years The Bartlett has seen an 11% increase in students across the faculty.  This increase in the student population has been met with the appointment of staff to a range of posts, taking the total number of staff at The Bartlett near to the 400 mark. 

Professor Alan Penn, Dean of The Bartlett explains “The Bartlett is now better placed than ever to provide the most comprehensive built environment education and research capacity in the country. In order to make this growth sustainable and to ensure we’re able to continue to provide a first-class learning experience, we have to find more and better space.”

The new Wates House will be, not only a better home for The Bartlett School of Architecture, but a meeting place for students, staff and alumni from all sections of The Bartlett, as well as professionals, partners and peers from the built environment world. Exhibition and social space, as well as the library, will provide a new focus for the faculty and its visitors.

An alternative home for the next two years

In order for work to start on the Wates House project, the schools of Architecture and Planning will have to move out of the building for an extended period of time.  The School of Architecture will move to 132-140 Hampstead Road, which is no more than a ten-minute walk from Wates House, and for which UCL has agreed a lease subject to planning permission. The School of Planning will also be relocated to space nearby or on the UCL campus.

Staff and students will have as much space as they do now, if not more, and will be able to continue their work and studies as normal.  The move is expected to happen over this summer.