The Brief
New College Oxford were refurbishing a number of meeting rooms within one of their early 19th century buildings.
The work included stripping back wall finishes to leave a clean white finish, returning the parquet flooring to its original finish, a rich dark oak and refurbishing the original lighting.
The rooms needed to be multipurpose as both internal lecture rooms for the students but also available for commercial letting, so a balance needed to be achieved.
The Solution
There were a number of factors to take into account;
To maintain the flexibility we used flip top tables, with the deep colour on the floor a white finish was selected. This allowed us to lift the light level within the room and removed the clash between the existing wood flooring.
The chair design was selected for a few reasons; firstly, good support but also its slimline shape with stylish ribbed back and clean chrome sled base. In addition, the chair will stack which fits into the flexibility requirement. A cool scandi green was chosen to lift the room without overpowering it and it offset the deeper floor finish.
With a parquet floor and a plasterboard ceiling the acoustics within the room needed to be addressed. Acoustic panels were added to the ceiling and one of the walls. The ceiling panels needed to be spaced so they worked around not just the lighting but also the smoke detectors and PIR fittings.
The Outcome
A flexible and attractive set of meeting rooms for both the college and commercial use has been achieved that has also come within the college budget.
