The judges praised 1 The Avenue as the creation of “not only an iconic gateway building to Spinningfields, but also a unique working environment appropriate to niche occupiers, making for a significant contribution to the office market in Manchester”.

The building itself is a flexible design offering both high quality office accommodation and retail space at its base. The retail space has been pre-let to Giorgio Armani.

Roger Preston & Partners have provided a full range of services on this landmark building including M&E, public health, security, fire strategy, vertical transportation and environmental strategy.

Excellent BREEAM

One of the primary objectives of the project was that the building should achieve a minimum ‘Very Good’ BREEAM rating. In response to this brief Roger Preston Environmental employed technologies such as heat recovery, air sourced heat pumps and an intelligent use of façade panels to maximise light whilst minimising solar gain. The project has now been awarded an ‘Excellent’ BREEAM rating.

Not The Only Fruit!

The prestigious BCO award and BREEAM rating are not the building’s first accolades though. This outstanding project has already received three awards from Manchester City Council at the 2009 Built In Quality Awards including: Technical Innovation Award - Winner 2009, In Recognition of High Quality Construction – Winner 2009 and Sustainable Construction Award – Winner 2009.

Chris Munn, the project associate at Roger Preston & Partners commented, “Receipt of this BCO award is a credit to the whole development team and reflects our commitment to adding value beyond building services engineering”. This commitment is also apparent in the recent London Region BCO 2010 award for the Guardian News and Media Group headquarters in London and last year’s win by 3 Hardman Street, also at Spinningfields.

Trevor Farnfield
Director, Roger Preston & Partners