
Watkins Payne carried out the Independent Design Reviewer role for Block A at The Soapworks development, comprising two new buildings alongside the restoration of the Grade II-listed former soap factory in Bristol. The Block A development works consists of a new build office over ground to fifth floor with the option for retail units at lower ground level.
A formal review was conducted at Stage 4 with the design successfully achieving a Design Reviewed Target Rating of 5.0 Stars.

The building has been transformed to provide a 133 bedroom hotel including car and cycle parking on site.

The completed site now comprises four detached industrial warehouse units ranging from 14,000sq ft to 36,000sq ft, all with naturally ventilated and heated offices. The two larger units each have an 8 person MRL passenger lift, while the smaller units have been provided with platform lifts. The warehouse area was designed as a shell for future fit-out with capped off utility services.

The Grade II listed building at 2 New Burlington Street has been redeveloped to offer 5,000ft² of high quality residential accommodation, for which Watkins Payne supplied building services engineering and energy consultancy to achieve an EPC D rating.

Exposed services has been adopted for the office floor provided new LED linear lighting, ducted fan coil units and power distributed within the office floors.