Scott Brownrigg's design for new science development at Oxfordshire's Eastpoint Business Park

Image: CGI courtesy of Scott Brownrigg

Planning has been submitted for a flagship life science campus at Eastpoint Business Park in Oxford for Railpen. Designed by Scott Brownrigg, the scheme will transform an underused business park to provide an additional 200,000 sq ft of much needed life science space for the Oxford-Cambridge Arc.

Three new state-of-the-art buildings are designed to suit a range of tenants and provide flexibility in occupancy, with 55% CL2 laboratory and 45% office space to support cutting-edge research and collaboration. Each building is carefully positioned to buffer noise and pollution from an adjacent A road, minimise visual impact to the surroundings, and encourage permeability across the site.

Community outreach and engagement is a key driver behind the design. The incorporation of a ‘Learning Lab’ provides opportunities to support young people pursuing a career in STEM, while a pavilion with a spacious café and social hub provides a communal focal point at the heart of the site.

With features such as a ‘Travel & Energy hub’ to promote sustainable travel, and pocket parks with integrated planting to enhance wellbeing and biodiversity, the scheme targets BREEAM 'Outstanding', WELL, Wired and Smart Platinum and Cycle Score Platinum.

Recently, Scott Brownrigg's Fiona Grieve spoke at Future Cities Forum's 'Science Cities' discussion at Jesus College Oxford. She is an advocate for equity and social justice and is concerned that young people see a future for working in science and that the work around new science park developments provides strong educational links for them.

She explained:

'Education is a massive thing. At Eastpoint we are working with our Oxford Academy neighbours. We realised with our science park that there was a school next door and while schools have their own issues to be getting on with, we realise that there was something we could contribute to there. We asked ourselves - how can we create this relationship to offer something positive?

'We speak a lot about the economy and jobs but how are we inspiring the next generation, the children of the future? We have done a lot of work on this with the Oxford Trust. Connections with schools are not easy but we can try hard to break those boundaries down. Anyone should be able to see science as their future. It is all about democratising science.'