Projects designed and built a 23m long x 9.5m deep glass extension onto this 16^th century listed coach house at Chicheley Hall. The structure of this extension is free standing with a glass roof providing lateral support to make sure that the delicate barn structure wasn’t required to support the new glass extension. For this heritage project in particular, IQ was completely responsible for concept design, structural design, site inspection, structural calculations and construction.

What was originally the Coach House, a Listed Grade II building, is now two lecture theatres with the new glazed enclosure which was created to provide a space for registration and break space for conferences.

As this is a listed property, there were building regulations that needed to be followed. To comply with these regulations, the extension was built with structural glass, specifying low iron glass with an anti-reflective finish so that the building was still visible through the glass extension. Creating floor-to-ceiling glass façades also provides natural light to pass through into the new glazed structure and into the original building.

The glass façades have been installed in a faceted design, to make the new extension look curved. The metal supports used in the extension to hold up the glass roof have been designed to look like arches, adding to the traditional look of the property. For a more authentic and traditional look, kiln dried oak was used throughout the design as the supporting structure. Usually, wood cannot be used due to the fact that it contracts and expends in different temperatures. However, using wood that had been through a kiln drying process allows this specialist method to be suitable and durable. 

Glass manifestations were incorporated into the structural glass design to ensure the safety of visitors. These glass manifestations are red dots and dots with ‘Sc’ incorporated into them to stand for Royal Society.

These have been placed at the required heights so that no injury is caused by people walking into the windows or doors in front of them.