One Southampton Street, London WC2

Client: Aviva Investors

One Southampton Street is an eight-storey 1930s office building located in Covent Garden. JRA was appointed to carry out the refurbishment of the building to upgrade it to contemporary standards.

Through careful design, JRA retained and enhanced the building’s historic features while ensuring it stands the test of time. Internally, JRA kept the frame and renewed the core freeing up the floorplates and thus improving their quality and flexibility. Extra space was also created by infilling the light well. The new entrance hall boasts a feature wall and high quality finishes which give the building a renewed presence at ground level.

Selective, carefully targeted improvements lifted the development to a BREEAM Excellent rating with the highest ever post-construction score for an office refurbishment at the time of completion: 82.17%. Some of these improvements included: new, energy efficient lighting and glazing but retaining the original stone cladding, new air conditioning and bicycle storage.