Plans for a 212,000 sq ft state-of-the-art lab building in Oxford go before councillors on Tuesday with a recommendation for approval.

An application from Forge_Kn & Partners seeks to demolish 97,000 sq ft Beaver House, a 97,555 sq ft office scheme in Hythe Bridge Street and a neighbouring commercial building at Nos 39 – 42 for the new development, to be known as Bridge Labs.

Oxford City Council’s planning committee will consider the scheme at its September 17 meeting.

The development, which will be car-free, will have a ground floor with three/four storeys above and two below. A café will be created on the ground floor.

A neighbouring building, Boatman’s Chapel, a single-storey former chapel and one-time school, most recently used as a restaurant, will be refurbished for use as community space. Later additions to that building will be removed and a garden created behind. The entire site stretches to 0.44 hectares.

The team on the project includes Savills on planning, Purcell on architecture and Velocity on transport planning.

The application’s design & access statement by Purcell states: “The presented proposals provide much-needed flexible laboratory and office use spaces, along with improvements to the public realm. This is achieved through a considerate design approach which aims to carefully integrate the scheme into the existing fabric of Oxford and respect the heritage significance of the wider setting.”

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