Vincent Road Campus with its grey standing-seam zinc hall block and purple horizontal cladding above a brick base, Plumcroft Primary School, Woolwich

Plumcroft Primary School, Vincent Road Campus. Metsec SFS, cladding and standing-seam zinc. Woolwich, London SE18.

The team behind Dmitro Development framed and clad the new campus for Frencon Construction.

01 · The zinc-clad entrance block and the purple teaching wing on Vincent Road.

At a glance

Main contractor: Glenman Corporation
Package let by: Frencon Construction, Glenman group
Client: Royal Borough of Greenwich
Architect: Pollard Thomas Edwards
On site: 2017-18
Floor area: About 2,750 m²

Plumcroft Primary School's Vincent Road Campus is a new two-form-entry school for the Royal Borough of Greenwich, built on the site of former sheltered housing in central Woolwich. It added about 420 places and took Plumcroft from three to five forms of entry across its two sites, with 14 classrooms, a nursery, a full kitchen and a double-height hall. The team behind Dmitro Development built the SFS and cladding envelope, from the framing to the zinc.

Part of: SFS and cladding packages

Looking up a deep purple horizontally clad elevation with dark-framed window bands and louvred vents against a blue sky

Purple horizontal cladding and window bands, looking up the teaching wing.

Instructed scope, May 2017

01Metsec SFS infill framing
02Sheathing board and insulation
03Breather membrane and fire barriers
04Brick channels
05Purple horizontal cladding
06Standing-seam zinc to the hall

Playground elevation of Plumcroft Primary School with a purple-clad teaching wing, a grey zinc hall lettered Plumcroft Primary and a yellow external stair

The playground elevation, with the yellow stair up to the zinc hall.

The envelope

Metsec infill in a steel frame, on a tight town-centre site.

The school is a steel-framed building with Metsec SFS infill walls. The finishes divide it by use: grey vertical zinc for the taller hall and entrance block, deep purple horizontal panels for the teaching wings, brickwork at the lower levels. The tender design specified a quartz-zinc standing-seam system on marine plywood for the main hall.

The site sits in central Woolwich, beside Woolwich Arsenal station and occupied homes. Access was tight, with little space to take deliveries or park, and the main contractor kept close contact with neighbours throughout.

Package50 weeks
Main contractFeb 2017 to Oct 2018

Purple horizontal cladding ending above a dark brick plinth with louvred ground-floor panels, seen from below at a corner of the school

Where the purple cladding stops above the brick base.

Timber-slatted canopy soffit with a downlight and security camera, meeting purple cladding and brickwork at its edge

The timber-slatted canopy soffit, meeting the purple cladding.

Aerial view of a grey standing-seam zinc hall with a three-pitch sawtooth roof, yellow Plumcroft Primary lettering and a yellow external stair

The hall block, wrapped in standing-seam zinc.

The purple teaching wing

Three views of the horizontal cladding on the teaching wings: over the nursery canopy, around the upper-floor roof terrace, and along Vincent Road.

Purple-clad teaching wing above a glazed canopy and artificial-grass nursery play area, with a yellow external stair in the foreground — Over the nursery canopy, beside the yellow external stair.

Paved roof terrace enclosed by purple horizontal cladding, dark-framed windows and louvred panels, with a steel railing on the open side — Around the upper-floor roof terrace.

Street corner view of the school: purple horizontal cladding over a grey brick base, with the zinc-clad Vincent Road Campus block at the corner — Along Vincent Road, with the zinc entrance block at the corner.

Award and rating

Project of the Year, Schools, at the 2019 Education Estates Awards.

The award recognised the completed school, designed by Pollard Thomas Edwards. It was won by the project as a whole, not by the facade package alone.

The scheme holds a BREEAM Interim Excellent rating of 76.9%, assessed by Stroma Built Environment. The Bauder green roof, solar photovoltaics and high-performance glazing formed part of the wider environmental design.

Aerial view of the school with its purple-clad teaching wing, green roof and solar panels beside the grey zinc hall, above the nursery play areas

From above: the zinc hall and its sawtooth roof.

The wider campus

The roof and play space around the envelope were delivered by others on the wider project: the green roof and solar array as part of the environmental design, the play ship, games court and sensory play by Playcubed.