Haleys were appointed to provide consultancy support in the form of Project Management, Cost and Commercial Management and Construction Design & Management Co-ordination services to this project.

The project’s goal was to provide a new training and resource centre for use by the Black and Minority Ethnic Community Partnership (BMECP) in Brighton.

The Partnership had acquired shell and core premises and part funding through a regional development grant.

The building was required to fulfil the requirement for a flexible and secure centre to house the BMECP administration team, to provide a revenue stream from office and meeting room lettings as well as meeting the needs of the community groups who would be using the centre.

The project was required to deliver a marketable centre that met the aspirations of the community within a limited budget and with low operational costs.

The project was also required to meet BREEAM targets imposed by the local authority as part of a S107 agreement.

The premises were located on a sloping site and consisted of the two bottom floors of a seven story residential block. The floors were arranged in a ‘V’ shaped configuration dotted with supporting columns and soil pipe work servicing the apartments above. The lowest floor was semi-basement; no services had been provided to the premises.

Haleys first task was to contribute to negotiations with the developers to address shortfalls in the completion of the shell & core finish and to gain compensation to address these as a part of the fit-out.

Haleys then developed an outline design that they presented to the community for approval in principle prior to the project being tendered and let on a design and build basis.

The project site lay at the apex of a busy road junction and this precluded an external site set-up. This together with the occupation of the apartments above presented the project with a number of challenges arising from services installation, deliveries, site accommodation and noise issues.

The project was delivered within the budget and Centre was opened in time to allow BMECP to vacate their temporary accommodation as planned.

Despite the configuration of the premises the Centre now offers very attractive meeting rooms which have taken on the challenges presented by the columns and soil pipe work  for example by the formation of the ‘Stonehenge Suite’ which embraces the columns to provide a circular meeting space.

BMECP is now receiving revenue from the office space and meeting rooms as well as providing a much needed and attractive facility for their community.