Forth Valley College's Falkirk campus wins Scottish Design Awards category

The Grangemouth Road campus came out on top in the Architecture: Education Building or Project category during a special online ceremony.

Designed by architects Reiach and Hall, the opening of Forth Valley College’s Falkirk campus marked the culmination of 11 years of collaboration and the completion of a family of three campuses, joining the facilities in Alloa and Stirling – which have also won the exact same award.

The new site, FVC’s headquarters, completed the college’s ambitious £138 million estates programme which saw Alloa facility open in 2011 and Stirling campus welcome students a year later.

The Scottish Government’s £78m investment in the construction of the new campus made it one of the largest publicly funded building projects in the country.

Delivered by Keppie Design and Balfour Beatty, the facilities include world-class laboratories, a process training rig, transmission training centre, distillation plant, virtual control room, mini rig, biotechnology centre, construction workshops, sports centre and front of house training salons for hairdressing and beauty.

Dr Ken Thomson, FVC principal, said: “We are delighted that our new Falkirk campus has won the Scottish Design Awards Education Building or Project category for 2021.

“Seeing our students walk through the doors of our new Falkirk campus was an exhilarating and proud experience. It was great to welcome them and I am excited to see everyone settle in to this excellent new learning environment.

“Unfortunately the new opening was tempered by Covid-19 as working from home became a necessity. However, the fabulous design for flexible space and digital infrastructure has meant we’ve been able to accommodate staff and students under social distancing guidelines and Scottish Government direction.

“I am very proud the campus is now being utilised not only for learning, but as the vaccination hub for Falkirk. A fabulous community asset.

“Our new HQ, which focuses heavily on training facilities designed for science/technology/engineering/sport and healthcare, will enhance further education for the people of Falkirk and beyond for years to come.

“We can’t thank architects Reiach and Hall and Balfour Beatty enough for designing and constructing our new building and helping us to realise our vision, and I personally would like to thank everyone who has worked on the project for guiding it to completion.”

Thank you for reading this article on our free-to-read website. We're more reliant on your support than ever as the shift in consumer habits brought about by coronavirus impacts our advertisers.

Please consider purchasing a subscription to our print newspaper to help fund our trusted, fact-checked journalism.

https://www.localsubsplus.co.uk/nord/dm/FKH/V