Sports

Buildings that people like to look at and love to use

Buttress architects provide architecture, heritage and masterplanning to clients across the country. We’re a multi-faceted community of specialists. Experts, not egos. Team players with all the skills you need, in house.

We’re thinkers as much as makers. Believe that architecture is as much about people as buildings, and that buildings should be shaped by their surroundings, their role and the people who’ll use them.

Our work includes the public and private sectors, the urban and the rural, the residential and commercial, the traditional and the contemporary, and we’re internationally renowned for our exceptional skills in heritage and conservation, and in aquaria.

Our approach is about combining the practical and the beautiful, the real and the visionary, responding to the brief and going beyond the brief, finding different angles and perspectives.

We enjoy the unusual, the complex and the challenging. We respect the individual and we work collectively. Giving life to buildings and award-winning buildings to clients and the community.

Ours is a start to finish service, built around quality, creativity and fresh thinking, designed to give you what you want, even if it’s not what you asked for or expected. Good to look at. Great to use.

contact: Gavin Sorby

gsorby@buttress.net

07931 377851

address: Buttress

41 Bengal St, Manchester M4 6AF

t: 0161 236 3303

www.buttress.net

The sports centre at Abingdon School re-uses and wraps around the existing sports hall and provides new accommodation including an 8 lane 25m competition swimming pool with spectator seating, judo and fencing studio, fitness studio, ergo room, squash courts, climbing wall and changing for indoor and outdoor sports. The centre also includes classrooms and a flexible multi-functional suite for events that opens to a viewing balcony. The school is in a conservation area and adjacent to listed buildings.

Abingdon School Sports Centre

Monmouth School Sports PavilionThe new changing and social facility sits on the school’s playing fields adjacent to the River Wye. The roof of the pavilion is designed on a double curve providing a dynamic building profile which sits appropriately in its green belt setting. Special consideration in the design and detailing of the pavilion has been given for its location within the flood plain.

“The School enjoyed working closely with architects Buttress, and we are delighted with the exciting and vibrant

design that they have delivered. The main reception room and spacious balcony offer stunning views over the

playing fields and to the hills beyond, and a visit will long remain in the memories of all who journey here.”

Dr Steven Connors, Headmaster of Monmouth School

“The Pavilion is functional yet spacious, elegantly proportioned and scrupulously detailed.”

National Eisteddfod of Wales Architecture Selectors’ Statement. 2010

Withington BathsProposals for the redevelopment of Withington baths in Manchester following the assett transfer to a community trust. The proposals see the Edwardian baths retained and run by ‘Love Withington Baths’ as a hub for the local community.

It is intended that the baths become a new community centre retaining provision of swimming, gymnasium and exercise facilities whilst expanding its offer to include other recreational and work facilities to meet the specific needs of the local community.

Merchant Taylors’ Schools Crosby Sports Centre

Merchant Taylors’ Schools Crosby comprises 5 schools on 3 sites. The new sports facility is for shared use between both junior and senior boys and girls, and is located in a prominent position on the boys school site adjacent to listed buildings.

The new facility contains a multi-games sports hall, dance/drama stu-dio, fitness gym, changing for indoor and outdoor sports, and out-door climbing wall and sports teaching classrooms.

The skyline and massing of the building is broken down by the stepped plan and section arrangement and then further broken down on the tall sports hall roof with sloping roof planes that have glazed northlights. These are utilized to provide natural ventilation and day lighting to the sports hall.

Range StadiumA multi-purpose sports hall, aerobics studio, fitness suite and changing facilities for Whalley Range High School, Manchester, plus ten floodlit outdoor five a side pitches. The centre is used as a regional basketball centre and is home to the Greater Manchester Youth Basketball Club.

Hurlingham ClubSubmission to an invited design competition for the development of a new indoor tennis centre on the banks of the Thames in Central London.

The three dimensional form of the building welcomes people in; sweeping curves define the entrance and circulation, and draw people through the building to the ‘hubs’ and into the main spaces. The volumes required for the sports activities within helped form the building, defining the softer curved shape that also responds to the mature landscape setting.

Leventhorpe Sports CentreA new 1500m2 Sports Hall for The Leventhorpe School to accommodate 4 badminton courts and changing facilities, fitness suite, dance studio and classroom, all weather pitch, tennis courts, hard play area and surrounding landscaping works. The new centre is designed to Sports England space standards and provides amenities to the wider community in addition to the school.

Prior Park CollegeNew build sports centre in very sensitive landscaped setting; an area of outstanding natural beauty, set within a Conservation Area, world heritage site and green belt. We were appointed by Prior Park College to create a new Sporting Centre of Excellence. Facilities include an indoor sports hall, new changing facilities, teaching space / multi purpose function room and associated balcony overlooking the first cricket pitch and a 30 piece fitness suite. The design was informed by a comprehensive feasibility study assessing the site’s heritage, landscape setting, existing services, operation & functional requirements for delivering sport.

Wigan Joint Service CentreConsultancy to the PFI team employed to create the Wigan Joint Service Centre in recognition of the historic significance of the proposed centre’s location in a conservation area. The project includes for the provision of

substantially improved public services, including a One Stop Shop, Library and Swimming Pool.

Millennium PowerhouseThe Moss Side Millennium Powerhouse is a multi-functional centre meeting the needs of local young people. Created to celebrate the diversity of Moss Side’s youth, the building includes multi-purpose sports and performance hall, fitness studio, drama/dance studio, recording studio, cafe, careers library, external performance space and cafe. Accommodation for visiting students/athletes was also created on site.

The design was the result of extensive collaboration between the Design team , local young people, health, sports, crime prevention, education, training, careers and employment agencies.

An extension to the existing sports hall was created to provide new changing facilities and offices for Manchester Leisure Sports Development. The design replaced all existing extensions with a single pavilion linked into the centre and providing protected entrance and viewing balcony for the centre.

Ducie Sports Centre

Buttress have created two climbing centres for climber John Dunne, in Manchster converting a grade II* listed redundant church and in Reading an early 20th century warehouse.

Manchester and Reading Climbing Centres

architecture | heritage | urbanism