Turf Cutting Marks Start Of Work On College’s New Science Centre

The new building situated on the College campus to the north of The Limes building, will house ten laboratories, serving Biology, Chemistry and Physics teaching at the school. It will ultimately transform the College’s entire campus allowing other areas to be redeveloped and departments clustered within the main school building.

The turf cutting took place on Tuesday 1 March with the Headmaster, Ed Hester, and incoming Heads of School, Pratheesh Prabakaran and Freya Mills, donning hard hats and hi-vis jackets to perform the official ground-breaking ceremony. They were joined by Trendgrey Construction Ltd MD Nick Henderson, Foundation Assistant Head, Alex Darkes, Trendgrey Site Agent, Kevin Wynne, Chair of the Old Princethorpians Association, Peter Rollason and long-standing VSOP, Mary Wheildon.

The new £8 million Science Centre is due for completion in mid-2023, ready for opening at the beginning of the 2023-24 academic year. Trendgrey Construction moved onto site just over a week ago and have already established a large self-contained compound and the access road for the construction traffic at the back of the tennis courts in preparation for the real work commencing.

Comments Ed Hester, Headmaster, “The start of the construction work marks a key milestone for the College. This new building will provide cutting edge, state-of-the-art Science facilities and help inspire future generations of Princethorpe scientists, engineers, researchers, chemists, doctors and more. In a demanding world, where scientific progress is essential, we need to provide the very best facilities for teaching and learning to stimulate the intellect, ambition and creativity of our pupils. This tremendous new building will enable us to do just that.”

Adds Alex Darkes, Foundation Assistant Head and Project Manager, "After years of planning this is a very exciting day for us all here at Princethorpe. It won’t be long before we start to see some big changes on site as Princethorpe’s vision for the future starts to become a reality.”