The new £7.7 million Winston Way Primary School in Redbridge near Ilford has had to achieve exceptionally high environmental standards in a challenging project and NorDan has played a key part in its construction.

Built as part of the government’s Building Schools for the Future initiative, which sees billions of pounds invested in upgrading and refurbishing the UK’s school building stock, Winston Way has been built to provide additional school places for children in the Redbridge area. It provides places for 630 five to eleven year olds and also offers a community nursery unit.

Located on a brownfield site that was formerly a car park, the project has taken three years to complete. The project managers faced three major challenges: first, the school is located next to a busy dual carriageway and housing; second, the site is an awkward triangle shape; and third, it is an unusually small site for a school and so the building had to be developed upwards - to three storeys in parts - rather than outwards.

NorDan’s tilt and turn pine and aluminium clad windows and doors play a part in making the school eco-friendly by combining sustainably-sourced wood with high levels of thermal insulation. The manufacturer has supplied all classroom windows, ground floor screens and doors that open out into play areas, as well as the full height fixed glazing units specified for the administration block.

The NorDan windows use safety glass throughout because of the height of the building and the location, which means tough, vandal-proof windows are a must. The windows on second and third floors are tinted to provide privacy, plus the windows have also addressed the issue of noise pollution from the adjacent busy main road.

Geoff Sparkes of the London Borough of Redbridge, who assisted on the project, explains that the developers dealt with the site’s space problem by ‘building up, not out’. An innovative roof garden area, available for both teaching and play, is enclosed with perspex material with impressive views over to Canary Wharf in the distance.

Mr. Sparkes comments: “There’s a growing demand for schools to be more environmentally friendly - the greener we can become, the better. We are very happy with the windows and doors supplied and we found NorDan easy to work with. What’s more, the company was able to supply and install within 12 weeks, which was imperative due to the programme’s tight deadline.”

Syd Birnie, managing director of NorDan said: “It is really satisfying for us to be able to play our part in the creation of a school which is environmentally sound, has exciting architecture and incorporates tomorrow’s technology. It underscores the quality of the products we produce and flexibility of our approach.”

For more information on NorDan’s ranges of high performance windows and doors, please use the email provided.

Email: info@nordan.co.uk