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Pets at Home

CLIENT: CBRE LIONBROOK PROPERTY FUND


CONTRACT VALUE: £1.8M


ARCHITECT: BLACK ARCHITECTURE


SECTOR: COMMERCIAL


EXPERTISE: NEW BUILD, EXTERNAL WORKS / HIGHWAYS IMPROVEMENTS, ELECTRICALS


Vale Southern Construction delivered a design and build contract, which brought a new Pets at Home store to a Southampton retail park while improving access.



The Brief

Site owners, CBRE Lionbrook Property Fund, required a contractor to build a new Pets at Home store at Hedge End Retail Park in Southampton.

With a 929 sq m gross floor area, the store was to be located on existing car parking at the busy retail park which was also home to Homebase, Currys and PC World.

The building was designed to achieve a BREEAM Excellent rating and demanded significant highways improvements to accommodate visitors by car and foot.


Maximising aesthetics and sustainability

Vale Southern was selected to deliver the design and build contract. Working in partnership with the architects, they created a single-storey steel framed building with a curved green roof.

The curve allows areas of the green roof to be visible from the car park, enhancing the building’s appearance while reducing surface water run off. An elevated section running along the roof’s central area contains rooflights providing natural light into the building.

The build also required high level glazing to be installed and a variety of external building materials. These included masonry block work, timber and aluminium cladding which had to be skilfully installed to ensure a flush fit and high quality finish.

Inside the new store, Vale Southern delivered the electrical works ready for Pets at Home’s contractor to complete the specialist fit out.


A seamless approach

Located in an existing car park in the southern corner of the site, the new store had to be constructed without negatively impacting the surrounding retailers and their customers. Access to the car park had to be maintained at all times, requiring Vale Southern to carefully co-ordinate the steel frame lifts.

Consistent and effective communication with the neighbouring retailers was also paramount. Vale Southern ensured these businesses were kept informed of its programme, minimising any disruption particularly around busy sales times.

The project also required significant highways improvements. This saw Vale Southern redesign the roundabout junction for the retail park, making it wider to improve traffic flow and minimising the risk of any tailbacks into the site once the new store opened.

During the works, Vale Southern had to co-ordinate the re-routing of traffic and work closely with the local highways authority and the retailers to ensure visitors could still access the cark park and the shops.

New parking spaces, pedestrian walkways and a dedicated crossing point also formed part of the package.

Overcoming all challenges, Vale Southern completed the project on time and meeting all the client’s requirements.

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