Location: | Roehampton, United Kingdom |
Size: | 11,500 m² |
Client: | Lawn Tennis Association |
Year: | 2007 |
Awards: | RIBA National Award; RIBA Regional Award; IPC/IAKS Award: With Distinction; British Council for Offices (BCO): National Best of the Best Award; Civic Trust Awards: Commendation; Structural Steel Design Award. |
Located in Roehampton, the National Tennis Centre brings together administrative, sports and hospitality uses in a world-class new home for British tennis.
The design responds to the Metropolitan Open Land setting, preserving existing woodland and using the fall across the site to hide some of the bulk of the building. Only when visitors pass through the entrance pavilion is the level change revealed, along with the full extent of the centre’s courts and facilities beyond.
The composition is anchored by the position of a 250 year old London plane tree. This informs the axis for the accommodation, which is organised around a sunken courtyard. The largest volume is the six-court tennis hall, spanned by 36m steel trusses with a sweeping roof profile derived from LTA minimum height requirements for indoor tennis courts. Twenty outdoor courts of different surfaces are located nearby.
Ancillary facilities are at courtside level including changing rooms, plant room and seminar rooms. Above is homely accommodation for young players on residential courses, specialised gymnasia and medical centre, social spaces and a media room. An administrative building to the north of the courtyard provides office accommodation for 150 LTA staff. Each element has a separate identity to give richness and articulation to the façade.