Corpus Christi College, Oxford
Corpus Christi College, Oxford
Corpus Christi College required new facilities at their central Oxford site in order to adequately house their unique library collections, which include documents related to the production of the King James Bible.
The college site, which is located within a conservation area and appears on Historic England’s register of historic parks and gardens, contains a dense collection of listed buildings ranging in date from the 16th to the 20th century.
Asset prepared a comprehensive Heritage Audit for the site, which identified the location most appropriate for new development within this highly sensitive site. The constraints of the site were such that the ‘least harmful’ location for development involved the demolition of a Grade II listed building, dating in part from the early 20th century and in part from the 1950s.
As part of the project team, alongside the scheme architects, Berman Guedes Stretton, and others, Asset Heritage advised on the development of the proposals, negotiating with Historic England, Oxford City Council, the 20th-Century Society, and other stakeholders.
We subsequently prepared a Heritage Impact Assessment, which considered the effects of the scheme in heritage terms, including the heritage-related benefits resulting from the retention of the college’s unique library collections on site.
The scheme was granted listed building consent and planning permission in 2015.