Project Brief
The Royal Alfred Seafarers’ Society provides housing, residential and dementia care to former seafarers and their dependants.
Under a four-phased redevelopment, we were appointed directly by ITC to provide structural design services for the extension and refurbishment of the north and east wings of Belvedere House, a residential and nursing care home. The scheme improves internal circulation and expands the existing accommodation with new ensuite bedrooms, communal spaces and staff areas.
Solution
Our structural design work centred around the creation of a new first-floor extension to sections of the existing ground floor, including a new dormer and rooflight, and general strengthening works.
The existing building was load-bearing masonry with beam and block floors. We opened up sections to explore and assess its layout and strength and undertook trial pits to determine the need for new foundations. Our final proposals minimised additional loading on the ground floor construction.
We provided general arrangement drawings for the foundations, ground floor, first floor and the roof. We detailed the new structural openings and steelwork for areas of the existing first floor structure, as well as some new foundations. We coordinated with the architect to design the timber post structure supporting the dormer roof and roof truss junction. Our structural proposals also integrated with the M&E engineer’s upgrades for the new air conditioning, power and data systems. Our initial scope was extended to fully detail a reinforced concrete staircase cast in situ.
As it was necessary to make new openings in the existing structure, we assisted with the design of temporary works during construction. This included calculating loadings for temporary supports, advising on the location of props and designing elements of safety hoarding. We reviewed subcontractor design input throughout.
