Planning approval given for £108M extension to Royal College of Art Battersea campus

The Royal College of Art’s (RCA) Battersea campus has been given the go-ahead for its Herzog & de Meuron designed £108M extension.

The 15,800m² building for postgraduate students and ‘entrepreneurs’ at the RCA’s Battersea South campus will replace the institution’s sculpture building and moving-image studio at the corner of Howie Street and Elcho Street.

As well as studios, workshops and incubator units, the design incorporates a café and art materials shop with ‘improved routes through the site which will all be publicly accessible’.

RCA Vice-Chancellor Paul Thompson described the creation of the new Battersea campus as ‘a landmark moment in the history of the RCA’ and said the scheme would offer ‘unparalleled studio, workshop and high-tech facilities’ for its students.

He said: “[We] are delighted by the support we have received from both local and central government in helping us realise an entirely new type of art and design university which will contribute to the developing cultural quarter in Battersea.”

Herzog & de Meuron Senior Partner Ascan Mergenthaler said: “Workshops are the nucleus of the college and of the new campus extension. Our design is rooted in the surrounding townscape – it is simple, robust and flexible, and delivers a formula for the transforming dynamic of the RCA.”

Work is expected to start on site this summer and complete by 2020.