The Edge Hotel at Wivenhoe House

Beacon advises on £9m+ approved hotel scheme on Colchester campus

Beacon Planning is providing conservation advice on a £9 million-plus development scheme to create a luxury hotel and hotel school at the University of Essex which was given the go-ahead by Colchester Borough Council recently (21 October).

Beacon are the planning and historic building consultants for the project to turn the Georgian, Grade II* Listed Wivenhoe House in Colchester in to a fully operational country house hotel and the base for the Edge Hotel School.

Led by the University of Essex, the project is supported by Edge – an independent, education foundation dedicated to raising the standard of practical and vocational training.

Working in conjunction with a range of consultants including Bond Bryan Architects, Beacon Planning co-ordinated the submission of the planning application and gave specialist advice on alterations to the existing building and the sympathetic design of the new extension in grounds which are registered as an Historic Garden.

Beacon led discussions with the borough council's planning and conservation officers and groups such as English Heritage, the Victorian Society and the Georgian Group.

Past alterations to Wivenhoe House – such as the removal of its main Victorian staircase in the 1980s– offered scope to reinstate such key features as part of the planning proposal which took just eight months to develop.

Jon Burgess said:

"Every building tells a story. Wivenhoe House began life as a Georgian family home, was used as an army camp during the world wars, became the University of Essex's headquarters in the 1960s and was then used as a hotel and conference centre.

Our job has been to pick through this story and to develop sympathetic and practical proposals which build upon this fascinating history and help restore the splendour of the building whilst reviving it for a very modern leisure and educational use."

The hotel is scheduled to receive guests in spring 2012.