College cements ambitious plans for ‘transformational’ campus buildings
Work is getting underway on a trio of large capital investment projects at Bradford College.
Over the last two years, the college has secured nearly £29m in funding, which will go towards major construction schemes. Plans include:
· New £3.5m vocational T Level facilities in the existing David Hockney Building.
· A £6.9m refurbishment of the derelict Garden Mills building on Thornton Road.
· Construction of a new £17m Future Technologies Centre (FTC), also on Thornton Road.
T Level Facilities
A £3.5m Department for Education (T Level Capital Fund – Wave 5) investment will create a commercial barbering salon, nail bar, collaborative lecture spaces, TV studio, enhanced media editing and recording studios, outdoor dining facilities, and remodel of The Grove training restaurant.
T Level qualifications are an alternative to A Levels and focus on the hands-on skills that employers need.
Opening in September, these latest T Level facilities follow on from £1.3m Wave 4 funding which built T Level health and early years facilities in 2023.
The first phase of work incorporated five new digital teaching suites, a large collaboration science lab, a mock clinical ward, and the conversion of classrooms into indoor and outdoor nursery training rooms.
Garden Mills
The Garden Mills refurbishment is the result of £5.8m worth of funding received from The Office for Students (OfS) Higher Education Capital Fund (with a £1.1m college contribution).
Contractor Tilbury Douglas has finished the strip out of the five-storey building for fit-out and completion by this summer.
Garden Mills will enhance the college’s existing health science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) facilities. Higher-level HNC/HND and degree students will use this building from the new academic year.
It will house two new flexible laboratories, a prep room, six higher education digital IT labs, an ophthalmic dispensing suite, a clinical suite, a real-life work environment with consulting and testing booths, a collaboration area, and academic teaching spaces.
Future Technologies Centre (FTC)
Construction of the purpose-built FTC building will begin in spring following the demolition of Junction Mills and surveys by contractor, Morgan Sindall.
The project was made possible thanks to £15m funding from the Department for Education’s Further Education Capital Transformation Fund (FECTF), secured in October 2022, boosted by a £2m college contribution.
The FTC will be the new home of modern automotive and digital engineering curricula, such as electric/hybrid vehicles, robotics, advanced manufacturing, and digital/3D design.
The college’s Automotive and Digital Engineering Department will relocate from Bowling Back Lane to the new premises once completed during the 2025/2026 academic year.
Christopher Malish, Bradford College vice principal finance & corporate services, said: “We’re thrilled to see work scaling up across our project sites after years of logistics and planning.
“We have an exciting year ahead as we develop sector leading facilities. This is a huge boost for the college but is also a transformative investment in Bradford city centre, that also supports the wider city centre development.
“These multi-million pound investments will create cutting-edge learning environments for the local community, allowing the college to deliver on its mission of transforming lives.”
