Keele is the largest campus university in the UK, and, in a recent global sustainability league table, was ranked number one in the world for its green setting and campus infrastructure. The University has grand plans in place to develop its estate, in order to meet demand from its growing student body and to facilitate new major research initiatives on campus.

The University’s estate was originally owned by the Knights Templar, a medieval military order, and then in the mid-sixteenth century came into the possession of the Sneyd family before becoming an army base in 1938. In 1949 the estate was acquired by the newly created University College of North Staffordshire, and in 1962 the college received its charter as Keele University.

Keele is set in an estate of some 250 hectares, with woodlands, eight lakes and landscaped parkland. In order to inculcate a sense of community, the founding ideal was for all students and staff to live on campus; over time this has been relaxed, but a high proportion of students still live on campus, and, unusually, 2 hectares of land still consist of staff housing and flats that allow hundreds of staff members to reside on campus all year round.

At the heart of the campus is the majestic Keele Hall, which was built in 1580 and rebuilt on the same site in 1860. Of the other campus buildings, 4% were constructed before 1913, around a fifth between 1940 and 1959, and more than half between 1960 and 2000; 22% have been constructed since the new millennium.

Keele Hall and lakes

In the mid-1990s part of the estate was taken out of the green belt, allowing Keele to expand. This was a milestone for the University. In 2000 a new entrance was provided; this coincided with the development of Innovation Centres 1–4, which formed the foundations of Keele’s Science and Innovation Park.

The completion of the David Weatherall building marked the opening of Keele’s School of Medicine in 2003, allowing the University to increase its student intake and widen its area of groundbreaking research. Since 2006 the Science Park has expanded with the creation of Innovation Centre 5 and the new privately owned Caudwell International Children’s Centre (CICC), opened in autumn 2017.

Since 2007 Keele has invested more than £140m in its campus, and it is now one of the fastest-growing universities in the UK; over the next five years it will be transforming and expanding its on-campus accommodation via a £160m partnership with University Partnerships Programme (UPP).

Visualisation of new accommodation

There are also plans to develop a new music and teaching facility, a new replacement medical centre, a dedicated postgraduate hub and social spaces in halls.

The University is also planning to expand its academic estate, supporting growth in teaching and learning and developing an innovative new research environment. An exciting new £10m development is already under way to expand the Huxley building, home to the School of Life Sciences. The development, partly funded by HEFCE, will provide new state-of-the-art teaching laboratories.

The University recently secured £15m of investment in a new research project to create Europe’s first ‘at scale’ Smart Energy Network Demonstrator (SEND) – essentially turning the campus into a living laboratory where new energy-efficient technologies can be researched, developed and tested in a real-world environment.

The University has also developed a master-plan framework that includes the proposed Mercia Centre for Innovation and Leadership (MCIL), in partnership with Staffordshire County Council. The plans include the development of Hub 1 – containing an Innovation and Leadership Centre, Innovation Centre 6, and new academic space and facilities – representing another £15m investment, and providing a reception hub for both students and business as part of the fully integrated Science and Innovation Park.

The master plan also includes a new four-storey Central Science Laboratories block, located at the heart of the campus, for laboratory-based teaching and also supporting the growth of research within natural sciences and pharmaceutical studies. The development also facilitates the provision of a new 400-seat multi-user lecture theatre.

With responsibility for the biggest single campus in the UK, the estates team at Keele faces various challenges, including balancing the need for continued growth and the remodelling of space with maintaining the character of the historic site, taking in the listed buildings and the historic park and gardens that form part of Keele’s attractiveness. The estates team is dedicated to managing the space efficiently and to sensitively adapting the estate in order to respond to a changing education sector, while remaining one of the greenest and most sustainable universities in the country.

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Article taken from the book ‘AUDE: The First 25 Years’. Digital and hard copies available to buy.

Content for the book was drafted during 2016 and 2017 and was correct at the time of writing.