The site for the Youth Zone faces Preston Bus Station – refurbished by our practice and re-opened in 2018 – and the new public square created as part of our masterplan for the area. The main entrance opens onto the public realm, taking advantage of the prominent location to create a building that young people can identify with and be proud of. Marked by yellow columns that echo the bus station, a deep overhang provides a place to gather before going inside.

Internally, the building offers an extensive open-plan recreation area where young people can socialise, play, and have a hot meal. This opens into a double height space that visually connects to the tall rooms of the climbing wall and sports hall at first floor level, making dramatic use of the interlocking volumes. A range of arts, music, sports, performance, and enterprise facilities are on offer within the building.

The building’s massing is broken down into a composition of three blocks to reduce its scale along the narrow side streets. A play of light and shade is created across the façade with vertical folds in the chalk-coloured panels – again with a nod to the Modernist bus station. An accessible garden at roof level gives young people a valuable green space in this urban location, while PVs and windcatchers contribute towards reducing the building’s energy use.