Halifax Opportunities Trust

The Elsie Whiteley Innovation Centre

The organisation

Managed by Halifax Opportunities Trust, a local social enterprise and registered charity, the Elsie Whiteley Innovation Centre (EWIC) provides over 14,000 sq ft of contemporary, quality serviced, office space designed to meet the needs of forward-thinking and fast-moving creative and digital businesses operating in global markets and innovative niches.

The building

Situated just outside the town centre of Halifax, the Elsie Whiteley Innovation Centre is a stunning mill conversion. 'A fusion of Northern grit with simple, modern, minimalist design'. The Innovation Centre is a fitting tribute to the town’s entrepreneurial fashion and textile designer Elsie Whiteley, who created a successful, world renowned business empire from the mill.

Although the business, occupying the mill, had to close in 1994 (closure was enforced by the number of textile mills moving abroad), Elsie Whiteley herself never retired. However, the building was left empty for some years before a viable scheme and funding package were available to facilitate the refurbishment.

The building was purchased in 2004 by Yorkshire Forward (the regional development agency - RDA) on behalf of Calderdale Council, with the vision of refurbishing it into an innovation centre for Calderdale and the surrounding region. The purchase and refurbishment were a joint initiative between the RDA, Calderdale Metropolitan Borough Council and Action Halifax’s Urban 2 programme.

The newly refurbished Elsie Whiteley Innovation Centre opened in February 2006.  As a thriving creative and innovation business centre, it is a reminder of Halifax's past as a leading industrial textile hub, and embraces the region's future as a base where digital and new media companies can develop their businesses.

Design Impact workshop

The Glass-House Community Led Design led a Design Impact Workshop with Halifax Innovation staff and Tenants of the Innovation Centre in April 2010. During and following a walk around the centre, the group highlighted many of the aspects that the refurbishment has facilitated - what works well or not so well for them - and reflected on the opportunity for future change:

What is working well?

The refurbishment of the buildings has helped towards the regeneration of the local area, re-establishing pride in the history of the place, and creating a new sense of activity in the immediate environs.

The 'feel' of the building internally is really successful: there is a real 'wow' factor on entering the building. The entrance is a clearly defined space, whilst natural light pours through from the high glass ceiling of the atrium created over the former loading courtyard.

The atrium is a beautiful, large space. It contains comfortable and stylish sofas, and has capacity to be used as a gallery; it leads on to a small café space (about to be converted to a more commercial café, open to all tenants), with a small area for outside seating.

The entrance/reception area is warm, welcoming and comfortable. The reception desk is easily identifiable.

It is a 'confident' building. The visibility of the old structure, the two original buildings amongst the new, has helped the legibility, and gives a sense of pleasure, security and history. The combination of old stonework with the modern ‘minimalist’ refurbishment is harmonious and aesthetically pleasing. There is a general feeling of solidness, warmth, good finishing and a sense of comfortable welcome.

The scale of the spaces provided is good, with a range of room sizes, for different sized companies.

There is good natural light throughout – even interior rooms achieve good light levels due to being positioned overlooking the atrium.

The staff team provides an environment which works well for the tenants and enables them to work together. Good opportunities for meeting have been provided, such as the Friday networking breakfast, a regular event to encourage the tenants to socialise. Other opportunities provided for the tenants are greatly appreciated – a free meeting room is available to all tenants. Staff are generally really helpful and friendly.

EWIC has a strong identity linked to innovation, creativity and digital industries. Clients and groups hiring the space enjoy visiting; tenants feel good inviting people to the building. People enjoy working here, and the reputation of the building helps the enterprise side of it.

The current economic climate has led to diversification of tenants, which, tenants felt, has brought benefit through a wider a mix of different business types and people.

What is not working so well?

Generally there are a number of issues around the planning and use of energy. The heat and lighting is expensive and energy consumption is high.
The Building Management System (BMS) is temperamental and difficult to use. The boiler system is over-computerised, with no manual over-ride. This means that at times, when the outside temperature would demand ventilation, the heating is still on and ventilators in the atrium roof do not open.
The ventilation and air conditioning are seen as requiring considerable attention: windows only open slightly, so don't ventilate sufficiently; there is a lack of natural air circulation generally; in particular, the offices on the west side of the building tend to over-heat.

Some areas that were designed and fitted for particular purposes are not being used sufficiently:

The Ballroom – the largest room in the building and a beautiful space – has insufficient acoustic separation from the floor below, and it disturbs the businesses below if it is used during office hours.

The Seminar theatre – fitted out to very high specifications – has too low a capacity for most conferences (that require 150-200 seats) The seats are fixed to the floor and there is no flexibility. Hence the rental of this space is low.

The Gallery area is right outside tenants’ offices, so any event held here disturbs the businesses inside. What seemed to be a good idea at design stage is effectively not usable during office hours.

The reception staff aren’t able to see visitors until they enter the building, which hampers their sense of being able to monitor incoming people sufficiently. A new fob system has partly solved the security of the entrance, giving tenants access 24 hours a day, but this could be improved upon.

Lack of storage is also an issue in the reception area.

Atrium and reception flooring: the bumpy lino in the atrium is difficult to clean, and has pitted due to under floor heating.  It is noisy too – especially for taking cleaning and delivery trolleys across the hard surfaced atrium. The uneven surface of the flag stones is also noisy to take trolleys over.

The intruder alarm system is ineffective: the electronic readout doesn't say which room an alarm has been set off in.

Car park security is an issue for some tenants after dark – they feel there is insufficient lighting and feel vulnerable until they have reached the building.

In the visitors car park the barrier is hard to negotiate.

Some windows have let in damp, there is pooling of water on the internal windowsill, and this allows water to seep into the wall. The problem is at its worst following persistent driving rain. It’s not yet clear what the solution to the problem is, but it seems like it will be expensive to fix.

Whilst one informal sitting area was much valued by tenants, it was noted that maybe the corridor kitchen areas also needed to have seating, to make informal meetings between tenants more frequent. However, this would block the corridors. The kitchen areas are quite tight for space.

Top Tips from Halifax

• Before starting out on a building refurbishment, tenants/users and staff should go and visit other similar buildings and talk to people who've been through the process, learning from examples.
• Talk to potential users before the build – engage with them as early as possible.
• Get more tenders for specialist software, telecoms, heating and access control.

Glass-House learning points:

• A sustainable building and resource strategy and approach could have enhanced the building and cut running costs in the long run. Marketing of a building as 'green' can bring interest from many new clients.
• Natural ventilation and light play a vital role in energy conservation and retaining a comfortable and healthy environment.
• Make sure you have suitable manual over-rides to all computerised systems.
• Creating flexible spaces for different tenant uses increases the hire potential.
• This building has a large footprint.  Within the existing shell they can quickly and cost effectively rearrange spaces to suit the tenants’ requirements. The larger rooms with air flow and light from both sides feel more comfortable.
• Whilst the range of rooms gives flexibility, controlling a variety of smaller cellular spaces and large meeting rooms within the overall scheme has been a challenge in terms of environmental control.