Revamp of New Zealand House, London

Started in April 2023, the revamp of New Zealand House in London’s St James’ area will cost in the region of £150 million. The work is due to be complete by the end of 2025, involving collaboration between MultiCAD and a number of other specialist contractors.

Project Background

New Zealand House is a Grade II listed building, best known as the home of the New Zealand embassy. Designed by architect firm RMJM and built by Holland, Hannen & Cubitt in 1963, it was the first tower block built in central London after the Second World War.

It is an 18 story building, with 4 podium levels and a fourteen storey main tower. In 1963 its design and fit-out was ground breaking, including being London’s first air conditioned building, as well as the first to have continuous glazing on all elevations.

Following the revamp, the building will continue to be used by the New Zealand government. It will also be refurbished to include 95,000 sq ft of office space available for rent along with space for retail and bar facilities.

MultiCAD are working for contractor ROC MEP, alongside other contractors Wilson Gray Consulting, GWE, Hall & Kay and Etec. The project is lead by global construction company Multiplex.

Deliverables required

MultiCAD’s expert team are providing

• MEP Coordination
• BIM Modelling
• COBie asset inputting

The building has been stripped back to the structure, ready to be fitted out completely as new. All the services, therefore, must be designed and planned for the new fit-out.

MEP coordination will deliver a set of clash free drawings for the building services, which will be used for installation. The software used for this is Revizto, to provide high quality clash detection.

A digital twin BIM (building information model) will also be provided for the entire building, using the industry standard software, Revit. This includes producing COBie data.

Main challenges

The biggest challenge for this project is resolving all the spatial issues of trying to fit all the necessary services (mechanical, electrical and plumbing) into the building structure.

Clash detection for MEP is a crucial step for a project of this scale, as MEP elements can account for up to 40% of the construction budget. Any rework required later will increase MEP costs and may significantly delay the project, so it’s vital to get the design right, first time.

Solutions provided

MultiCAD is providing seamless collaboration with other contractors, using Autodesk Construction Cloud.

Our specialist technicians are delivering:

• a fixed-fee project,
• meeting tight deadlines at each phase,
• and razor-sharp coordination for MEP elements.

The team at MultiCAD are keeping up the momentum and spinning the critical works around, ensuring the project stays on track.

Wayne Turvey, Senior Project Manager.

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