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Walking Tour of the University of Leicester: Celebrating 100 Years of Student Life
Item 8 of 11
Completed in 2016, the George Davies Center is a one of a kind groundbreaking feat of architecture; providing top of the range facilities for medical students and researchers at the lowest monetary and ecological running cost. Costing £42 million, it is one of the universities largest investments of the last decade.

The George Davis Centre

The George Davis Centre

From September 2016, medical students at Leicester began study at the George Davies Centre (formerly the Centre for Medicine). The centre represents a union between world-leading medical research and medical education under one roof and to produce doctors who are able to deliver high quality care in an effective and compassionate manner in the rapidly changing environment of medicine. Costing £42 million, the centre is the largest investment in medical teaching and applied research by any UK university in the last decade. It has been designed to help to meet the demand for more capable and caring doctors and also to house applied research that will be at the forefront of improved patient safety and the fight against chronic disease. The building houses staff and students from the Medical School, Department of Health Sciences and School of Psychology. Designed to minimise environmental impact, the George Davies Centre is the largest non-residential building in the UK to meet the exacting ‘Passivhaus’ standard; a charter of standards relating to energy efficiency, air quality and other environmental factors which can be applied to new buildings. The concept was invented and defined in 1988 with the first Passivhaus buildings constructed in Darmstadt two years later. None have previously attempted to meet the standard with a non-residential building on the scale of the George Davies Centre, which provides 12,836m2 of teaching facilities, offices, laboratories and support spaces for more than 2,350 staff and students (including two lecture theatres of approximately 200 and 300 seats). One of the many ways this building achieved this status is through the installation of a ‘living wall’ and green roof, which provides insulation, rainwater run-off and a fantastic environment for local wildlife. In addition, the building has 140 solar panels generating an average of 30,000 kWh of electricity every year. 

Lyons. A, 2017. 'Center for Medicine'. From 'The Architecture of the Universities of Leicester'. Anchor Print Group.

The University of Leicester, 2020 'The George Davis Center'. Available at: https://le.ac.uk/about/info/history/george-davis

Image Sources(Click to expand)

https://le.ac.uk/about/info/history/george-davis