New Dining Hall Wins Wood Award

Homerton College’s Dining Hall, designed by Feilden Fowles and built by Barnes Construction, has triumphed in the 2022 Wood Awards, winning the Gold Award in a field of 200 entrants.

Established in 1971, the Wood Awards is the UK’s premier competition for excellence in architecture and product design in wood. The awards recognise outstanding design, craftsmanship and installation. At the awards ceremony at the Carpenters’ Hall in London on 23 November 2022, the Homerton project won the ‘Education and Public Sector’ building category, and a Structural Award, and went on to win the Gold Award for the competition.

“Elegant and impressive, this dining hall celebrates the integrity and inherent beauty of its materials and craftsmanship, creating a space which is both inspiring and functional for students.” – Wood Awards nomination

Homerton’s dining hall and its associated buttery are bright, airy spaces by day, and transform into a ceremonial setting for formal evening meals. The hall itself uses long sweet chestnut glulam trusses, echoing the hammerbeam ceilings of a traditional hall in a slender and elegant modern form. The trusses are held together by wooden pegs: the compressive strength of these cross-beams is used to transfer the heavy weight of the butterfly roof to the vertical columns each side.

The last Charter Dinner held at Homerton was held literally days before the world locked down in 2020 so it was a pleasure to resume the occasion in the new Dining Hall in June this year. Both Theresa May MP and Diane Abbott MP spoke to a gathering of over 200 guests from Cambridge, the UK and beyond.

Congratulations to Professor Simon Gregory, Homerton Fellow in Clinical Medicine who was awarded an MBE in the 2022 New Year Honours List for services to General Practice. Simon also serves as a Deputy Lieutenant in the county of Northamptonshire.

Earlier this year Homerton became home to 20 students from Kharkiv National Medical University, who were brought to Cambridge for a bespoke programme of clinical placements, to help continue their studies.

While full-time Cambridge medical students were on their summer break, Cambridge University’s School of Clinical Medicine created a seven-week programme for the displaced Ukrainians, focusing on core medicine, surgery and a specialism of the students’ choice. The course included lectures, observation and practical experience and was funded by a very generous anonymous donation.

Homerton College was delighted to be able to support the initiative by providing the students with a home base in Cambridge, giving them accommodation, library access, catering, and a quiet campus to bond as a group and to meet other Homerton students.

The visiting students were supplied with prepaid cards allowing them to buy their meals in the College dining hall and were accommodated in en-suite student rooms. While the training programme meant they had had a full study timetable, they enjoyed a taste of collegiate life, including two postgraduate Formal Halls attended by students and Fellows.

Their stay at Homerton was organised by Postgraduate Tutor Dr Melanie Keene, who said, “We’ve really enjoyed getting to know our visitors: they’ve been a lively presence in College. They have all relished the opportunities their clinical placements have provided for hands-on medical work, whether on ward rounds, in surgery, and in their various specialities.”

HUS President’s Report

Sport

Charter Choir of Homerton College

ent Term 2022 saw the further easing of COVID restrictions, which students embraced with enthusiasm – bringing friends to see Homerton, whether that was in fancy dress at a bop, having a drink in the ever popular Griffin bar, or dressed up at formals. To combat the Week 5 blues, the welfare team organised the universally popular ‘Welfairy’ initiative, reminding our students to check in on friends and do our bit to make the community a more welcoming place. It was this collective spirit that ensured Homerton’s overall performance in the famous Lent term bumps was a resounding success, with W1 going up a place and M1 earning superblades. The club even organised a 150k relay erg to raise over £600 for Streetbite Cambridge in April.

The brand new dining hall opened for service this year and provides a striking modern contrast to our beloved Great Hall. With this new hall, we were able to host formals at an increased capacity whilst still filling the hall with the same old conversations and merriment as before.

Easter term also saw the most ambitious election of a HUS committee so far, with 22 roles to be filled, some highly contested at that. The previous HUS team certainly put on their fair share of events throughout the year, but in Easter term the revival of Sunday Funday events to help alleviate exam stress was down almost entirely to my predecessor Phoebe Hardingham – her effort was highly appreciated by finalists and freshers alike. Of course, no recollection of Easter term is complete without huge congratulations to the May Ball committee, who put together an amazing night of fun, food and frivolity – they

Lshould be very proud of pulling off a successful night, particularly given that most of the committee had never previously attended one.

At the end of the academic year, my fellow finalists and I graduated together and in person in July. To top it all off, the first cohort of Homerton medics finished their clinical years and graduated – we all wish them the best with whatever comes next.

The new academic year has brought its own exciting changes along with our new set of freshers – the HUS office has moved from its old home in the corner of the Cavendish building to a newly built office in the JCR itself, leaving HUS members more accessible and accountable to the students they represent. Even more exciting is the fact that the JCR is now an entirely student focussed space, with events such as ‘baby bops’, open mic nights and seasonal welfare events taking place here. There has even been a new quiet room built into the JCR, allowing students to take breaks from social events without missing out.

Having Simon step into the role of Principal has provided a push for change and growth within the College: most recently Homerton has taken on 5 students for the first Cambridge Foundation Year. Simon’s influence extended even further, with myself and the BME officers helping him organise a spectacular Black History Month dinner hosted at Homerton, for Black students across the University, in October.

Freshers matriculate, finalists graduate, but through it all Homerton remains the same as it was when I arrived in 2017 – a community of friendly, driven individuals striving to make the world a better place, just as they made Homerton home n