Longwall is a street of mainly Grade II Listed 18th Century terraced houses. It is owned by, but entirely disconnected from, New College Oxford. The terrace runs just outside of the medieval city wall, a scheduled ancient monument. We were selected from a limited competition to rethink how the terrace could connect to the college and simultaneously provide more student accommodation.

Ancient texts suggested the possibility of a second city wall. We spent a year designing in collaboration with the college with this significant information barely mentioned. An archaeological dig was commissioned over a long summer break confirming the city wall’s presence; the only outer city wall discovered in the UK, a unique, glorious find – yet inconveniently situated directly under our original proposals. We had to radically rethink our approach.

With the college, we co-created a new solution using half levels, where we proposed to dig down and reveal the top of the second city wall; the rampart would be reinstated as a sloped wildflower garden, providing the new pedestrian route back to the New College, & with a new structure along the city wall giving the much needed new 35 ensuite bedrooms and teaching rooms alongside 37 refurbished student rooms in the reconfigured terrace.