Cottesmore Academy

Cottesmore Academy is a small primary school situated in Kendrew Barracks, Oakham. It is a smaller than average school with only six classes overall and the majority of the pupils there are of service families.  It became an academy sponsor led in 2018 and is now part of the Rutland Learning Trust. We have been working with a lot of schools as a business and enjoy collaborating with them as they have new and innovative ideas for patterns in classrooms, in corridors and school halls.  

We were part of a unique project with Cottesmore Academy as they had a design for their corridors which we had never encountered before but were really excited to complete. The corridors of Cottesmore were transformed into that of a road, with added bus stops, carparks, roundabouts and even junctions at the entrances to classrooms. As well as an innovative design it will assist the young children of the school with road awareness and other outdoor surroundings. 

By using a special type of rubber vinyl from Nora by Interface coupled with a high standard installation, we were able to create a pattern and ensure it looked high quality and served its purpose as a fun new highlight to the school. The road followed through approximately 200m² of corridors and circulation areas in the school, along with 4 flights of stairs.  

The material we used for this project Noraplan Sentica which is especially made for heavy usage, high footfall sound absorption, slip resistance and increased safety thanks to its high fire-retardant properties. All of these features make it the perfect floor covering for a school corridor. Additionally, this flooring requires no finishing, waxing or sealing. All these floor coverings have a dense, nonporous and dirt-repellent surface—eliminating the need to use unfriendly, harsh cleaning chemicals which was important for us to consider due to small children being in close contact with the flooring on a more regular basis.  

Additionally, we prepared the subfloor throughout. All four flights of stairs saw new contrasting coloured nosings with anti-slip properties. 

It was fantastic to get involved in such a unique project and gain more skills and knowledge. As a business we welcome new challenges and it was great to work on something different and for it to be a really positive result for us and the school.