Mill House Hotel

The Mill House Farm Development consisted of a two-storey Hotel and Spa split into three connecting buildings: Building A for the sleeping accommodation, Building B for the restaurant and bar and Building C for the Spa and Fitness areas.

Innovation Fire Engineering were asked to develop a fire engineering strategy for the building to enable an open spiral staircase from the reception stair to be used as part of the means of escape for the residential part of the development.

Innovation Fire Engineering identified the credible worse-case fire location for each of the three buildings. For Building A, a fire at the base of the open staircase was assessed. Innovation Fire Engineering specified the required level of detection, automatic opening vent and fire curtain to retain the open plan accommodation staircase but maintain adequate means of escape for patrons and staff. For Building B, a fire in the ground floor restaurant kitchen was assessed. Innovation Fire Engineering specified the location of automatic fire detectors, fire alarm panels and fire resistance to ensure early awareness of the fire by the staff but maintain a phased evacuation policy to minimise disruption to patrons. For Building C, the impact of a fire in the bar kitchen on the occupants in the lower ground floor spinning room and studio was assessed. Innovation Fire Engineering compared the proposed design with a code compliant inner room design and calculated the required time to escape for each design to show that the proposed design offered a higher level of safety than the code compliant design which is deemed to provide an acceptable level of safety to people in the event of fire.

By careful placing of detectors, automatic opening vent, fire curtain and fire resistance Innovation Fire Engineering enabled design freedom (open plan spiral staircase and arrangement of lower ground floor) and less disruption to the patrons of the hotel in the event of fire (phased evacuation policy).