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Morgan Sindall to upgrade ‘finest recording venue in the world’
Cristina Lago Deputy Editor
CGI of the revamped Watford Colosseum (Image: Morgan Sindall)
Morgan Sindall has begun a comprehensive refurbishment project at Watford Colosseum to preserve, modernise and upgrade the historic live entertainment venue.
Works include creating a new stage and lighting rigs to enable a wider range of acts to perform, and reopening the original grand entrance, which has been closed for over a decade.
Morgan Sindall will improve the accessibility, lighting and signage of the venue to bring the pre-war site up to modern standards. It will also install an external ventilation duct and roof plant, and refurbish the existing canopy to the front of the building.
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To make the Colosseum more energy efficient, the contractor will install modern insulation materials, upgrade the mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems, and add photovoltaic panels to the roof.
Once complete, Morgan Sindall said that Watford Borough Council – which appointed the contractor for the job – could save 40% on gas bills due to new cavity wall insulation. When combined with replacing all lights with LED equivalents and installing new roof insulation, this will deliver a 166t annual saving in carbon emissions.
The refurbishment will also deliver U-value improvements, with the rate of energy loss from the walls reduced by a factor of six, and from the flat roofs by a factor of 17.
‘The finest recording venue in the world’
Built in 1938, Watford Colosseum is a Grade II-listed building renowned worldwide for its exceptional acoustics. Described by conductor and broadcaster Julian Lloyd Webber as “the finest recording venue in the world”, it is home to the BBC Concert Orchestra and has been used to record multiple famous film soundtracks.
The Colosseum project follows Morgan Sindall’s ongoing refurbishment of the adjoining, also Grade II-listed, Watford Town Hall. The combined £20m project is part of the town’s plans to achieve net zero by 2030.
The works at the Colosseum and Watford’s Town Hall area have been funded in part by the government’s Levelling Up Fund, which awarded the project £16m.
The Colosseum refurbishment is scheduled for completion in autumn 2024.
The January/February 2026 issue of Construction Management magazine is now available to read in digital format.
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