The prestigious Garden House Hotel was acquired by London based Ability Group in 2007, subsequently internationally rebranded as a Hilton Doubletree Hotel and has since undergone significant internal refurbishments.

The proposals seek to extend the existing 122 bedroom hotel with a further 56 more letting bedrooms and to replace and enhance the provision of in-house leisure facilities.

The design brief for the extension has been challenging for a number of reasons. Not least of these being the hotel‟s unrivalled position on the immortalised banks of the river Cam between the Conservation Areas of Sheeps‟ Green and Coe Fen, set against a backcloth of fine medieval collegiate buildings and historic cityscape. Furthermore, the long narrow site lying north to South is already fully developed at its northern edge closest to the City‟s historic urban fringe.

The proposed new extension falls within a section of the site which protrudes prominently into natural Conservation Areas. This has inevitably influenced the architectural style of the scheme. In essence, the proposed new extension assumes a ziggurat form diminishing in height and scale as it projects away from the existing hotel building and interacts with sensitive areas of public open space beyond.