The Wilkins Roof Garden Marquee To Close

UCL to close Wilkins Roof Garden Marquee in second term and will put nothing in its place.

Pi Media reported on Twitter on the October 6 that in “term 2 the Wilkins Garden Roof Marquee will be permanently closed with no replacement given.”

The Wilkins Marquee was erected, in the Japanese Garden, as a transitional space to compensate for the closure of buildings for the “Transform UCL” construction project taking place on the Bloomsbury campus.

It was thought that The Marquee could have acted as a “new student social Hub”.

Many societies use the Wilkins Marquee for meetings and UCLU uses it sometimes to host events such as part of the Freshers’ Fair this year. The Marquee is particularly important to Arts societies, who use if for rehearsal space.

Spaces for the Arts societies are scarce due to the prolonged closure of the Bloomsbury Theatre for construction work. The closure of the Wilkins Marquee will mean that there is even less space for the societies to rehearse in.

The Wilkins Marquee will not be replaced, instead the Japanese Garden will be transformed into a “new outside space that will compliment [the newly developed] Wilkins Terrace.”

This will eventually form part of the new route through campus which will connect to the “New Student Centre”, located between 26 Gordon Street and the Bloomsbury Theatre.

All the societies who used the Wilkins Marquee will have to book new rooms for their meetings and rehearsals in the second term.

There are fears that this will put an even greater strain on the already faltering UCL room-booking system.