Opened in August 2012, M&S Cheshire Oaks is our multiple award winning, biggest greenest store. It’s designed to be the most carbon efficient, premier M&S store to date with an architectural and design strategy that addresses several areas of sustainability at once. Just click on any of the following areas to find out more about: water, energy, waste, biodiversity, community and materials.

It’s the second biggest M&S store in the world, and the biggest we’ve ever built from scratch, with over 148,000 sq ft of selling space over two floors – that’s the size of nearly 11 Olympic-sized swimming pools! The store features the very best and most extensive range of M&S products, giving customers thousands of shopping options, as well as a large Food Hall and two M&S Cafés, with seating for around 430 customers. It’s also created over 350 new jobs and included placements for Marks & Start, which provided employment opportunities for disadvantaged groups. 

We’ve considered the environment through every aspect of the store design and build. But what makes M&S Cheshire Oaks so green?

• 1st retail store to have a 100% FSC-certified glulam roof. Glulam is a type of engineered softwood timber, it’s as strong as steel or concrete but requires only a fraction of the carbon to produce!
• 1st store to use hemp and lime external wall panels which have excellent insulation properties resulting in the store losing less than 1°C  of heat overnight compared to 9°C in other store environments.
• 42% more energy efficient and 40% fewer carbon emissions than an equivalent store. 
• 80,000 litre rainwater harvesting tank which supplies a third of the store’s water.
• Achieved BREEAM ‘excellent’ rating – the leading and most widely-used environmental assessment method.
• Climate change resilient features, including a re-landscaped swale, sustainable urban drainage system (SUDS), mature trees, a green wall, white reflective roof, rainwater harvesting, displacement ventilation, Hemclad® external wall panels and earth bunding around the store.
• A net increase in biodiversity on the site, with 88 plant species such as white willow and wild cherry
• As a first for M&S, we engaged customers in and around the store by producing informative signing relating to each major area of sustainability that the store design addresses. On each sign, customers are able to scan a QR code that will take them to a site to receive more information about that specific area.
• Feedback from Cheshire Oaks customers and employees using the ‘Building Users Survey Methodology Survey’ (BUS) methodology placed the store within the top 1% of all buildings for “design” and “image to visitors”, top 5% for user satisfaction and top 7% for improved employee productivity against BUS 2011 benchmark of 66 other buildings.
• If you’re visiting M&S Cheshire Oaks, print out this tour guide to learn more about the store’s groundbreaking sustainability features.
• Cheshire Oaks is an industry leading sustainable development and to date has won 14 awards including: (Guardian Sustainable Business TBC).

If you would like to receive an email alert when we post our latest blogs, click here.