Our covered walkways can be designed to blend into the surroundings and existing style of the buildings. They can also bring architectural flare and a great design ethic that can enhance the aesthetic of a building while also offering a practical solution.

Practical and inspired design of covered walkways

Current choices in materials and technological developments in synthetic fabrics and associated topcoatings has allowed a rapid growth in the covered walkways market. Using flexible materials means flexible designs. Covered walkways can be both practical but also innovatively designed.

Rapid technological development in materials has vastly improved material performance. This has improved strength and flexibility and also improved life expectancy of the material. A well maintained fabric canopy can last for years. Our tensile fabric canopies have a live expectancy of 10 to 30+ years.

You can see in the materials section of our website that we offer a huge range of material choice. Each material will have specific benefits which gives flexibility to meet the requirements of any brief.

Three examples of covered walkways

Our website is packed with projects we have successfully delivered. Here are just a few of our covered walkways to give you some inspiration.  Whatever your job, need or brief we can work with you to deliver the right solution

Canolfan Addysg y Bont

This co-educational day special school specialises in the care and education of students between the ages of 3 and 19 who are diagnosed as having severe learning difficulties.

As part of an £8.5m construction project, we were selected as the preferred supplier for fabric structure to provide covered walkways around the school’s high-traffic areas.

The design of the 34m long curved fabric structure walkway is unusual, with double canopies forming a “gull-wing” which provides as much cover as possible, while keeping the concrete foundations to a minimum. The 3m high clearance on the underside of the canopies allows school buses and cars to get close to the main entrance, providing their passengers with full wet-weather shelter.

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Southampton City Cruise

Over £9 million was invested in refurbishing the UK’s number 1 cruise port, enabling the terminal to accommodate some of the largest cruise vessels afloat. Part of the refurbishment included a 320m2 curved fabric structure providing an all-weather walkway for travellers moving between terminal buildings.

The design for this bespoke six-peaked conic tensile fabric structure was complicated by a 46m curved walkway. Patterning the fabric for a structure to imitate the curve exactly was an engineering challenge and one that Fabric Architecture relished. The 40m x 8m curved fabric structure was installed as a single fabric unit requiring a unique triple crane lift to hoist it onto its bespoke steel framework.

To ensure the space is dry, the structure over sails and under sails connecting buildings and a fabric rain gutter was installed around the perimeter of the canopy. The result is functional and beautiful.

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Bulwell Academy

The Bulwell Academy consists of a series of buildings interlinked with eight of the UK’s largest Inverse Conic tensile fabric structures. These structures cover a courtyard creating a ‘town square’ also used by the community. As part of the school’s sustainability strategy, the Inverse Conics are designed to harvest rainwater.

The challenge was to design a series of tensile fabric structures that would completely cover the school’s courtyard, allowing staff and students to move freely between buildings all under all-weather protection.

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About Fabric Architecture

We are a dedicated and creative team of in-house experts. We have been delivering tensile fabric structures for 40 years. We pride ourselves on building strong relationships with architects, contractors and decision-makers based on honesty and experience.

​We focus on excellence – creating tensile fabric structures that are innovative and of superior quality, and that benefit from the latest technologies and manufacturing techniques.

​Working with Fabric Architecture

We transform original concepts into buildable, sustainable and memorable tensile fabric solutions. Supporting our clients through this creation journey, we use our significant knowledge of tensile fabrics and the engineering behind them to realise the full potential of every design.

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