Just a month after its official opening the new John Bentley School sixth form centre in Calne has been named the best new educational building in the west of England.

The £700,000 project was nominated by Wiltshire Council and beat off competition from all the other local authorities in the region, including a multi-million pound scheme in Bath, to win the Local Authority Building Control’s building excellence award.

The new centre, which has an open plan common room, study area, two computer rooms, kitchen and conference room, caters for the current 150 sixth form students, with a view to accommodating 190 students by 2013.

Post 16 director Mel Sutton said: “It is a fantastic building and the students love it. It has been something we have worked on with the governors and the students. We spent hours trying to make it perfect and it shows our investment in them.”

The building was partially designed by sixth form students, allowing them to get involved in all aspects of the planning, and the students could not wait to start using the facility last month.

Year 12 student Sally Chalker said: “It is a great new aspect to the school, especially for Post 16 students, but it also gives the younger students something to look up to and aim for.”

The nominations were judged on a variety of factors including cost, design and eco-features. The judges were impressed by the imput from students, who were on the panel that chose Bailey’s Partnership as the designers and contractors.

Philip Stuart-Harris of Bailey’s Partnership said: “This award is a credit to the hard work put in by the whole team.

“The school set a clear and consistent brief to Bailey’s Partnership as their designer, project and cost managers and worked very well with us to evolve the design, encouraging valuable early input from students.

“Local contractor Rigg Construction made a major contribution in delivering this excellent project to a high quality within the expected cost. All involved are rightly proud of this first-class Post 16 facility that can officially be called the best education project in the west.”

The award was presented by Alex Lovell from BBC Points West, and was received on behalf of the school by bursar John Lawrence. The project goes on to the finals in London later this year.