UCL East Campus: One Pool Street — Attraction in London

There has been a lot of debate about this accommodation, mainly because it was rushed in 2022/2023 which caused multiple problems in heating, water temperature, laundry, and other minor issues to students for that academic year. Being one of these students, I felt I should describe my experience: Heating and water temperature (1/5): the building is designed on sustainability principles, which don’t give you full control over how warm your room would be, not to mention the consistent distributions because it’s still a new building. The accommodation team have been trying to fix them, yet it’s not totally solved but it got better since I moved in. The view and the area (5/5): honestly living in a park was a unique experience- you can see the pictures. Also the area is 10 minutes walk from the tube station (Stratford station). A TfL bus usually comes in front of the building so you can take it easily and go where you want if needed. You have a close Westfield under your fingertips, so you can find whatever you want. I can say that One Pool Street was intentionally built in a strategic location. Laundry (2/5): it‘s relatively small, only 8 washers/dryers per tower. Some of them break and need time to get fixed. Room and flat size (3.5/5): there are 9 en-suits in a flat. This could be a large number but the kitchen is ridiculously big so it makes difference- see the pictures. The room itself is tiny, sometimes I had a difficulty in moving. Quality (4/5): kitchen tools were new and state-of-the-art, there is a big TV screen too connected to Wifi. Sometimes things malfunctioned because they are still new and were still being calibrated, but clearly quality was put in mind when this building was constructed. Note: I noticed that students’ experience differed because they lived on different floors and different towers. Some floors had more issues than others. Disclaimer: I lived and studied in the same building, so I didn’t have...

Unfortunately, I cannot recommend this place, despite its appealing exterior. The rooms are very small (especially in Tower 1), and the luxury of having a 'private' bathroom does not necessarily compensate for that. The heating system also has its flaws: it's centrally regulated, meaning your room could be extremely cold or extremely warm, with no way to adjust it manually. You need a magnetic card (similar to the ones used in hotels) to access every space of the building, including your room, which can be troublesome at times - especially when going from the kitchen to your room, since you constantly have to remember to carry the key with you. The same key is also used to open the multiple security doors present at every level and in every space, making the space feel overly secure at times to the point where the extra security becomes more of an annoyance than a benefit. Clearly, the designers of the building and its policies did not consider the user's perspective. From a user/student perspective, it may feel that this won't be a place you could call a 'second home,' primarily because of the extreme security and the hierarchical distance between the personnel and the occupants of the building. Last but not least, as someone mentioned in another review: the security is so strict that you can't literally bring anyone from the outside in or have any guests. Despite this being possible (by signing up for guests to stay overnight for a maximum of 7 nights per month), the process is made so complicated, with many caveats, that it almost feels like that's a no-go. Essentially, my suggestion is to opt for this place only if you're in extreme need of a place to stay or you value the location as a significant selling point.

Edit: All these details and information were not revealed to me prior to arriving here, that's why I'm warning potential...

I am honestly astounded at how poorly managed this place is. I will leave a longer review when I have time but as I have just moved out, I wanted to give you an idea of the chaos of this accommodation by talking about the moving out process. We had to move out at 10am the day after most dissertations were due. An email was sent out saying we could leave things we wanted to donate in the kitchen, but apparently it “didn’t apply to our accommodation” even though this was not mentioned anywhere in the email. As a result, every floor ended up leaving things in the kitchen, and everyone—staff and students included—was stressed out, with people having to throw things onto carts and stuff themselves into the lifts to get everything out, even with a few hours extended to our card access. The lift broke, boxes were scattered all over the place, and most people just gave up and left, accepting any fine they were charged just to be done with the place. This place has a terrible combination of very strict rules and complete mismanagement. PLEASE do not stay here!!!!!!!

On a side note, the cleaning staff are wonderful people—frankly they are the only good thing about living here. I have only had pleasant and helpful conversations with cleaning staff and am so sorry to...