IT WAS a real challenge design four new buildings for the Great Western Designer Outlet Village.

And it mirrored real life in that a planning application for the four buildings has been made to Swindon Council.

This is the third year the contest, sponsored by the outlet village, has been run.

Martin Turnbull, manager of the Swindon Town Study Centre, which helped organise the event, said: The schools received a project pack and the children were asked to come up with exciting innovative designs for modern buildings to contrast with the existing Victorian buildings .

The winning school was St Joseph's RC Comprehensive which has entered twice before without success. Second was Wootton Bassett and third Corsham.

The judges felt the winning design was excellent and best matched the brief. In addition St Joseph's worked well as a project design team, which is what it was all about, said Mr Turnbull.

The team was Kevin Foxworthy, Anna Upton, Laura Mc Ateer and Fiona Harrington, all 14.

Judges were Martin Nash, project manager for the developers Carillion, Andrew Reed from architects Eric Cole and Partners and Richard Rawlings, deputy manager at the outlet village.