A GROUP of award-winning students will be helping to design plans for a proposed new ice rink in Hampshire.

They have been recruited to work with the team putting together proposals for the rink in Winchester.

Students, Meg Alipat, Florence Japzon, and Mariya Joseph had previously been part of a team which took top prize in the Building the Future Shaping our Worlds competition for designing an environmentally friendly ice rink for Southampton while studying for their A levels at St Anne’s School and Peter Symmonds College.

Developers of the Winchester rink plan Aethos, saw an article in the Daily Echo about the students award winning design, and were so impressed that they decided to bring them on board.

All three said that working with the developers had been a great experience so far and they looked forward to becoming more involved with the project

Florence Japzon,19, from Lordshill, who is now studying architecture at the University for Creative Arts in Canterbury, praised the developers reaching out to young talent, she said: “We need the younger generation to be a part of what is going to be built because we are going to use it, and will be the future leaders.”

Mechanical engineering student Meg Alipat added: “The country can only move forward if we build for the future. The new ice rink will help the community by creating jobs and bringing more people to the area.”

The proposed £20 million private scheme would see an Olympic sized ice arena, and curling rink built at the old depot site at Bar End in Winchester.

Proposals suggest the facility would also include a ten-pin bowling alley and indoor caving.

However, Winchester City Council have stated that although they are open to proposals such as the ice rink the Bar End site was not currently for sale.

Ice skating advocate Edna Boden, who has championed the Winchester scheme, said that Aethos planned to hold meetings with Winchester City Council, and Winchester MP Steve Brine in the next month to try to move the project forward.

She said: “It will be a very good development for the city. that will bring jobs and give people a new place to go, and since it’s private it won’t cost the council a penny. We would like to work with the city council to bring the project to fruition as soon as possible.”