These are the latest images of how the next major school project taking shape in Cardiff will look. Cantonian High School, Riverbank School, and Woodlands School, would all be located in new buildings on one site in Fairwater.

Work on building the new schools has now officially started with a ground breaking ceremony attended by pupils. The £110m project is the largest in both scale and investment of Cardiff’s education developments.

It’s being funded by Cardiff Council and the Welsh Governments Band B Sustainable Communities for Learning Programme. The development will be Net Zero Carbon and all the three new build schools will be “highly energy efficient” and powered from renewable energy sources, said Cardiff Council. You can get more story updates straight to your inbox by subscribing to our newsletters here.

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Artist's impression of the new Fairwater education campus
The entrance to the new campus

The plans include

  • Replacing Cantonian High School buildings with new build accommodation on the same site expanding the school from six forms of entry (6FE) to eight forms of entry (8FE) with sixth form provision for up to 250 pupils.
  • Expanding the specialist resource base for children with an autism spectrum condition (ASC), hosted at Cantonian High to 30 places in purpose built accommodation in the new school buildings.
  • Relocating Woodlands High School to the Fairwater Campus from its current site adjacent to Trelai Park and increasing the size to 240 places in new build accommodation.
  • Relocating Riverbank School to the Fairwater Campus site from its current site adjacent to Trelai Park and increasing the size to 112 places in new build accommodation.
Artist's impression of the new Fairwater education campus in Cardiff
Cantonian High School, Riverbank School, and Woodlands School, would all be located in new buildings on one site in Fairwater.

The campus will also offer facilities which will be open and available for public use outside school hours. The aim is to complete the entire campus by autumn 2026 with work on the new build Cantonian High School complete earlier, by the end of 2025.

Pupils at the turf cutting as work starts on the new joint education campus in the Fairwater area of Cardiff The £110m project will include three new build schools for Cantonian High School, Riverbank School and Woodlands High School, all situated on a single site

The ground to start building was cut by First Minister Mark Drakeford, Cardiff Council leader, Cllr Huw Thomas and deputy leader Cllr Sarah Merry. They were joined by pupils and Cantonian’s head of school, Geraint Jones and Wayne Murphy, executive headteacher from the Western Learning Federation, of which Riverbank School and Woodlands High School are both a part.