THE £200m buildings that will form the centrepieces of a new city centre quarter are unveiled by Oxford University today.

A landmark humanities building with an underground library and a five-storey Mathematical Institute will be the main structures on the former Radcliffe Infirmary site, in one of the biggest development projects seen in the city for a century. The Radcliffe Observatory Quarter, as the ten-acre site has been named, will feature courtyards and gardens alongside a striking high glass and copper pavilion, which will be the symbolic centre of the site, providing “a 24-hour beacon for learning”.

The plans go on show today and tomorrow at an exhibition in St Luke’s Chapel, one of the listed buildings on the site.

They are revealed just ten days after the university acquired planning permission for the first phase of the scheme, involving new buildings at Somerville College and the refurbishment and removal of some former hospital buildings.

A planning application will be submitted to Oxford City Council by the end of this month, four weeks after Oxford Brookes University’s £150m scheme in Headington was controversially rejected by city councillors.

Oxford University says the buildings will bring together faculties scattered around the city, to provide cutting-edge research and teaching facilities. The new maths institute, costing £70m and designed by Rafael Viñoly, will consist of two blocks, linked by a two-storey glazed structure housing the main entrance. The institute will be the main workplace for more than 500 academics and support staff and 1,000 undergraduates and will provide more than 300 offices.

There will be teaching areas below ground along with a car park for about 65 of the 100 vehicles permitted on the site. The university said its objective had been to create “a wow building” that fitted in with its historic setting.

The £90m humanities building, designed by Bennetts Associates, will consist of five floors above two floors of library and teaching space.

It will house the university’s english, history and theology departments. The slope between Walton Street and Woodstock Road means the underground library and teaching spaces will be entered at a lower ground floor level from a new square.

A library lantern building has been conceived “as a pure geometric object” in sharp contrast to the simple faculty facades.

Rising two storeys above ground level with a copper sheet roof, it provides the library and gardens with a striking pavilion at its centre.

The shape of the lantern also allows views of the Radcliffe Observatory from the library.

Prof Anthony Monaco, chairman of the ROQ Board, said: “These two projects are at the heart of our academic mission on this site.

“They offer state-of-the-art research, teaching and study space, while offering new avenues through the site, exciting courtyards, gardens and squares, all with views of the Radcliffe Observatory.”

The university said that one of the key aims was to create high quality spaces, open to the public, with a new pathway for walkers and cyclist between Woodstock Road and Walton Street.

It says the new quarter would feature a sequence of major and minor streets, public squares and formal courtyards and an informal garden, reflecting the way “Oxford’s historic core” is traditionally experienced.

The university is hoping building work could begin by the end of 2010 and be completed by 2013.

The cost of the second phase of the Radcliffe Observatory Quarter will take up about a third of the £600m earmarked for the redevelopment of the whole site.

Funding will come from capital funding generated by the Oxford University Press and from the university’s Oxford Thinking fundraising campaign launched in 2008 with a minimum target of £1.25bn.

The architects say the new buildings will maximize the use of natural ventilation and include ground source heat pumps.

The new library will bring together up to 15 separate faculty libraries and collections.

The landscaping will include a Radcliffe Observatory Garden bordered by the observatory and the humanities and mathematics buildings.

Rab Bennett, director of Bennett Associates, said: “The intention behind this scheme is to extend the spirit of historic Oxford, with quadrangle, gardens, glimpses and vistas.”