Leading construction and fit-out company, Gilbert-Ash has underlined its commitment to its supply chain by organising a Meet the Buyer event where sub-contractors can learn how to build lasting partnerships with the award-winning company. The event, which is open to both new and existing suppliers, will take place on Wednesday
LEADING housebuilder Lovell has furthered its commitment to support left behind people and communities across the West Midlands by working with Standing Tall – a charity that gives power to people experiencing homelessness by providing employment opportunities. The charity, which was established to help people move away from the streets for good, is currently
ADDING to a brimming trophy cabinet, specialist retrofit decarbonisation turnkey provider Sustainable Building Services (SBS) has been named Retrofit Contractor of the Year by The Retrofit Academy. The expertise and collaborative approach of SBS’s team has been recognised with the retrofit decarbonisation sector’s most acclaimed national accolade. The Retrofit Contractor
Toni Wikberg, MBA has been appointed as Business Development Director at Nuuka Solutions. In the selection, we valued Toni’s long experience in building technology, building automation and facility management services. Toni has previously worked in international management and business development roles at CBRE, Honeywell, Trend and ISS. Toni will be
Baxi will be supplying its 100% hydrogen boilers for the H100 Fife Project, a world-first hydrogen-to-homes demonstration delivered through a partnership between gas distribution company SGN and Fife Council in cooperation with industry regulator Ofgem. Baxi attended an event hosted by SGN on 8 March to mark the beginning of
The architects behind Bearsden’s new Allander Leisure Centre, which opened its doors yesterday, are hailing the facility as a potential future flagship for community-led, combined leisure and adult day care projects. The £42.5m facility – designed by architects Holmes Miller for East Dunbartonshire Council – replaces the original Allander sports
Liverpool City Council has given the go-ahead to Peel L&P’s plans to develop a Central Park. The proposals include a new public park and essential infrastructure to enable the delivery of approximately 2350 homes. Located within the Central Docks neighbourhood at Liverpool Waters, just south of Collingwood Dock by the
Manchester City Council has announced next steps for the once in a generation transformation of Collyhurst Village. This comes as the joint venture between Manchester City Council and Far East Consortium has now appointed a masterplanning team for future phases of development. Collyhurst is one of the first areas to
Leading construction and fit-out company, Gilbert-Ash has underlined its commitment to its supply chain by organising a Meet the Buyer event where sub-contractors can learn how to build lasting partnerships with the award-winning company. The event, which is open to both new and existing suppliers, will take place on Wednesday March 22 at the Royal College of Pathologists in Alie Street, London. The location is well-known to Gilbert-Ash as they constructed the multi-award winning new seven-storey headquarters in 2019. Against a challenging backdrop for the construction industry, the Gilbert-Ash team, including Managing Director Ray Hutchinson OBE, will update on plans for 2023, including policy issues and provide insights into upcoming workload. In the afternoon there will be an opportunity for Gilbert-Ash to introduce themselves to new supply chain partners and share valuable insights into the qualities they seek from suppliers. The event will also provide an opportunity for the company to outline its strategy to reach net zero by 2040 as well as revealing what will be expected of supply chain partners to help meet this target. Gilbert-Ash Managing Director Ray Hutchinson said: “The construction industry has been dealt a number of challenges over the last few years. “We are working in a landscape where the project delivery time and cost given two years ago to the client must now contend with unforeseen fluctuations in price and longer lead in times brought on by Brexit. “It is a challenging environment, but engagement and collaboration with suppliers throughout all stages of our projects has mitigated the impact of the market. “The last two years has seen significant growth for Gilbert-Ash. We want to build on this momentum and bring supply chain in early on plans for the future so we can work as one every step of the way. “The Meet the Buyer event will provide an opportunity to update new and existing partners on exciting plans for the future including our net zero strategy and how they will decarbonize their operations. Gilbert-Ash has committed to engaging with 80% of its suppliers within the next 48 months on net zero, increasing to 100% by 2030. By 2040, the company aims for its supply chain to also be committed to implementing net zero strategies. The award-winning company has already implemented a number of sustainable practices, including the introduction of its Green Fleet Policy in 2021 to reduce carbon emissions and established an Environmental Sustainability Team. Looking ahead to 2023, Gilbert-Ash will align with the Science Based Targets initiative and introduce a Green Electric Policy at all of its sites and at its headquarters. Also in 2023, all Gilbert-Ash projects will have eco cabins installed while supplier and sub-contractor carbon footprints will be vetted. Existing supply chain members can reserve a spot here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/gilbert-ash-meet-the-buyer-event-tickets-547712000337 New supply chain members can reserve a spot here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/meet-the-buyer-event-tickets-560431855767 Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
LEADING housebuilder Lovell has furthered its commitment to support left behind people and communities across the West Midlands by working with Standing Tall – a charity that gives power to people experiencing homelessness by providing employment opportunities. The charity, which was established to help people move away from the streets for good, is currently operating in London, Manchester and Birmingham. Individuals undertake a three-month trial with an employer, which is paid for by Standing Tall, with the potential to complete valuable training and be offered a full-time position at the end. In addition to this, Lovell will also finance Construction Skills Certificate Scheme cards for those on the scheme, which are a necessary qualification to work on UK construction sites. Stuart Penn, regional managing director at Lovell’s Midlands office, said: “The work Standing Tall does is as commendable as it is important, and has helped many people impacted by homelessness to move away from the streets and into real living wage jobs – changing their lives in the process. The people they help don’t just receive a handout, they’re given the chance to find a better place in society where they can use their skills and learn new ones to find long term employment. “We’re immensely proud to be working with Standing Tall and doing our bit to support its work in our region. We hope that by supporting Standing Tall, we can reach those who may otherwise not have the chance to learn a trade as well as encouraging different skills and a diverse range of people into the construction industry. We’re looking forward to sharing the great success stories that come from working together.” Christy Acton, founder and CEO of Standing tall said: “There’s a certain stigma around people experiencing homelessness, and a public perception that gets in the way of individuals realising their hidden potential. Our work is about breaking this stigma, discovering and bringing out the skills needed to improve their situations. “With Lovell’s support, we’ll be able to continue this mission and help more people in Birmingham and the surrounding areas. The experience gained from working on a Lovell site will be invaluable to the future of those supported by the scheme. “As long as homelessness continues, our work will be ongoing, and we’re delighted to have the backing of a responsible business such as Lovell that shares our values.” To learn more about the work Standing Tall does, visit the website here: https://www.standingtall.org.uk/ To learn more about Lovell, visit here: https://www.lovell.co.uk Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
ADDING to a brimming trophy cabinet, specialist retrofit decarbonisation turnkey provider Sustainable Building Services (SBS) has been named Retrofit Contractor of the Year by The Retrofit Academy. The expertise and collaborative approach of SBS’s team has been recognised with the retrofit decarbonisation sector’s most acclaimed national accolade. The Retrofit Contractor of the Year award endorses excellence, meeting PAS 2035 principles, consistent delivery of high-quality resident engagement, innovation, high-quality whole house retrofit projects, and providing career pathways within the retrofit sector. Derek Horrocks, owner and chairman at Sustainable Building Services, said: “This award goes to show that expertise and compliance will always succeed. Being named Retrofit Contractor of the Year ahead of multiple, large-scale Tier 1 contractors is down to our demonstrable understanding of the how and why the different aspects of a decarbonisation project must fit together. “Fundamental to this is providing the highest level of PAS compliance, which is required for delivering works under specific funding regimes but each principle is deployed on each and every scheme we work on. “As leaders in this field, we’re often breaking new ground and leading the way in housing decarbonisation through innovation and experience. Our team is committed to providing high quality support and expertise, on all the projects we work on, taking a bespoke approach to every home to ensure there are no disappointments with the results.” SBS holds a wealth of specialist experience in delivering housing decarbonisation work and is one of a small number of contractors that have delivered projects at scale under the Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund (SHDF) Demonstrator and Wave 1, the Local Authority Delivery (LAD) and the Home Upgrade Grant (HUG). It provides full ‘turnkey’ large-scale retrofit services to social housing providers and owner-occupiers, upgrading the energy efficiency of thousands of homes every year – delivered to PAS2035:2019 compliance standards. The prestigious national win follows swiftly from EEM’s Building Communities Awards, at which SBS won both ‘Carbon Reduction Project of the Year’ and ‘Refurbishment Project of the Year’. EEM’s award submission was a joint entry with Rykneld Homes for the expansive work being delivered on more than 400 homes for North East Derbyshire District Council. With funding from the Local Authority Delivery Fund, SBS was appointed by Rykneld as principal contractors on a two-year, £12m multi-phase, multi-measure retrofit decarbonisation scheme. This work has led to a £23m Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund Wave 2 application. Derek said: “All three awards from both EEM and the Retrofit Academy are greatly valued as recognitions of our ongoing work. We consider them to represent a benchmark we shall continually strive for moving forward and are excited to build upon this success into the future.” The Building Communities Awards are highly esteemed within the industry and is entered by leading property and construction organisations every year, vying for a win. SBS and Rykneld Homes was also named runner up for the ‘Collaborative Working Award’. To discover more about Sustainable Building Service’s mission to decarbonise the UK’s housing stock, visit its website at: www.sustainablebuildinguk.com Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Toni Wikberg, MBA has been appointed as Business Development Director at Nuuka Solutions. In the selection, we valued Toni’s long experience in building technology, building automation and facility management services. Toni has previously worked in international management and business development roles at CBRE, Honeywell, Trend and ISS. Toni will be responsible for the development of the partner channel in accordance with the company’s new strategy. The new strategy is based on providing energy savings to building owners with AI optimization applications, in cooperation with Nuuka’s new partner network. The company’s previous business development director Olli Parkkonen is taking on new challenges in a new position outside the company. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Baxi will be supplying its 100% hydrogen boilers for the H100 Fife Project, a world-first hydrogen-to-homes demonstration delivered through a partnership between gas distribution company SGN and Fife Council in cooperation with industry regulator Ofgem. Baxi attended an event hosted by SGN on 8 March to mark the beginning of construction of the H100 Fife hydrogen homes demonstration facility. Due to open to the public this summer, the new facility will comprise two hydrogen show homes where visitors will be able to try out domestic hydrogen appliances, including Baxi’s 100% pure hydrogen boilers. The H100 Fife project enables households in the Buckhaven and Denbeath areas of historic Methil on the south Fife coast, to opt-in to be supplied with hydrogen through a new network which is due to go live in 2024. The scheme has already signed up over 300 householders who want to be part of the first 100% green hydrogen-to-homes zero carbon network anywhere in the world. Their participation will provide important behavioural and social evidence critical to help the UK decarbonise home heating. Green hydrogen will be supplied via the dedicated ORE Catapult 7MW wind turbine connected to an on-site electrolyser and storage facility. Modelling shows the turbine could provide the energy to produce enough hydrogen for up to 900 homes a year. The H100 Fife Project is the latest in a line of hydrogen projects to benefit from Baxi’s involvement, with the leading heating specialist having already supplied its full hydrogen and 20% blend compatible boilers to residential projects such as HyDeploy, Hy4Heat, HyStreet, Northern Gas Network’s 100% Hydrogen Home near Gateshead. In the commercial heating space, Baxi also recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with H2GO Power to deliver the world-first commercial hydrogen boiler and demonstrate the technology’s potential to decarbonise multiple industries. Karen Boswell, managing director of Baxi UK and Ireland, said: “We are thrilled to be providing our 100% hydrogen boilers to another innovative, world-first demonstration project. It’s great to see the support for this project from the local community and hands-on involvement from Fife council and other important stakeholders in the area. With such projects, we can help the public, Government and wider heating industry to better understand the potential of hydrogen to provide safe and low-carbon heating in the future, alongside other options available today such as heat pumps, hybrid systems and heat networks.” For more information, visit www.baxi.co.uk/about-us/the-future-of-heat Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
The architects behind Bearsden’s new Allander Leisure Centre, which opened its doors yesterday, are hailing the facility as a potential future flagship for community-led, combined leisure and adult day care projects. The £42.5m facility – designed by architects Holmes Miller for East Dunbartonshire Council – replaces the original Allander sports complex, built in 1978. It also now accommodates support services for adults with learning disabilities, previously offered at the Kelvinbank Resource Centre in Kirkintilloch. The new centre features an 8-lane swimming pool, sauna and steam room, hydrotherapy pool, gym, spin room, an 8-court games hall, two squash courts and a café, while also offering dementia, rebound, sensory and physiotherapy treatment rooms, training kitchens and arts and crafts, dance and music rooms. A second phase of the project includes a new ‘sports dome’ with two football pitches and a tennis court, which is expected to be completed this autumn. The new building was designed after a thorough 12-month consultation, involving community workshops and extensive dialogue with users of both facilities, to ensure local people had the chance to shape their building. The focal point of the centre’s interior is a naturally-lit, timber-clad triple height entrance atrium that serves as a flexible events space for the community, and also houses a café. To reflect changing trends in sport and recreation, multi-purpose spaces have been designed in throughout, giving the flexibility to meet changing levels of demand throughout the year while catering for local sports club requirements. Ian Cooney, Project Director at Holmes Miller said: “As the design of health and wellbeing facilities adapts and evolves to ensure local authorities can provide good value for their communities, Allander is a leading project and representative of this new trend. “When we were asked to bring leisure and adult day care facilities together into one inclusive community hub, we saw this as a chance to break down barriers and make a real difference to the lives of many different groups of users.” Nada Shehab, Project Architect at Holmes Miller added: “We wanted to create a distinctive and timeless design that is welcoming, open, and of civic architectural quality – with a calm and simply designed internal environment. By collaborating closely with East Dunbartonshire Council and our partners, at the new Allander Leisure Centre we have delivered facilities that we hope will give local people an exceptional quality of experience and improve lives, both now and in the future.” Councillor Gordan Low, Leader of East Dunbartonshire Council, added: “The new leisure centre gives people the chance to have fun, get fit and improve their health – both physically and mentally. I’m pleased the project also includes services and facilities for adults with learning disabilities. This is a great facility which will benefit people across East Dunbartonshire.” The project is being delivered as part of the Scape- Major Works UK Framework. The project team also includes McLaughlin & Harvey (main contractor), Harley Haddow, Davie & McCulloch, Barton Willmore and Brown & Wallace. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Liverpool City Council has given the go-ahead to Peel L&P’s plans to develop a Central Park. The proposals include a new public park and essential infrastructure to enable the delivery of approximately 2350 homes. Located within the Central Docks neighbourhood at Liverpool Waters, just south of Collingwood Dock by the historic Tobacco Warehouse, Central Park will become one of the city’s largest green spaces, spanning 1.9 hectares, and will form an important part of the next stage of the Liverpool Waters development. The approved plans also include the creation of a network of public spaces in the Central Docks neighbourhood, with green streets and rain gardens; the delivery of high-quality public realm; and new street infrastructure, such as high-quality footpaths and a variety of street types to support vehicles, pedestrians and cyclists. Hundreds of trees will also be planted across the Central Docks neighbourhood. The development of this 11ha site will enable and accelerate the delivery of around 2,350 homes over the next 10 years, in line with the Liverpool Waters Central Docks Neighbourhood Masterplan. This planning application and the development it will enable demonstrates the scale of ambition for Liverpool Waters and the transformative impact it will have on this historic brownfield site. Coastal and woodland planting, wetland planting, community gardens and open parkland will all help to create a unique, world class environment at Central Park, celebrating the site’s post-industrial heritage and its coastal locality. The park will also include shelters and canopies, areas for sport, recreation and fitness, and spaces designed to support local wildlife. Connectivity for pedestrians and cyclists between the city centre, Princes Dock, Everton’s new stadium at Bramley Moore Dock, and the city’s northern docks will also be significantly improved as part of this development. Central Docks will become the largest of the five planned neighbourhoods in Liverpool Waters and will directly enable the delivery of thousands of new homes, alongside commercial, retail, leisure and community developments over the next ten years. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Manchester City Council has announced next steps for the once in a generation transformation of Collyhurst Village. This comes as the joint venture between Manchester City Council and Far East Consortium has now appointed a masterplanning team for future phases of development. Collyhurst is one of the first areas to be developed as part of the major Victoria North regeneration programme being delivered by the joint venture, which will see 15,000 new homes built across seven new and emerging neighbourhoods in north Manchester over the next two decades. With site works having begun to deliver 274 new low carbon homes – including 130 homes for social rent – alongside a new community park and commercial space, the JV is turning its attention to delivering the longer-term vision for both neighbourhoods. Outlined in an update to the Collyhurst regeneration plan, the JV intends to work with a masterplanning team to develop a street-by-street plan that builds on the vision set out in the 2019 Strategic Regeneration Framework (SRF) for Victoria North. The masterplanning team includes Mæ (lead architect), Turner.Works (meanwhile use), Schulze+Grassov (landscape and public realm) and IF_DO (community engagement). The team is expected to work with existing local residents to shape the design of potential new homes, streets and parks, with a programme of public engagement due to begin in the coming months. This will include a range of interactive events and activities, which will be inclusive and accessible to all members of the community. The community engagement programme is likely to involve workshops and consultation events to gather the views of local residents and get their feedback, a series of community design sessions involving residents, exhibitions and online engagement. Initial modelling undertaken as part of the Strategic Regeneration Framework (SRF) for Victoria North indicates the potential for up to 3,000 new homes The 2019 SRF for Victoria North sets out the potential for up to 3,000 new homes – with a key focus on affordability – to be built in Collyhurst through a process of long-term and phased estate remodelling. Future housing investment would be delivered alongside new local services and amenities, public realm and transport infrastructure, including investment in active travel. Any future development would build on meaningful community engagement and consultation to ensure local people remain at the heart of the investment proposals. The joint venture will also retain its commitment to support current residents to remain in Collyhurst – as a single move to a newly built property – so they can benefit from the investment in the area. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
