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CEO of the Year 

Mark Reynolds of Mace

There is no denying it has been a successful year for Mace chief Mark Reynolds. The firm’s consultant arm has continued to expand – recording a 36% jump in income to £500m last year. It has also continued to grow its overseas operations, with strong contributions from the European and Middle Eastern markets.

On top of this, in July Reynolds announced Mace planned to be a 10,000-strong business by 2026, seeking 2,500 new staff over the next three years. He said it expects to take on 1,000 people this year, numbers already up to 7,800 from 2022’s year-end figure of 7,300 and up 19% on the 6,652 employed in 2021.

Another focus for Mace under Reynolds’ leadership has been evolving the business culture. This included welcoming the most diverse group of undergraduates yet, in part due to its support of the 10,000 Black Interns programme. The year also saw a 21% rise in women working in Mace’s construction business.

Major project highlights this year included the completion of the much-lauded Battersea Power Station project – which has been recognised as one of the world’s most technically challenging schemes.

On top of this, Reynolds has been batting for the industry as a whole in his role as Construction Leadership Council co-chair. The CLC’s work this year has included launching a pilot project on a scheme developed by the contractors’ umbrella body ActuateUK to tackle project defects at source, research into the sector’s productivity, and a consultation on its biodiversity roadmap.

International Project of the Year

Winner: New Administration ºÚ¶´ÉçÇø, Mae Ramat

Entered by Bidwells

This project comprised the design and delivery of a new administration building in rural Mae Ramat, Thailand, alongside a lab fit-out on the ground floor of a local hospital, funded by the University of Oxford’s Nuffield Department of Medicine and by the Wellcome Trust.

The scheme was delivered for the Borderland Health Foundation, which focuses on malaria, tuberculosis, and maternal and child health.

The university led the supplier selection process, which saw Bidwells named as project manager. The client brief evolved over the course of the project. After the initial design was created, Bidwells was given the design, which was further developed by a Thai multidisciplinary architect to translate and deliver it.

As a result, the location of the development was moved from a town to a rural location on the outskirts, and the design was modified to make the most of the new location and create an optimal finished product.

Retrofit/Refurbishment Project of the Year

Quadrangle ºÚ¶´ÉçÇø, King’s College London

Entered by Hall McKnight

Hall McKnight’s project brings a building that occupies an unusual, constrained space back into use as a home for the university’s engineering department.

Situated within a grade I-listed site in The Strand conservation area, the building’s roof forms the quadrangle of the founding campus.

The undergraduate learning and teaching spaces are designed to encourage collaboration and interaction.

Employer of the Year

Stride Treglown

As part of its B Corp certification, Stride Treglown changed its articles of association in 2022 to set in stone its legal commitment to run the firm for the benefit of society, the environment and its members.

It has also launched GROW, an in-house programme creating opportunities for its teams to develop personally and professionally.

The firm offers staff technical training, workshops, coaching, study leave and online learning materials. Its recent Deaf Academy project in Exmouth is pictured.

Housebuilder of the Year

Berkeley Group

In the last year Berkeley Group has continued to focus on brownfield regeneration, reviving underused land to create unique, sustainable and nature-rich places where communities thrive. The firm has delivered 86% of its homes on brownfield land and built more than 4,600 mixed-tenure homes in the last year alone.

According to the Home Builders Federation, Berkeley had a net promoter score of 79.2+, against an industry average of 42. In addition, 97.5% of its customers would recommend the firm to a friend, compared with an industry average of 90%.

Current schemes include the 2,500-home White City Living (pictured), in west London.

Berkeley Group has 54 net biodiversity gain strategies in place, to deliver more than 550 acres of new or measurably improved habitat. In March of this year it co‑hosted the Biodiversity Net Gain Conference in partnership with Natural England and the Local Government Association, in order to share best practice.

The firm says 97.5% of its sites incorporate wetland features, with 52 acres of wetland habitat planned or completed. Its Royal Exchange development in Kingston achieved water neutrality in a trial completed with Thames Water, which involved retrofitting and upgrading 79 local businesses, homes and schools to save 45,00 litres of water.

This year Berkeley achieved its 2030 science-based targets for scope one and two emissions, having seen a 56% reduction compared with 2022 and a 76% reduction since its 2019 base year.

Berkeley has invested £560m in the communities in and around its sites in the past year, through affordable housing subsidies as well as wider community and infrastructure contributions.

The firm says 100% of its regeneration sites with residents have community plans in place, and it has actively engaged with the industry-wide Future Homes Hub and the Nature and Places Steering Group, as well as the Quality of Life Foundation.

The past year was also a breakthrough year for Berkeley’s social impact programmes. It scaled up partnerships and invested £3.9m into 50 charities supporting 13,000 disadvantaged people in local communities. Meanwhile, 59% of its employees contributed to the Berkeley Foundation in the past year.

Small Project of the Year

Grenfell Nursery

Entered by Perkins&Will

This is a new home for the Grenfell Early Years Nursery, a cornerstone of the Lancaster West Children’s Community Network in north Kensington.

Originally housed at the foot of Grenfell Tower, following the tragedy of 2017 it moved to temporary accommodation before having its new home developed.

Perkins&Will’s facility includes two main rooms on the ground floor and one on the first, providing flexible spaces and supporting opportunities for outdoor learning – fundamental to the nursery’s approach.

Net Zero Award

The Entopia ºÚ¶´ÉçÇø

Entered by ISG

When Cambridge’s Institute for Sustainability Leadership wanted a new HQ, it had to be a low-carbon  exemplar. This deep green refurbishment features 35% bio-based materials and reclaimed steel. Targeting BREEAM Outstanding, it has already met the EnerPhit standard with predicted operational energy use of 58kW/m²/yr; monitoring suggests actual use is 45kW/m²/yr. Upfront embodied carbon is 130kgCO2/m².

Contractor of the Year (up to £500m)

Britcon

Last year saw Britcon return to the black after a loss-making 2021 due to a volatile trading environment. A buoyant market with skills shortages also caused higher-than-normal employee churn. In response, it introduced a new senior management team focused on growing the business and introducing strategies to address key challenges and improve resilience.

Successfully returning the company to profit while retaining and attracting people from diverse backgrounds has been a cornerstone of the past 12 months.

Britcon has invested over £1m in people, technologies and partnerships to respond to industry challenges, including decarbonising its operations, improving health, safety and wellbeing, embracing digital technologies and implementing MMC and whole-life efficiencies. The positive impacts of these changes include the firm’s digital snagging process reducing defects by 26%.

Britcon has also expanded its operations geographically with work for ABP in East Anglia and a clean energy hub for Redcar and Cleveland council. 

ºÚ¶´ÉçÇø Awards 2023: ºÚ¶´ÉçÇø Magazine Project of the Year

Battersea Power Station Phase II

Entered by Mace

Bringing the mighty power station back to life after closure in 1983 has been one of Britain’s biggest and most challenging projects.

The four distinctive chimneys were demolished and carefully rebuilt to match the originals, with nearly 1.8 million bricks specially made.

The turbine halls have been reinvented as retail spaces, the old boiler house as offices and the switch houses as flats.

At the project’s peak there were 17 cranes and 3,000 workers on site.

Architectural Practice of the Year

HLM Architects

HLM has this year further strengthened its position as a leader in MMC and sustainable design. Through projects such as The Wave in Sheffield (pictured), NMIS in Glasgow, and Keele University’s Innovation Centre 7 in Staffordshire, it continues to drive innovation, seeking to improve the built environment.

The practice has led cutting-edge platform research to address key issues within the industry, including the skills and social housing shortage, and to promote adoption of MMC in key sectors such as healthcare and education.

It has also developed HLM_Impact, a digital post-occupancy evaluation tool to assess building users’ satisfaction.