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Jane Priestman (1930-)

The brains behind Stansted and the Eurostar terminal

Jane Priestman can justifiably claim a big hand in two of the most iconic buildings of the past 20 years - Lord Foster's Stansted Airport and Sir Nicholas Grimshaw's Eurostar terminal at Waterloo Station.

Priestman first made her name as design manager at British Airports Authority between 1975 and 1986 when the company was undergoing breakneck expansion in the run-up to privatisation. She worked on the refurbishment of Heathrow's terminals 1, 2 and 3 and the construction of Terminal 4. But the most significant project that she was involved during her time at BAA was Stansted. Priestman was instrumental in appointing Foster, who broke new ground in airport design worldwide.

Priestman left BAA to oversee design at British Rail, where she selected Grimshaw to design the Eurostar terminal. Since leaving BR in 1991, Priestman has run her own design consultancy.

Hall of Fame judge Spencer de Grey says: "During her distinguished career Jane has brought good design to the widest possible audience and proved that good design pays."

In her own words: "Everything was up for grabs [at BAA]. There had never been anybody who had managed their design portfolio before."

Three key dates:

1975 Appointed design manager at BAA
1986 Joined British Rail
1991 Awarded OBE

Jane Priestman appointed Lord Foster to design Stansted Airport

Ian Macpherson (1944-)

Pioneer of construction management

Ian Macpherson shocked the industry in 1989 by quitting his comfortable job as a board director at Bovis to start his own business dedicated to construction management.

Macpherson had just finished his first construction management project, London's much-admired Broadgate. He says working on the scheme changed him forever. "The energy released by the construction management system was just awesome, so I decided I wanted to commit the rest of my time in the industry to this way of working," he says.

With this in mind he started the success story that is Mace. The firm started with just eight people, but when Macpherson left 10 years later it employed 600.

Macpherson ran the business with what he calls a "socialist" approach, allowing subcontractors to directly contract with the client and get involved in the design process. "It encourages the trade contractors to come up with ideas and sit at the table. Before they were always stuck out on site being told what to do," says Macpherson. He says the process results in better buildings and saves time and money.

Hall of Fame judge Anne Minogue says Macpherson "was a key player in the early days of construction management; he recognised the need to professionalise the building management process as opposed to just the design process".

Macpherson's seminal socialist act came at Bovis when he took over the Liverpool Teaching Hospital project. For some 15 years the scheme had been bogged down in industrial disputes, including a fight over the canteen, used by 2500 labourers and plagued by rats. Macpherson's first act on site was to bulldoze the hated facility.

In his own words: "Construction management is about releasing the knowledge and energy in the industry, treating people as equals not just subcontractors and encouraging people to be open and honest."

Three key dates:

1989 Completed work on Broadgate
1990 Founded Mace
2001 Sells Mace to management

Nicholas Serota (1946-)

The man who revamped the Tate

If there was a contest for the most visited museum of modern art in the world - there would be some clear frontrunners: the Pompidou Centre in Paris, which attracts an impressive 3.5 million visitors a year and New York's Museum of Modern Art which was visited by a million between November 2004 and March 2005. But neither of these can touch the UK's own contender, Tate Modern, which is now drawing in 4 million visitors a year. Not bad for a converted power station.

The man responsible for this turnaround is Nicholas Serota who oversaw the transformation of Sir Giles Gilbert Scott's derelict Bankside Power Station on London's South Bank into one of the hottest galleries in the world.

Serota took over the position of director of the Tate in 1987. He immediately began to focus on expansion: the Liverpool Tate opened in 1988 and the St Ives Tate followed in 1993. In 1995, the Tate received £52m from the National Lottery to convert Bankside. Serota made up the remainder from private donations.

Hall of Fame judge Ann Minogue says: "Without Nick, the Tate wouldn't be what, or where, it is today."

In his own words: "Art should be transgressive. Life is not all sweet."

Three key dates:

1973 Director of Museum of Modern Art, Oxford
1987 Director of the Tate
2001 Tate Modern

The iconic Tate Modern on London’s South Bank was commissioned by Nicholas Serota

George Brumwell (1939-2005)

The man who saved UCATT from collapse

In the early years of his 35-year career as a union official, George Brumwell was called to the scene of the death of a steel erector, and to a bridge collapse which had killed four people. These were pivotal moments that forged his commitment to union organisation.

In 1991 George was elected general secretary of UCATT, an organisation on the verge of collapse. But over 13 years, Brumwell successfully transformed it into the UK's 10th largest union. When he retired from the union in October 2004, UCATT was operating with a healthy financial surplus and saw a massive expansion in memberships.

The construction industry was left reeling after Brumwell's unexpected and untimely death last November - he will be sorely missed, not least for his larger-than-life persona. Hall of Fame chairman Graham Watts remembers how his friend used to have a habit of bursting his own bubble. The unionist was known to be a bit of a namedropper and on one occasion told Watts about the time he had met Breshnev at a trade union delegation in Russia. However, after a few drinks, meeting Breshnev had turned into catching a glimpse of the top of his head in a crowd. "Typical of George to give himself away in the end," says Watts.

"He had to be one of the 40," he adds. "We all felt it was very important to have someone who represented the masses of construction workers and George just stood out."

In his own words: "Construction relies on the efforts of working people and in return building workers deserve to be valued and treated with dignity. Partnership cannot be reduced to profits and the bottom line."

Three key dates:

1980-82 Leader of Doncaster council
1991 Elected general secretary of UCATT
2004 Elected chairman of the Construction Skills Certification Scheme

Paul Morrell (1948-)

Design-conscious quantity surveyor

It was Paul Morrell's long-held ambition to be a quantity surveyor - apparently he told his contractor father that he wanted to be one when he was eight - and he grew up to become one of the most enlightened around. As a profession, the QS is often seen as looking to scale down ambitious designs in order to keep within tight budgets. But Morrell wants to help build great buildings, and that's exactly what he did as senior partner of Davis Langdon & Everest, the world's largest QS, between 1998 and 2003. For example, he ensured that the firm costed Herzog & de Meuron's Tate Modern without compromising the integrity of the design. The admiration that architects afford him is shown by the comments of Ken Shutleworth, then a director at Foster and Partners, at the time of Morrell's appointment as senior partner: "Paul is brilliant. He's more than just a QS - he's part of the design team, and comments on things beyond his discipline."

He was rewarded by being appointed a commissioner for architecture watchdog Cabe, and as president of the British Council for Offices he concentrated on providing clients with the business case for good design.

As head of Davis Langdon & Everest, he oversaw the practice's reorganisation into an international network just months after becoming senior partner, and successfully completed several mergers over the following years.

In his own words: "We had to upgrade the quality of factories in the 1960s. Now we have to upgrade the factories of the 21st century, and these are offices."

Three key dates:

1998 Appointed senior partner of Davis Langdon & Everest
2001 Completion of the Tate Modern
2001 Became a Cabe commissioner

Paul Morrell (1948-)

Design-conscious quantity surveyor

It was Paul Morrell's long-held ambition to be a quantity surveyor - apparently he told his contractor father that he wanted to be one when he was eight - and he grew up to become one of the most enlightened around. As a profession, the QS is often seen as looking to scale down ambitious designs in order to keep within tight budgets. But Morrell wants to help build great buildings, and that's exactly what he did as senior partner of Davis Langdon & Everest, the world's largest QS, between 1998 and 2003. For example, he ensured that the firm costed Herzog & de Meuron's Tate Modern without compromising the integrity of the design. The admiration that architects afford him is shown by the comments of Ken Shutleworth, then a director at Foster and Partners, at the time of Morrell's appointment as senior partner: "Paul is brilliant. He's more than just a QS - he's part of the design team, and comments on things beyond his discipline."

He was rewarded by being appointed a commissioner for architecture watchdog Cabe, and as president of the British Council for Offices he concentrated on providing clients with the business case for good design.

As head of Davis Langdon & Everest, he oversaw the practice's reorganisation into an international network just months after becoming senior partner, and successfully completed several mergers over the following years.

In his own words: "We had to upgrade the quality of factories in the 1960s. Now we have to upgrade the factories of the 21st century, and these are offices."

Three key dates:

1998 Appointed senior partner of Davis Langdon & Everest
2001 Completion of the Tate Modern
2001 Became a Cabe commissioner

Sir Peter Hall (1932-)

The UK's most famous planner

An awesome force for good in the planning profession." That was how Vincent Goodstadt, former president of the Royal Town Planning Institute, described Sir Peter Hall when presenting him with the RTPI Gold Medal three years ago. It is a view that few would dispute, particularly the government ministers who have sought his counsel over the past two decades.

Hall was special adviser on strategic planning to the Conservative government in the early 1990s, taking special responsibility for the Thames Gateway, then called the East Thames Corridor, and the Channel Tunnel Rail Link. Soon after Labour came to power in 1997, Hall found himself influencing policy again. He was a key member of Lord Rogers' Urban Task Force, which published the landmark report on urban regeneration, Towards an Urban Renaissance.

Hall has influenced generations of planners, both as a professor of planning at the Bartlett since the early 1990s and by writing and editing nearly 40 books, including his critique of 20th century planning, Cities of Tomorrow.

Kelvin MacDonald, the RTPI's director of policy and research, says: "Many of the key national policies and projects in planning at the moment have been shaped by Sir Peter's incisive thinking - from the Thames Gateway to the thinking behind the urban renaissance."

In his own words: "The built forms of cities should, as generally they now do not, come from the hands of their own citizens."

Three key dates:

1988 Cities of Tomorrow
1998 Urban Task Force
2003 RTPI Gold Medal

Sir Peter Hall has been one of the main voices demanding that the Thames Gateway, Europe’s largest brownfield site be regenerated

Peter Rees (1948-)

The man who revived London's skyline

Peter Rees became the planning officer for the City of London in 1987. Since then, he has been responsible for freeing up the planning system in the City and changing its skyline.

Rees is a firm believer in creating space by constructing skyscrapers. He has been criticised over some of the buildings he has supported, including Foster and Partners' controversial Swiss Re building. But the planning officer has always backed up his support for tall buildings, reiterating that such proposals are necessary for the future well-being of the City as a financial centre.

Rees believes that without skyscrapers there is a real fear that companies may take their business to other financial centres, such as New York, Hong Kong or Tokyo. That said, Rees argues for buildings that are not necessarily New York tall, just London tall. "The skyline is not going to become Manhattan over the next five years," he once said.

Hall of Fame judge Peter Murray says: "It is not just the massive impact Peter has had on the City of London over the past 20 years but the impact he will have over the next 10. He has been instrumental in the form we see London taking on today."

In his own words: "We need to concentrate offices together. The alternative is to live in caves."

Three key dates:

1987 Became planning officer for the City of London
1989 Founder member and director of the British Council for Offices
1997-2000 Guided Swiss Re tower to planning approval

Peter Rees has been responsible for the radical redrawing of the City of London’s skyline over the past two decades