Century Construction Group has continued to invest in it's businesses which is why we are excited to announce that we have re-located to new offices in Tonbridge.
Our new home, Wharf House, was acquired by the group in 2021. We have spent the last few months carrying out an extensive internal refurbishment to create a facility with sufficient space and technology to take the business well into the future. We have also incorporated a superb cafeteria area for Century team members to relax away from their desks, and this area will also provide a sociable meeting space for clients and supply chain partners, when perhaps the formal surroundings of a meeting room are not necessary!
Wharf House sits alongside the River Medway in a beautiful setting and boasts ample parking underneath the building. Our new postal address is detailed on the press release shown above.
Century Facades is delighted to have been appointed by Greystar to carry out the re-cladding of two sixteen storey student accommodation blocks in Kings Cross. With planning approval granted, works can now commence. The Century team will be led by senior PM, Nigel Richards. Century will undertake the project in the capacity of principal contractor. Century was delighted to add this £8m contract to it's growing portfolio of recladding projects.
As part of our commitment to nurture a new generation of talent, we have recruited two exceptional graduates to the team.
Matthew Hedgergrace and Noah Bickle are honing new skills and benefiting from our more than 200 years’ experience in high specification building façade projects as they work across key areas of the business.
Noah, who achieved a distinction in BSc Design and Construction Management at the University of Greenwich, is assistant site manager on Chapter Kings Cross, one of our new recladding projects.
“Century has provided the perfect place to kickstart my career in construction - an SME that is growing rapidly and investing heavily in its team promising fast career development and strong salary growth,” he says.
“The role is very dynamic and challenging; there’s no chance of me getting bored.”
Meanwhile, after securing a Bachelor of Engineering with First Class Honours in Civil Engineering, Matthew is working as assistant site manager on our Greenford project where he is managing the logistics on site. He has already spent time in our scheduling department, logistics centre as well as on our successful College Road project in Croydon - the site of the world’s tallest modular building.
“I am enjoying being exposed to a variety of roles and interacting with professionals from all disciplines within the industry. This has allowed me to develop abroad knowledge for someone with my level of experience. What I enjoy most is being at the forefront of a new and innovative accelerated development scheme in a rapidly developing company and the valuable experiences and opportunities that come with this. I’m also grateful for the close relationships I’ve made with the directors and senior managers and the amount of support and attention I get from them, which is especially rare in larger companies,” says Matthew.
We have also recruited three of the best A-level students from the local area. James Dunn, Danni Taylor and James Woodthorpe are due to start part time degrees in quantity surveying within the next two years as part of our training programme.
“There is a huge skills shortage in the UK construction industry, so it’s imperative that we continue to invest in the future of the sector by putting strategies and programmes in place that help recruit, engage and retain the very best talent. We’ve been blown away by the quality of our latest recruits and look forward to supporting them in their future careers,” says Graham Hackley, Director of Century Construction Group.
We are delighted to announce our sponsorship of professional triathlete, Lydia Dant, as she prepares to qualify for the Ironman World Championships this year. The 30-year-old from Cheltenham made her professional debut in 2021, just three years after taking up the sport.
“I am incredibly grateful and humbled by the support from Century Facades. This sponsorship has opened doors and allowed me to consider opportunities that would have never been possible at this stage in my athletic journey,” says Lydia. The support from Century Facades has allowed Lydia to invest in racing and vital equipment.
“Starting off a professional career is hard. I’m confident in my ability but just knowing I have this backing will help me go into a race with a totally different feeling. This really does make a difference and I know that being able to race this way will probably lead to a better outcome as a result,” she says.
Working with Passion Fit, a triathlon coaching community, Lydia is committed to a process that aims to continue to unlock her potential. She typically trains for 15 to 25 hours a week and has maintained her training programme throughout the pandemic which has seen an uplift in her performance levels.
“Like many others, the pandemic changed my perspective and during this time I made the life-changing decision to leave my corporate job and launch my own bike fitting and cycling consultancy business called Phoenix Evolution.
“One of my key reasons for wanting to race as a professional athlete is to use the platform to inspire others with my journey. The better I can race, the bigger platform I can create to do this. I am really excited to have the support from Century Facades heading into 2022.”
Tim Lovell, Joint Managing Director of Century Facades, says: “We are delighted to support Lydia as she embarks on her professional career. We were inspired by her commitment to excellence and continual improvement - both qualities that we employ in our work at Century Facades. We wish her the very best in her events this year and in qualifying for the World Championships.”
Our sister company, Innovate Facades Ltd, is carrying out a £5m re-cladding contract at Bermondsey Square, working in the capacity of principal contractor direct for the client. Our site team can be seen here, Mubeen, Luke and Sergejs doing a fantastic job!
Century Facades entered a team for the annual Dragon Boat Race held last month at Bewl Water in Kent. The team, named the Centurions, did a fantastic job raising in excess of £2,500 for World in need International. Great work guys!
Century Construction Group invests in the future of façade engineering
As the skills shortage continues to impact the construction industry, we are delighted to welcome the latest cohort of graduates to our popular placement programme. Three of the best-performing students from the University of Bath’s MSc Modern Building Design have been selected to kickstart their careers at the UK’s leading façade engineering and building façade contractors.
The six-month programme will see the graduates work alongside experienced engineers, develop state-of-the-art solutions and learn best practices that can be applied across the industry. They will also have the opportunity to build a compelling portfolio of work and develop their skills via ongoing mentoring to help them thrive in the workplace.
The students will combine their placement with a dissertation related to the use of Total Quality Management and Building Information Modelling in all phases of construction.
Jeremy Choy has joined the Pre-Contract department to assist the bid manager with 3Dmodelling, access package and tender package preparation. Sravya Devireddi is working with the Quality Assurance team, while Mubeen Zafar is experiencing all aspects of the company’s Logistics and Operations process.
“Investing in future talent is critical to addressing the sector’s skills gap, while driving standards and innovation. Our placement programme is designed to create independent and adaptable learners, who have the freedom to stretch and challenge themselves in an open and supportive environment,” says Graham Hackley, Director of Century Construction Group.
“Guided by some of the most experienced specialist engineers in the UK, graduates on our placement programme grow both their skills and confidence, while making areal contribution to the dynamic field of façade engineering.”
Two years after the last fishing trip, four Century team members away for a long weekend in Riba-roja d'Ebre, southern Spain!
L to R: Graham, Christian, Craig and Fowad.
Façade and building envelope specialist Century Facades Limited is nearing completion on the world’s tallest modular student building.
Part of the ongoing regeneration of Lewisham and the wider Lewisham Gateway development, Lewisham Exchange provides 758 student rooms and 67 affordable homes over two towers of 35 and 20 storeys. The buildings are connected at lower levels to provide retail and commercial space, amenity areas and an entrance to the future Bakerloo line extension. Designed by architects JTP, the development is constructed from volumetric 3D structural modules, which were manufactured offsite to ensure a higher quality finish, a faster construction programme and 90 per cent less waste than traditional construction methods.
As a key supply chain partner to principal contractor Tide Construction and a specialist in high rise building facades, Century Facades was appointed to fit high performance window screens at Tide’s associate company Vision Modular Systems’ industry-leading modular factory in Bedford, as well as design, procure and install a complex architectural building envelope at Lewisham Exchange.
The architects specified natural brick finish for the building envelope to ensure the towers remained in keeping with the local architecture. Century Facades was tasked with identifying a suitable lightweight brick slip that lost none of the architectural intent, while offering all the benefits of a lightweight, non-combustible and fully-tested cladding system.
The building envelope specialist also delivered2,000sq m of aluminium systemised cassette rainscreen featuring a striking bronze finish to complement the architectural brick, in addition to some fine examples of glass rainscreen to the crown of the buildings and brick slip arches at the ground and first floor levels.
Tim Lovell, Joint Managing Director of CenturyFacades, said: “We are proud to have successfully delivered the building envelope for this innovative development in less than a year. Our client's expect the very best, and Lewisham Exchange is another example of where our commitment to innovation has resulted in the delivery of a very quick building envelope of the highest quality, providing a welcome addition to Lewisham’s town centre and one of the largest regeneration schemes in the South East.”
In recognition of 'freedom day', some of the guys decided to celebrate with a boat trip up the River Medway. A lovely time was had by all!
The Century team is absolutely delighted having secured a £21m façade contract for a new co-living scheme in College Road, Croydon. Following the success of George Street, Croydon (pictured on the left hand side in the CGi image), works have already commenced on site next door in College Road. George Street, at 44 storeys, achieved the status of being the worlds tallest modular building, however, this record will be exceeded by the College Road scheme at a staggering 49 storeys. Like George Street, the new co-living scheme in College Road will have a beautiful terracotta façade.
Great progress being made at our Lewisham Exchange project, Mechslip brick cladding installation from double stacked mast climbers. As always, fantastic work being carried out by all Century team members working together achieving an excellent end result!
We are delighted to announce having achieved accreditation under the FIRAS certification scheme for the installation of cavity barrier products. This was achieved through the diligent work carried out by our QA and operations teams.
We are delighted to have secured another phase of work at the Greenford Quay. The development, situated beside the Grand Union Canal, will include residential, communal and commercial areas. Century's £4m contract includes windows, doors, curtain walling plus architectural cladding elements. Century's work is due to commence on site early summer.
Good progress is being made at our Lewisham Exchange project - two high rise residential blocks centrally located in Lewisham town centre. Working from double stacked mast climbers, installing Mechslip brick cladding system, windows, doors, curtain walling and pressed metalwork. Great work being undertaken by the Century team!
We were delighted to see our Spitalfields project featured as part of an article in Fire Magazine on the new draft Building Safety Bill released last year. On the Spitalfields project, we were contracted to remove the existing ACM cladding and replace with solid aluminium panels, fabricated at our in-house fabrication facility based in Hitchin, Hertfordshire. Tenants were able to remain in occupation during the works, with the building remaining fully operational.
A few months following completion of works to the tower, our Sister company, Innovate Facades Ltd, (which has been set up specifically to work in the capacity of principal contractor), also worked on the same building, but direct for the end user client, re-cladding the podium level.
Century has launched a Graduate Training Programme across all disciplines. This represents an amazing opportunity for individuals to join a truly dynamic company.
November 2020 saw the Century team complete on a fast track student accommodation project known as The Valentine. This new student hub, perfectly located in Gants Hill, affords easy access into central London. Century installed aluminium windows, doors and curtain walling, plus all architectural feature metalwork. The Century team were presented with numerous challenges this year resulting from Covid-19, but overcame them all to deliver a high quality product, to programme. Century was delighted to work with Tide Construction again on another modular project.
Great work by the Century team over the past few month's continuing to build during the difficulties presented by Covid-19
We were pleased to see that following a period of closure due to the Covid-19 crisis, work has now re-started at Great Eastern Quays.
Main contractor, Vistry Partnerships, has introduced strict new health & safety rules to ensure safe working on site. See here our project Manager, Raja Youchaa, instructing the Century installation team on the new rules for observing strict social distancing on site.
The Century team were pleased to secure the contract for a new student block in Gants Hill. The 321 bed purpose built block is located centrally in Gants Hill, just 30m from the underground station. Demolition of the existing Valentine public house was completed last month, allowing construction to get underway in March. Century's £2.5m contract includes aluminium windows, doors, curtain walling, and an extensive feature metalwork package.
The Lewisham Exchange scheme consists of two high rise blocks of 35 and 20 storeys, linked at lower levels to provide retail and commercial space, as well as amenity areas. The lower level will also provide an entrance point for the new Bakerloo line extension. The residential part of the scheme will provide both student and affordable housing. The form of construction is modular.
Century's £16.5m contract includes windows, curtain walling, doors, brick slip clad facades, aluminium rainscreen, and associated feature metalwork. Work is due to get under way on site later this year.
To all clients, suppliers, and associate companies
Following guidance provided by the Government and Public Health England, Century Facades Ltd has put measures in place to minimise the risk of the potential spread of the COVID-19 virus.
The health, safety and wellbeing of all those involved with Century’s day-to-day business is our No.1 priority. Indeed, some of the Century team are now working remotely, and interact on a daily basis with colleagues and clients via video links. This is working extremely well and is allowing Century to operate as effectively as possible in these very difficult times. We are tremendously grateful and proud of our supply chain, all of whom have risen to the challenges presented by this COVID-19 outbreak, and continue to fully support us.
Thank you.
We have taken steps to limit non-essential travel, however, we remain committed to providing our clients with the best possible service, and our site teams are doing an amazing job in maintaining productivity at good levels, whilst keeping everyone safe. Great job guys!
It goes without saying that everyone in the UK and around the world is of course hoping that we can return to normal as quickly as possible. However, during this period of uncertainty, should you have any concerns or questions regarding Century, please do not hesitate to contact our head office in Tonbridge on 01732-317030.
Thankyou
Senior Management Team
Century Facades Ltd
The directors of Innovate Facades Group Ltd have formed a sister company to Century Facades Ltd, a new division set up specifically to carry out specialist refurbishment projects. The new business, Innovate Facades Ltd, will target work in the London region. Innovate Facades Ltd was delighted to secure it's first contract working direct for the client, Greystar International, to re-clad the podium level at Spitalfields Tower. Sister company Century Facades originally carried out the re-cladding of the main tower in 2018. The £1.1m podium contract will commence on site in February 2020, with Innovate Facades Ltd acting in the role of principal contractor.
Century working on multiple blocks at Great Eastern Quay for Vistry Partnerships (formerly Galliford Try Partnerships).
The wraps are almost off at South Thames College in Wandsworth, revealing the brick clad building in all it's glory. A stunning development, with the main façade design based on Corium brick slip cladding
Chair of judges, Century's very own Graham Hackley, seen here presenting awards to the winners of the 2019 Society of Façade Engineering Projects of the Year. Another great success, with a number of informative and imaginative presentations during the day by industry leading figures, followed by the awards ceremony, and of course the Glass Supper. This year's event was held on 10th December 2019 at London's Guildhall, a stunning setting exuding history.
Our George Street Croydon project looking absolutely stunning, fantastic work by the Century Team, and a happy client!
Another high quality finish by the Century team on the Greenford Quay project, large scale residential development working with Tide Construction.
Century Senior Project Manager John O'Kane and QA Manager Zhanna Nazarenko, present a QA award for outstanding workmanship to two worthy winners.
Century team members Denise, Raja, Christian and Graham went off to Elphicks Fisheries just outside Tonbridge last weekend for a spot of fishing!
But who caught the biggest fish?.........…...….......you decide!
Greenford Quay, Century working with Tide Construction for developer Greystar. When all phases are complete, the development will provide nearly 2,000 new homes.
Century project Albion Wharf Ipswich is nearing completion, and stands as testament to the brilliant team lead by our Luke and Raja in delivering a high quality façade installation.
101 George Street Croydon, modular units up to floor 24, terracotta cladding chasing up the building!
Rich green high glaze large format terracotta, looking beautiful. Stunning architecture.
Some of the Century crew out for a beer (or three) helping our Craig Scott celebrate his 21st birthday!
Bollo Lane completed project, terracotta cladding, curtain walling and windows.
The Century team of Jack, Mike, Kaman and Bikash are delivering a fantastic project for our client, United Living.
£9m Corium brick slip package, looking absolutely stunning!
The Century family continues to grow with two new additions to the team:
Daniele Marques - Site Manager
Hugh Ross - Senior Designer
We wish them every success in their new roles at Century!
Our Albion Wharf Ipswich project has been superbly executed by the Century team - well done Luke, Raja and all involved. The waterfront development of 150 apartments, overlooking the River Orwell, once complete will include one of the tallest towers in the Ipswich area, standing at 19 storeys.
Our Croydon project is progressing well, see photograph showing modular units being installed. Next update will show cladding following up the building!
Century extends a really warm welcome to new team members in April 2019, all of whom are joining our Croydon project.
John O'Kane - Senior Project Manager
Steve Faulkner - Stores Manager
Sam Shoebridge - Assistant Stores Manager
Above photograph shows the lift cores towering above the Croydon Skyline
With spring in the air, we welcome new recruits joining the growing team at Century!
Amy Stevens - Accounts Assistant
Zhanna Nazarenko - Design Engineer
The Century family continues to grow, watch this space for a further announcement next month!!
Century was delighted to see Mapleton Crescent win the Architects Journal award in February 2019 in the category off-site fabrication.
Century installed aluminium windows off-site into modular units, and then continued on-site with cladding the structure with large format
green glazed terracotta cladding. The judges were particularly taken with the fact that normally, volumetric buildings are easy to spot,
but admitted that this was not the case with Mapleton Crescent!
Due to continued expansion, an opportunity for a Senior Façade Designer has arisen in our busy design department. Full job description shown above.
If you think you could meet the challenge, please send your CV and details of salary expectations to sales@centuryfacades.co.uk
Great work by Luke, Raja and the team at our £5.6m Albion Wharf project, scaffold strike underway, job looking fantastic, happy client!
Century start 2019 with the announcement of three new members to the team:
The Century team extends a warm welcome to Helder, Akshat, and Kiyomi Denise, and wishes them every success in their new roles.
Project image shown: work in progress at Bollo Lane, Chiswick
This year's chair of judges was Century director, Graham Hackley, seen here on stage at the Roundhouse in Camden, a stunning venue for the 2018 Glass Supper held on 6th December.
Century is delighted to announce two new appointments to the team;
Jack McCormack - Contracts Manager
Daryl Bowd - Supply Chain Buyer
Full details of Century management and team structure can be provided on request.
The Century team were delighted to secure their biggest ever contract, a £20m façade package for a new high-rise residential development in Central Croydon.
The scheme located close to East Croydon Station, consists of two joined towers of 38 and 44 storey’s. The method of construction is modular (off-site) with this scheme being the tallest of its kind throughout Europe.
This joint development by Greystar Properties and Tide will house 546 apartments, social areas, retail and commercial space, plus café and art gallery.
The main façade design includes a stunning green unique designed terracotta cladding, GRC, curtain walling, windows, doors, glazed balustrades and feature metalwork. Century has commenced the design phase, and plan to start on site early 2019.
Some of the Century team along with other contractors attended an ILM (Institute of leadership & management) course hosted by United Living, with whom we are currently working at South Thames College.
Century's Holloway Road project is nearing completion, absolutely first class installation of Corium brick slips!
Century Facades is fully committed to training at all levels throughout the business. Here are some of our guys on site undergoing a manual handling course.
Century Facades has been appointed by Tide Construction to carry out the contract to design, supply and install aluminium curtain walling, feature metal work, and balustrades. With the project being based on volumetric construction, Century has also supplied and installed aluminium windows to modular units off site. Window installation is already underway, site works are due to commence early 2019. Century's contract value is £3.7m
Century Facades hosted a team get together and summer party in August at High Rocks in Tunbridge Wells, set in the beautiful Kent countryside alongside a local railway line, complete with visiting steam trains on the hour! Everyone had a fantastic day, wonderful setting, good company, great humour, and truly a day to remember!
Century's co-owner Graham Hackley has been given the honour of Chairman of Facade 2018, the latest iteration of the SFE's international competition designed to reward and promote excellence in the key discipline of facade design, engineering and application.
The competition is created, managed and judged by some of the world’s leading exponents of façade engineering including Graham. The FAÇADE competition is increasingly regarded as a serious and highly desirable accolade. This years competition will be held at the highly prestigious and exclusive Glass Supper and an audience of some of the World’s leading architects and building engineers. For this year the event takes place on Thursday 6th December at The Roundhouse, Chalk Farm, Camden, London.
We were pleased to gain a new client in the shape of Galliford Try Partnerships, securing a £2.2m contract for phase two at Great Eastern Quays, Royal Docks in East London.
The scheme for end user client Notting Hill Housing Partnership, consists of several low level residential blocks with a total of 468 new homes.
Century has been appointed to carry out the complete design, supply and installation of the bespoke architectural metalwork package. Century has commenced the design phase, and plan to start on site autumn 2018.
Wharf House
Medway Wharf Road
Tonbridge
Kent TN9 1RE