Rmaysing Design and Build Ltd.

Current Projects

Grange Park Opera House. 

August 23 to now.

On this site we are adding two floors to the this section of flat roof. 

 The main risks on the site are working at height. The existing flat roof is 7 meters of the floor and when we get to the top of the roof we will be about 17 meters off the ground. One of the other site issues we have is keeping the water out of the existing buidling whilst we add the new steel onto the existing ones. This meant opening up areas in the building to connect the steels and devising a way of keeping out the water. We acheived this by making upstands with ply tops and torching roofing felt onto them and down onto the roof. 

There is also a season for opera, which starts in the middle of April and runs through to the end of July. So we need to try to coordinate the works on site with rehearsals and performances in the opera house. 

The second phase of the steelwork happened just after Xmas 23. As soon as it was complete we started to build the roof. 

By the end of January 90% of the roof had been cut and boarded. 

One of the unusual aspects of this job is the client likes me to take regular photos of progress on site and also to make video updates such as this one. These get sent out then to the patreons of the Opera house so they can see what is going on.

Although this was not officially a design and build project because of the lack of detail in areas that is what it turned into. 

So for example with the external cladding there was no detail regarding ventilation or how the windows were protected. 

What I would do was draw a detail and send it off to the architect and building inspector for thier comments and or approval and then we would build to that detail.

While we were working on site there was also a 3 month program of opera rehearsals and performances. This meant that we had to work "quietly" at certain times and adjust our work times so as not to clash with the start time of the opera. This also required careful planning to avoid our telehandler moving around when memebers of the production company where one site. At the beginning of the season we sat down with them all and went thought a kind of induction of how to behave around the telehandler, using the thumbs up rule etc. 

For example the client wanted to add additional windows to one elevation. This needed to be done with some thought because there was cross bracing in the steels which would interfer with the windows. Also a staircase cut through one of the windows so that was omited. 

The client also wanted a different overhang from what was on the existing building. So we needed a design that would work with the external cladding and not look out of place. 

This work is ongoing and I expect it to be complete around the end of September beginning of October 2024.

Ibis Limited. 

22nd of August 2022 until August 2023.

This is an existing building where the developer wishes to add another 4 stories on top. 

There were two previous main contractors before we came to site. There was no form of handover from them down to us. Therefore we had to do a lot of investigation work first to prove that the word previously done was correct before we could start to build upwards.

You will see from the pictures below that we had very little space to work with. The crane took up all of this. Logistics on this site are tough and I had to manage them very carefully so as not to run out of space. 

In the steel model below the darker steels are ones that have already been fitted ready for the new (lighter coloured) steels to be fitted on top. 

In the images below you will see where they have started to demolish the top floor of the building and take off the roof ready for the new steel work to go up. 

The job is made more complicated but the fact that the previous two contractors went bust. So we are also engaged in finding out if they have completed everything that was meant to have been done such as underpinning. 

So we are in the process of digging trial pits to see what has been completed. 

Feb 2022 until . 19th of August 2022

This is a project comprising 24 social housing flats for A2D. 

There are two blocks. One with 16 units the other with 8.

They are currently at final stages on the 8 units with tiling, decorating and kitchens being fitted. 

All of the units have Nilan low energy heating units installed. 

This means that each unit had to get an air test value of 1.0 or under to work at its optimum. So paying attention to details was very important as making good mistakes later would be very expensive.

This is a site where 4 new 5 and 6 bedroom houses were to be built. The houses were built to a high spec with super fast fibre internet, control 4 access and lighting, ensuites for 4 of the bedrooms with a shared bathroom on the top floor with dressing rooms for the principle bedrooms. 

My role in this project.

• There were the normal site duties such as site inductions, health and safety awareness and enforcement.
• Programming of the works.
• Procurment of materials and creating Purchase orders.
• Reporting regularly to the client/developer. 
• This was to a large extent a design and build project so some part of my role was highlighting misssing elements in the drawings. Offering a solution and getting it approved via liaison with the architect and structural engineer, 

All of the surface water from the site was stored in a permiable road and then let into the local water course in a controlled manner via a hydrobrake. So there were some extensive civils to do on this job. Because it was in an isolated area we also had to fit calor gas tanks, upgrade the BT to fibre, upgrade the electricity to 3 phase and install a private pumping station for potable water. 

Much of this project including the civils ended up being design and build. 

Each unit had its own Klargester Bioefficient 3 septic tank which then ran into the local water course.. 

If you want to see the finished product click here.

In the heart of the Oxfordshire country side this is a 9 bedroom single dwelling over 5 floors. As you can imagine is has all the features you would expect in a £35million build including (but unusally) an outside pool.

The style of the house is quite classical inside and out. The exterior is all stone work with a slate roof and the interior carries that classical feel with it. There are stone floors internally with lots of traditional joinery details. 

Because the build programme was very tight they planned to build the internal skin of the external walls first with a temporary roof on top. By doing this they could progress the internals whilst the external stonework and the roof followed after.

Campbell Court Princeton Estates.

Campbell Court in Kensington is a 1950's building that has not had much done on it for many years. After adding a new penthouse on the top floor the current owners decided it was time to spruce up t he building.  Its are large building with 70 flats over 8 floors with around 700 crittal windows and some curtain walling. 

Work to be done on the building included structural and cosmetic repairs to the stone and brickwork. 

All of the balconies were covered wiith asbestos promenade tiles which had to be  removed and disposed of by licsenced contractors. Then the surface underneath had to be prepared and waterproofed.

Then all of the 700 or so crittal windows had to be removed and replaced with modern aluminium double glazed windows in a similar style. 

Chertsey High School is sited about 5 minutes walk from where I live. The main contractor was Kier and I was working on behalf of a company called Rochfords Construction Ltd. Here is a link to thier website: https://www.rochfordltd.uk/

Part of my work was to monitor work and record how much was done over a period of time and report this back to headoffice.

I also had to record additional works such as this path being formed and report these back to the office with a client variation instruction signed by the main contractor. With these I used to load all of the details onto a OneDrive file that was shared with the head office contracts manager and QS for the job. These could then view all of the details as they wished without having to ask me unless they needed more information. 

Recording of details that would be covered over was an important part of my job so we could prove recommended product installation practice had been carried out. This was then added to company quality check lists that recorded what checks had been made and other details like the number of test cubes taken, time of the pour and weather conditions at the time of the pour. 

We also had occasions where as  with all jobs not all of the details worked and so we had to highlight these and send them to the appropriate professionals to get a solution that worked.

On this project there were three sections. One was the main building pictured above and my repsponsability was the top two floors which had 20 bedrooms and or suites on the two floors. It was my job to record the work as it progressed and sign if off as each section was handed over to us whilst ensuring the companies health and safety policies were being adhered to. We also had to upload a site diary onto Zutec and take updated drawings from the file share server Aconex.

It had a build cost of £65 million. The house was originally built in about 1790 as a hunting lodge and is currently garde 2 star listed. I anticipate being there until spring 2018.

Google  "The Langley" to see finished rooms.

Here is a little history of the park and house:

A deer park is first mentioned at Langley Marish in 1202, continuing in use throughout the Middle Ages. In 1603 Sir John Kederminster was appointed Chief Steward of the Manor of Langley Park, and shortly after replaced the hunting lodge with a house, red-brick stables and outbuildings. In 1626 the park and manor were granted to Sir John, ceasing to be Crown property. The park was sold in 1738 to Charles Spencer, third Duke of Marlborough who used it as a hunting lodge until, in 1756, he commissioned Stiff Leadbetter to build the present house, finished in 1760. His son George, the fourth Duke, succeeded in 1758 and commissioned Lancelot Brown (1716-83) to landscape Langley Park during his time working at Blenheim (qv). In Brown's account book under Blenheim an entry reads 'A plan for some alterations for Langley. The contract £2,810' (quoted in Bucks County Council 1997). There may be further evidence for Brown's involvement held in the archives at Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire. In 1788 Robert Bateson-Harvey bought the estate which remained in the family until 1945 when it was sold to Buckinghamshire County Council. The house is currently (1997) in commercial use.

PRINCIPAL BUILDING The house (Stiff Leadbetter 1755(8, listed grade II*) lies at the centre of the site, built as a hunting lodge for the third Duke of Marlborough c 100m south of the C17 Kederminster house. The design was innovative, producing a compact villa-type house, ashlar faced in brownish Woodstock stone. The otherwise simple east, entrance front is embellished by mid to late C19 blank-walled quadrant wings ending in square pavilions with angle towers in the manner of Vanbrugh, added for Robert Bateson-Harvey. A large rectangular orangery, also dating from this period, is attached to the north-west corner of the building; this has been converted to office accommodation, with a mezzanine floor. The view east from the entrance front crosses level parkland, with the remains of a line of Wellingtonias beginning 200m east, on an axis with this front. The views south and west from the house overlook the park and lake beyond the garden. From the north front a long view north crosses the car park in the garden, along an open area of park, parallel with the north avenue, to the northern woodland belt.

The red-brick stables (C18, listed grade II) lie 100m north-east of the house, a three-sided range with the fourth, east side consisting of a 6m high red-brick wall and central doorway into the kitchen garden to the east. The west range, facing the house and north drive, is the most ornamental, having a central pediment over an arched carriageway into the courtyard beyond, now formally laid out as a garden with a central pond. On the south side of the stable court a red-brick orangery and range of outbuildings (C18, listed grade II) has been converted to three dwellings.

Here are some original images of the house before work started on it.

There are many original features which are being renovated and preserved. Such as these pillers on the ground and first floors. They have had decades worth of paint stripped off of them and will some be polished to bring up the luster of the stone. 

This is a developement that we successfully completed for a company called Manor Park Developments in February 2017..  We are building 13 flats. The building is a reinforced concrete frame with Metsec internally and a brick skin to the external walls . We had a crane on this site as you can see but we had no space to speak of to store materials so we have to schedule deliveries in order to be able to control what is stored on site and so as not to block the road with lots of lorries. There was a lift installed in this building.

Dec 2016. This project is nearing completion now and soon will be finished. The majority of the flats are complete inside and the majority of the work is now external. The includes the balconies which have started to be formed as you can see from this picture below. The building was completed shortly after this and handed over to the client. 

This project is completed now and recently sold for £3.25m This project is small and as you can see the site is much tighter and will present its own challenges. It has a secant piled basement which will have a swimming pool, sauna, gym and cinema in it.

On this job we have been very involved in drawing up items such as the bathroom layouts shown below. Eventually we will also insert the tiling layout onto these so that the setting out points are pre-determined.

Here the dcuting had to work with the ducting and also the external terrace which was over part of it. It also had to work with the coffered ceiling and so could not run directly to the outlets. This meant we had to have enough space under the concrete terrace for insulation to avoid condensation issues. 

In this project the central courtyard is a major feature. There were not many details on the architects drawings and so we worked with the window company and the NHBC rep to develop a shceme that  the client was happy with. We also asked the architect to cast a critical eye over the final drawings so that we could identify any pitfalls which we may not of spotted.

We can also do 3D drawings such as this one which was for the setting out of steelswork for a central light well. the steels were set out this way we could then use this drawing again and add to it the roof details, floor and ceiling makeups then we could to send this to the window company so that they would know what openings they had to work with and size thier units accordingly.

I am currently working on two projects. One in Cobham, below is a CGI of the project. This project is being second fixed currently and we are looking to complete in early April 2015. It has a pool cinema full underfloor heating programable lighting and is about 9,000 square feet in floor space. Below is a CGI image of this project. There are some finished exteranal pictures at the end of this section.

An unusual element of this project is the render. All of the mouldings are dense polystrene that is coated to match the render and the mouldings are stuck onto the blockwork before it is rendered. Then the whole thing is spray painted. One advantage of this system is that big sections can easily be fitted by one or two me and the most as it is so light. It can be cut and fitted on site to suite unusual shapes and the coating can be reinforces with mesh for use in areas where there is a danger of it being knocked.

Below is a picture of the front of the house and then below that again a picture of the back garden. This year at the end of May (2016) the house won an Evening Standard Award for Best Luxury House.

The rednering on this project had many elements. We drew up a document and drawings of each of these on site initially based on the architects drawings and altered them where needed to suite the clients wishes and so that they look correct in the setting. We also added dimensions so that they could be priced and ultimately produced. The documents were available in many formats as required including DWG for prooduction purposes. We worked with the client and production company to ensure that they were all happy with these drawings.

Below is a copy of the initial document for the mouldings and also a report on a visit to the chosen manufacturer to see how the mouldings would be produced. I have also included some details that we sent to them of the pillars.

Below are some professsionally taken photos with some additional description in them.

Previous Projects.

Wimbledon Village.

The company that was building this went bankrupt and I was made recundant so I dont have any finished pictures. However as this was a design and build project there is a lot of work that we did with the client help them to see what would look good given the breif that they had given us.

Most of this work involved moulding details, panneling, doors and stair design. Some of this detail is shown below.

This is a 3D model that Rmaysing Design and Build formed to show how the mouldings and columns work in conjunction with the window and door frames. Building this model enabled us to be sure that the mouldings would work and how they would look and it also meant that we could show it to the carpenters who were to put it all together so that they understood what was being asked of them.

Guildford Refurbishment.