Robert Merry heads North from his home in London to revisit a city he has not seen since he was boy. He revels in Northern sandstone, architecture, history and art.
Away the lad.
Someone bought me a weekend in Newcastle, as a present. Not for me to go on my own. They came with me.
It’s a city I had read much about but not visited since I was a child.
In fact, the man who ran the largest department store in Newcastle in those days was my God Father. Who knew!?
Newcastle’s Georgian city centre is the home of sandstone. The Tyne, the home of bridges. Such splendid bridges – The Tyne, Queen Elizabeth II, Edward VII, Swing, High Level, Gateshead Millennium and Redheugh. Victorian mostly, built for railwaymen and their ambitions, with walkways and double decks and cast iron girders and span.
It is a city built on the riches of coal and shipping.
And then there’s those sandstone buildings in Grey Street and Grainger Street and around. It is known as Grainger Town, after Richard Grainger the architect who drew up plans for the transformation of the centre of Newcastle in 1834.
The columns and pediment in front of the Royal Theatre are glorious, chunky, carved sandstone, wearing remarkably well for nearly 200 years of standing in the cooler climes of the North-East.
Some of the stone, around the back streets where no one sees it much, is black with pollution.
But it is a fine city centre. Grainger Market and Central Arcade, with its decorative faience tiles still pristine, as if they were fitted yesterday.
Often described as the finest street in Europe, Grey Street is the jewel in the crown, relatively untroubled by corporate giants, with sandstone façades intact.
Even older church steeples spike the skyline. Inside the Cathedral of St Nicholas, dating from 1091, are fine stained glass windows commemorating the fallen in the South Africa Boar War, and the 1914-18 and 1939-45 World Wars. 20th century stained glass windows, with minimalist, abstract images commemorate industrial pioneers of the city. And all set in sandstone window jambs and cills.
A fine alter rail in an orange/red marble I couldn’t identify. Black and white stone floors, probably Carrara and Belgian black.
And Portland stone. Portland! This far north? It makes an appearance as cladding on the outside of the city’s 1960s civic centre. There is green slate decorative cladding below windows and granite paving and plinths. Arabescato can be seen through the windows, decorating steps and tables. And thin delicate strips of Portland adorn the facade of the circular building on legs at the back, next to the wonderful David Wynne bronze statue of the Tyne River God cascading as a fountain down the civic centre walls.
And the Wren stone, a 500-year-old piece of history set in the wall in the inner space, flanked on four sides by the civic centre buildings.
The story goes that the council decided the city needed to look further than the local sandstone, to reflect a modern, forward-looking Newcastle.
The supplier, Portland Stone Firms, was so pleased with the order that it gifted to the city an original Wren sample stone from St Pauls Cathedral that had been left on the Dorset island that gives its name to the stone.
The council mounted the relic in the walls and carved an explanation of its origin into the new Portland stone around it.
A granite clad plinth by a small pond on the north side commemorates a visit by USA President Jimmy Carter.
At first glance it looks like what it is, I suppose: a rather dated municipal building.
But on closer inspection it is a place of beauty.
The fine sculpture of swans in flight, also by David Wynne, and the bronze seahorses by John Robert Murray McCheyne are more gems.
The building and surrounding streets were empty early on a Saturday morning, leaving us free to wander and stare.
The emptiness was eerie; the stone and sculpture a delight.
Newcastle’s coal and shipping industries are long gone.
Some boat building and ship repair yards still exist further up the river, near Tynemouth, but no more are the heady days of Swan Hunter and the Ark Royal.
We took the metro to Tynemouth Priory and Castle, standing on the top of the cliff above the sea. From there we strolled down through the North Shields quays, past the Corten steel sculpture of a Fiddlers Green Fisherman by Ray Longsdale.
Fiddlers Green is a place in the afterlife for fishermen and sailors lost at sea.
We caught the ferry to South Shields and were interrupted by tug boats pulling and pushing a cruise liner up the Tyne – for repair, I suppose. It was so big it almost blocked out the sun as it passed.
And then back on the Metro to Newcastle Central station, with its sandstone façade and splendidly curved, wrought iron-ribbed arched roof.
I haven’t mentioned The Cluney, The Sage, The Laing or the Baltic Flour Mill (now a contemporary art centre). But there’s simply not enough room for it all here.
A great trip to a great city. Ah yes, it were aareet!
Some of Newcastle’s impressive sandstone architecture.
A new element has been added to the Lichfields website providing the latest analysis and findings around the Levelling Up & Regeneration Bill.
The new resource from planning & development consultant Lichfields will offer quick, easy and free access for local authorities, developers, builders, decision makers and other industry stakeholders to news and coverage of the Bill alongside expert analysis and technical insights.
It will be updated regularly as the Bill progresses and takes shape and the consultations on related regulations and policy emerge, highlighting the implications for planning procedures and certain sectors and regions.
The Bill seeks to change the way powers can be devolved to local authorities and will see reforms to the planning system in England.
The Lichfields web resource will also feature blogs on the crucial issues and expert contributions around the key changes with explanations as to why these are important.
Access to the site’s content will be free and visitors can download and save relevant documents if required.
The web resource has been developed by Lichfields associate directors Edward Clarke and Jennie Baker. They say the Bill is one of most important issues currently in the planning realm, so it’s important for decision makers and stakeholders to keep abreast of the latest developments and changes.
Dublin natural stone and tile outlet Deeward Ltd has been told to pay €1,500 to a headscarf-wearing woman after she was asked at a job interview where she was from originally, reports breakingnews.ie.
At Ireland’s Workplace Relations Commission (WRC), Adjudicator Marian Duffy ordered Deeward Ltd to pay Narimene Saad the money for discriminating against her on race grounds under Ireland's Employment Equality Act.
Ms Saad was being interviewed by the firm’s Operations Manager, Ray Sood, for the position of a part-time administrative assistant. She said he had asked her where she was from. She told him she was from Germany and he asked here where she came from originally. She said she was born in Algeria.
Ray Sood told the Adjudicator the question was asked in the context of a friendly chat as he is the son of immigrants from India.
He said the company has 70 employees, about half of them non-Irish – 22 from Poland, one each from Brazil, India, Italy, Romania and England, five Croatian and two Russian.
The firm denied that the question was discriminatory. Another candidate was appointed to the position at the company.
Ms Duffy stated that she was satisfied Mr Sood did not ask the Irish candidate and candidates of a different nationality who were not wearing a headscarf about their nationality and concluded: “I cannot accept that it was an appropriate question."
Ms Duffy found that a separate claim made by Ms Saad of discriminatory treatment on the grounds of religion was not well-founded.
WINS (Women In Natural Stone) got off to a great start with its first face-to-face meeting on 15 June since its official launch at The Landscape Show on 3-4 November last year.
There were 70 women from the stone industry and architecture, design and construction that work with the stone industry at The Counting House in the City of London for this networking event.
WINS was formed to give women involved with the stone industry an opportunity to connect and network, as well as providing role models for the next generation of women coming into construction.
The feedback from those who participated has been nothing but positive and the general consensus was that the event was a resounding success.
Stone Federation manages WINS, which is chaired jointly by Tamsin Pickeral, a Director of Szerelmey, and Becca Cranfield, a Director of Athena Stonecare. Stone Federation CEO Jane Buxey addressed the women in The Counting House, when she thanked the sponsors for their support. They were: Airelimestones, Cliveden Conservation, The Landscape Show, Recclesia, and Szerelmey.
If you would like to be kept up to date with future WINS events and initiatives, please email sara@stonefed.org.uk to add your name to the mailing list.
Using technology and training to keep staff safe and productive was at the heart of the meeting this month (15 June) of members of the Worktop Fabricators Federation (WFF).
Representatives of companies as far afield as Glasgow, Worthing and Cardiff swelled a capacity audience at Bellagio Stone’s Leamington Spa headquarters, where the meeting was held.
The day saw Caesarstone launch its Master Of Stone on-line training and safety programme; the Department for Education introduce the government’s new T-Levels scheme for school-leavers; Stonegate and LPE go head-to-head on the merits of laser templating in the showroom and brand new sponsor Stone Industry Group (SiG) sample real-time dust levels as members walked through Bellagio’s impressive production line.
“It was a really great day,” said WFF director Simon Souter. “Plenty to think about, plenty to talk about and plenty of opportunities to touch base with fellow fabricators and suppliers – which is really what the WFF is all about.”
Natural stone is the natural complement to planting as attention turns to carbon reduction and mindfulness.
Demand for stone in hard landscaping continued to grow last year, but cost of living increases this year combined with the easing of Covid travel restrictions that are encouraging more people to fly abroad for their holidays could be among the factors that are now about to take some of the heat out of the market.
The Covid lockdowns and working at home, with householders not able to spend their money on family holidays abroad, was as good for the garden market on the residential side of landscaping as it was for the worktops sector. Larger private and public sector commercial projects have also showed little sign of abating following the initial lockdown in 2020.
The high cost of shipping and containers, as well as additional Brexit-imposed costs of buying stone from Europe increased the price of imported stone and helped indigenous stone producers.
Lower cost imported stone has undoubtedly raised the profile of the use of natural stone for hard landscaping ever since the 1990s, but many councils and clients like the idea of using more locally produced materials, a preference that has increased since emphasis on tackling global warming and working towards Net Zero carbon emissions has grown.
With Far Eastern stone supplies hit by the pandemic and shipping and container costs multiplying, the price difference between imports and indigenous stone reduced.
However, the graph below shows that the volume of imports of setts, curbstones and flagstones – the only category of stone imports that can be identified as being specifically for natural stone landscaping – continued to increase throughout the pandemic. The drop in value of that stone in 2020 can be accounted for by importers taking advantage of deferred VAT payments allowed by HM Revenue & Customs in response to Covid, because the figures come mostly from tax returns.
Some of the indigenous stone advantage of higher price imports was lost in April this year when British quarries were no longer allowed to use red diesel. The duty paid on red diesel was 11.81p/litre when road users were paying 57.95p.
Although the Chancellor reduced the duty by 5p a litre to 52.95p in the Spring Statement in response to rapidly rising fuel prices, worsened by Russia, a major oil producer, invading Ukraine, the 5p duty reduction went mostly unnoticed. Quarries facing a sudden hike in the price of their fuel when it became liable to the full rate of duty of 52.95p were left with no option but to pass on that extra cost to their customers.
Contractors also lost the right to use red diesel on-site, adding to their costs, which were already increasing due to the rising prices of products and labour.
RAC fuel spokesperson Simon Williams said when diesel prices reached a new high in May (not yet included on the DBEIS graph below): “Sadly, despite the Chancellor’s 5p a litre duty cut, the average price of a litre of diesel has hit a new record high at 180.29p.
“Efforts to move away from importing Russian diesel have led to a tightening of supply and pushed up the price retailers pay for diesel. While the wholesale price has eased in the last few days this is likely to be temporary, especially if the EU agrees to ban imports of Russian oil.”
An indication of the confusion in the market to the various forces at work over the past few years comes from the fluctuation in the price of shares in Marshalls, a PLC supplying indigenous and imported natural stone (as well as concrete products) for hard landscaping, with sales of more than £500million a year.
In response to the Covid lockdown Marshalls’ share price fell from a high in January 2020 of 876p to 519.5p in April that year. In September last year it was back up to 840.5p and on 12 May, the day after Marshalls’ AGM this year, was down to 534.5p.
At the AGM Marshalls said it expects to be able to pass on price rises through the supply chain and remains confident about its own prospects for the year ahead, while acknowledging it expects “a more uncertain trading environment”.
In a trading statement just before its AGM Marshalls said revenues for the first four months of 2022 were up 5% on 2021 to £201million, in spite of “a very strong period” in 2021 that included record sales volumes for the months of March and April.
The increase in revenue was helped by price increases already imposed this year and came from the public sector and commercial markets, which account for two-thirds of the group’s sales, led by a strong new build housing market, where Marshalls expects demand to continue.
The domestic market fell 9%, which Marshalls said was “largely due to more holidays being taken in 2022 compared with 2021 when the country was in lockdown”.
Having just spent £535million on buying concrete roof tile company Marley, Marshalls says in future it will report under three separate categories of its business – Marshalls Landscape Products and Building Products, and Marley Roofing Products.
For the 2021 annual report presented at the AGM in May, the company reported Group revenue for the year ended 31 December 2021 of £589.3million, an increase of 26% compared with 2020 and 9% more than 2019. Pre-tax profit was £69.3million.
Vanda Murray OBE, Chair of Marshalls, says: “Here we are in 2022, after a challenging couple of years and with much global focus on how we shape our world and the places around us. The evolution of our purpose is to create better net positive futures.”
She explains that means putting more into society, the environment and the global economy than the company takes out, and understanding the impact of its actions.
Last year’s COP26 meeting of the world’s governments to discuss global warming had served as a timely reminder of the need to take climate change seriously and, she says: “I’m proud to say that Marshalls is well placed to take on the challenge. Last year, we committed to being a net zero business by 2030 as part of our plan and we are well on our way to achieving this.
“We’re already making changes, with focus on reducing plastic packaging, using lower emission fuels in our manufacturing sites and installing more solar panels.”
She said the global pandemic had “reminded us of the value of our public services – and why it’s so important to pay our fair share of tax.” It had also shone a light on ethical issues, where Marshalls were “supporting and upholding human rights at home and overseas in our supply chains”.
She says: “As focus on ESG rightly continues to gain momentum, we ensure we have structures in place so that our environmental, social and governance processes are at the core of our decision making and reporting.
“In 2021, an ESG internal audit was undertaken by a third party to look at our processes and controls. It also looked at our preparedness for the future and our alignment to reporting frameworks. The feedback was positive and we are in a strong position to embrace the changes in this space.”
Other changes in the hard landscaping sector include Talasey’s move into new headquarters in Scunthorpe, Lincolnshire.
Talasey was once called Natural Paving Products and supplied mostly natural stone. It is still proud of its range of ethically sourced imported natural stones but changed its name as it expanded its product offering into other areas.
It says strong and consistent sales growth over the past few years meant it outgrew its head office near Doncaster, so it moved to the new four-acre site in Scunthorpe, where 1.5 acres of mature landscaped gardens showcase the company’s landscaping products.
The head office includes nine en-suite rooms for visitors staying overnight, because part of the company’s ambition is to make the site a UK centre of excellence for the landscaping industry.
Another move comes from Fitzgerald Contractors, which has transferred ownership to an employee trust. Managing Director Nick Coley, who bought the business from Bouygues UK in 2013, completed the transaction to the trust in February, so Fitzgerald employees now own 100% of the business.
Nick and his fellow directors retain their positions, but employees influence decisions through an employee council.
Employee Ownership Trusts are growing in popularity as they offer benefits for businesses, their employees and owners looking at succession planning.
The art of paving
The growing familiarity of the stone processing industry with increasingly sophisticated computer-controlled saws, miller-routers, five axes waterjet cutters and even lasers in a few cases is leading to more designers appreciating that stone can be given an element of artwork affordably, often with inlaid contrasting materials that might be other stones, metals or hard-wearing man-made materials. Landscape materials supplier Hardscape has even set up a separate company, called IP Surfaces, specifically to supply the artwork to such schemes.
The granite paving pictured above came from CED, a leading supplier of hard landscaping materials nationally from seven outlets across the UK, including Scotland and Northern Ireland. The project pictured is in Milngavie, a suburb of Glasgow. CED’s Commercial Division supplied the granite paving with its bespoke engraving and the company’s Scotland depot supplied Steintec bedding, primer and jointing compound for the installation.
60m dry stone wall helps Graduate Gardeners win a BALI Grand Award
Although Graduate Gardeners, based in Stroud, Gloucestershire, are no strangers to winning BALI awards for their landscaping, Ian Morrison was not expecting to receive the Grand Prize when he entered a project for a private garden in Cheltenham in the awards last year. But that was what happened.
Admittedly the project was in the over £250,000 category and took almost a year to complete with six or seven people working on it most of the time, but the British Association of Landscape Industries (BALI) Grand Prize more commonly goes to even bigger landscape schemes in cities. So the Grand Prize was an unexpected welcome surprise for Ian.
The project was the garden of a large house on the side of Cleeve Hill, with views across Cheltenham to the Welsh Hills. It did not have a flat lawn and was to undergo a total renovation that involved digging into the clay-rich soil of the hillside to provide flatter areas for parking, an enhanced entrance, and more usable space in the garden.
There were a number of significant areas of construction, most notably and by far the most impressive being the 60m long traditional dry stone retaining wall using Cotswold limestone from Cotswold Stone Quarries’ Tinkers Barn Quarry.
A structural engineer was brought in as Cleeve Hill is notorious for movement. A mortared wall was not an option because a solid structure on concrete foundations would simply have cracked. The foundations used for the dry stone wall were the stone beneath the ground. Dry stone walling also allows moisture to migrate through the wall rather than being trapped behind it.
Some 600 tons of material was excavated and more than 300 tons of walling stone was used to build the wall, each piece placed by hand to create a wall 1.5m wide at the base (500mm below ground level) and 600mm at the top, with the finished height averaging 1.8m.
The BALI Award judges said: “The attention to detail, outstanding finish, and wonderful workmanship in evidence in this scheme represents excellence at all levels. The in-house designer has fulfilled the client’s brief with imagination, courage and panache and the contractor’s build team have surpassed themselves, delivering a beautiful, breathtaking setting for the refurbished property.”
Last chance to enter Landscape Institute's 2022 international awards
The 7 July deadline is approaching for entering the Landscape Institute’s 2022 international awards for landscape architecture.
There are five open categories, 15 professional categories, two for students and the President's Award for the best overall landscape scheme from all the categories combined.
Those chosen as finalists will be announced in September and the winners will be presented with their awards at a ceremony at the prestigious Troxy in Commercial Road, London, on Thursday 24 November.
For the past two years the awards have been presented as a virtual event online only. Last year’s presentation attracted 1,600 viewers, so with the knowledge gained from the previous two events, this year will also see the presentation streamed online, so those who can’t make it to the Troxy can still take part.
The hybrid format will allow people from all over the world to join in, promoting discussions and showcasing projects that combat climate change, support health and wellbeing, promote biodiversity and ‘level up’ local spaces at a global scale.
The open categories celebrate excellence in landscape projects and include the Landscape & Parks Management category.
The Building With Nature category is open to recipients of a Building with Nature Accreditation for their residential, commercial, or community infrastructure scheme.
Submissions from any individual, organisation, employer, government, university or combination of groups across the globe can enter the open categories, which are:
Landscape and Parks Management: celebrating excellence in the management of a place or landscape.
Innovation and Research: an innovative product, service, publication, or piece of research or guidance that has influenced the industry or has the potential to positively transform landscape practice.
The Dame Sylvia Crowe Award: for landscape excellence around the world.
Landscape Legacy Award: for a person, organisation or group that leaves a lasting landscape legacy to the world.
Partnership and Collaboration: for excellence in partnership and cross-discipline collaboration.
Jane Findlay CMLI, President of the Landscape Institute, says: “The 2021 Landscape Institute awards were a great success – we received over 200 submissions. These were whittled down to 73 finalists by our esteemed judges from organisations such as Historic England, National Lottery Heritage Fund and Public Health England.
“In the UK, the government published its long-awaited Levelling Up White Paper, outlining its mission to ‘level up’ the country. The paper reflects the fact that landscape, green spaces and the built environment will be instrumental to this agenda. We know that landscape professionals across the globe are already implementing this holistic vision and the awards will celebrate their exceptional contributions."
Discussing the importance of the Landscape Institute awards, Edward Green, landscape architect at Southern Green and last year’s winner of Excellence in Public Health & Wellbeing, says: “Winning awards is always special, but the Landscape Institute Awards represent the pinnacle of achievement in our profession, especially for projects that benefit the physical, mental and environmental wellbeing of our communities.”
He says the awards highlight how green spaces and parks can help to improve the health and mental wellbeing of communities and drive the agenda for improving funding for a sector that believes it has been underfunded for years.
Headline sponsor of the Awards this year is Hardscape, which has supplied natural stone for projects featured in Natural Stone Specialist magazine such as Elephant Park in London, and the Glade of Light in Manchester commemorating the victims of a suicide bomber.
Category sponsors are: Vestre, Furnitubes, Building with Nature, Maylim, Civic Engineers, GrrenBlue Urban, AG, Green-tech, McParland Finn, Selux and Wildflower Turf.
At Kings Square in Gloucester Lovell supplied 6,500m2 of its Forest Pennant mixed colour sawn paving, setts with various finishes, kerbs, steps and hazard paving to main contractor E G Carter & Co Ltd.
Nigel Stubbings, who worked with Stone Federation Great Britain for many years organising the Health & Safety Forum and progressing its health & safety publications, as well as acting as the point of contact with Roy Bush and the Health & Safety Executive (HSE), has died.
He had been a positive force in the construction world for nearly 40 years. He started out with the family construction firm in his native Birmingham and went on to hold a number of positions in various trade federations, including the Construction Confederation, National Federation of Builders, and latterly the Federation of Master Builders.
He had just been appointed the Chairman of CHARGE, the HSE group that represents Glass & Glazing, Ceramics, Cement, Stoneworkers, Concrete, Heavy Clay & Bricks and Refractories. He also liaised with the Stone Federation’s lawyers, Ward Hadaway, and undertook various other projects for SFGB.
He was a personal friend of Stone Federation Chief Executive Jane Buxey for more than 30 years.
His funeral service will take place on Friday 1 July at 11:00am at The Vale Crematorium, Pershore. Donations in lieu of flowers are asked for to the British Heart Foundation.
Mark Priestman is a Director of a training consultancy whose mantra is: Qualify the Workforce! Here he congratulates one of his former trainees for winning an award.
I received a call from one of our past learners – Aaron Lumsdon. Aaron achieved his level 2 NVQ with us and was a learner on the CITB’s Specialist Applied-Skills Programme (SAP) in Façade Preservation. He proved himself to be exceptionally skilled in stone restoration, and he received our nomination for a programme award.
We’ve kept in contact with Aaron, and he’s done the same with us since he successfully achieved those qualifications.
At the time, Aaron worked for and was mentored by Stone Co Ltd, and then moved to Westcountry Stonemasons. In 2020, Aaron set up his own company, AJL Stonemasons.
So when he called with some great news, it came as no surprise to us. He explained he was both nominated for and then presented with the accolade of Fix Radio’s Stonemason of the Year Award.
Hearty congratulations from us all, Aaron!
I hope the award is an additional springboard to your already progressive journey in the Stonemasonry specialism. Best wishes for your future plans for developing your career.
Aaron’s success focused my thoughts again on the importance of setting personal goals for professional development.
Ideally, we need to view our professional development needs as a programme of work. And the most successful programmes are managed by plotting milestones on a schedule.
Of course, plans change, but that’s the beauty of a programme of work, it bends and twists and peaks in response to the reality around it.
On the flipside, if we fail to plot our plans, or even fail to identify the route we desire to take, then sadly the only planning we are doing is planning to fail.
I recall as soon as Aaron had completed one module, he was quizzing me over the contents of the next. Frequently he would send me photos of his work, which he took great pride in. He was always quick to gain experience from his work-based mentor on up-and-coming off-site training subjects and to ask questions about the work he was doing to make his training as relevant as possible.
During off-site training, following the giving of instruction and demonstration, we naturally wanted learners to have a go and eventually undertake practical tests. Aaron was always the first to say: “I’d like to have a go!”
What a great attitude. It’s the sort of enthusiasm we want to bottle for others on their journey.
Why is enthusiasm for the learning process so important?
Working backwards from the goal of personal development, which has to be success. Success only results from changed behaviour (and appropriate behaviour at that). Changed behaviour can only result from the learner buying into the benefits of the method being instructed. And, of course, benefits will only be seen where the message presented is proven.
Ultimately, we all have to come to a realisation that we are on a learning journey. We might have arrived at a certain destination, but none of us has concluded the journey yet.
On Form is an exhibition of garden sculpture – all of it stone. It takes place in the rural idyll of Asthall Manor in Burford, Oxfordshire.
After going online only in 2020 due to Covid, it returned to the Manor last year and is back there this year from 12 June to 10 July, although you still have to book your tickets in advance, which you can do on the On Form website.
There is an open invitation to stoneworkers and carvers to submit their work to be included in this selling exhibition. Many have found it an excellent opportunity to develop a career in sculpture and carving. It's too late for this year, but anyone who would like to submit work for future exhibitions can find out how here.
You can see who is exhibiting what this year here.
All the sculptures on show at 'on form' are stone. The show is back in the rural idyll of Asthall Manor, in Burford, Oxfordshire from 12 June to 10 July. You can book tickets now.
