Trent Concrete to clad Waitrose supermarket
Trent Concrete has won a major contract to clad a new Waitrose supermarket in Wallingford, South Oxfordshire, and starts on site in October.
The contract covers a variety of wall panels, comprising 850 square metres of natural French limestone facing (with an additional 40 square metres handset in situ) and 660 square metres of Charnwood Windsor Red handmade brick facing. The limestone was selected for to its hardness and colour similarity to the surrounding buildings faced in Clipsham sandstone.
Contractors Pearce Retail introduced the precast solution to overcome practical on-site buildability issues. The site is bounded on two sides by the town centre's main roads, and a listed building on another, making traditional construction methods with scaffolding impossible. Precast also enables faster programme times. The project will be built in three phases from within the building footprint, requiring close coordination between Trent and the steelwork contractor. The proactive design coordination between all parties on the project has been highly successful.
Natural stone and brick faced cladding combines a traditional, unpanelised appearance with the durability and other benefits of precast concrete. The construction should not be affected by weather or labour shortages, and enables the early enclosure of a dry envelope so that follow-on trades can start sooner. In addition, precast helps improve on-site safety and tidiness, and guarantees a high standard of workmanship.
The supermarket is due to open in Spring 2005.
Contractor: Pearce (Retail Services) Limited
Architect: Michael Aukett Architects
Engineer: Clark Bond Structures Limited
Notes
Trent Concrete is a specialist precast concrete contractor, producing high quality bespoke architectural cladding and structures.
Providing a complete solution from detailed design development through skills-based manufacture to on-site erection using its own teams, Trent Concrete partners with leading developers and specifiers to ensure that their projects gain maximum benefit from prefabrication.
Trent Concrete's precast solutions make a major contribution to improved quality, certainty, sustainability, safety and efficiency in the UK construction industry today.
The company has worked on some of the most prestigious projects of recent years, including The Scottish Office and the Toyota GB Plc and Thames Water headquarters buildings, and the quality of its work is consistently recognised in the form of industry awards. Trent Concrete was founded in 1917 and employs more than 200 people.
Editorial contact: David Walker
Tel: 0115 987 9747
Email: lmason@trentconcrete.co.uk
Trent Concrete Limited - e-mail: quality@trentconcrete.co.uk