• Client: Lend Lease
• Value: £11 million
• Location: Elephant & Castle, London

South Gardens is centrepiece of the regeneration of the former Heygate Estate Elephant and Castle. Lee Marley secured the combined brickwork, scaffolding and stonework package. The project comprised 11 blocks ranging from 3 to 16 storeys which were all worked on concurrently during the 52 week programme.

It is an exemplar in how a main contractor (Lend Lease), subcontractor and suppliers can work together to improve the delivery of the project. By working with our client early and lending our expertise we were able to save Lend Lease £634,000 in direct material costs by advising on design of stone, masonry support, brick clad units and the substitution of some materials while adhering to the intent of the specification. In addition we advised on cavity design and logistics to ensure the smooth running of the project. As the largest combined masonry and scaffolding contractor in the country we were able to leverage our experience of the interface between the façade and the scaffold to minimise adaptions and make the pre-fabricated units easier to install which lead to both monetary and programme savings.

At the peak of the project Lee Marley had 223 operatives on site, including 6 apprentices and 12 local labour placements, and installed 1800 tonnes of scaffolding, 5000 off site produced units and laid 1.3million bricks.