More news – Page 4199
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News
Optional extras
We're talking creature comforts this month, indulging in those optional extras that soon become must-haves – after all, once you've enjoyed the luxury of an on-tap masseur or the added light from a conservatory, do you think you'll be willing to give them up?
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Features
Get it right: Plumbing and electrical
The Annual Customer First Survey carried out on behalf of Zurich Insurance Building Guarantee is in its fourth year. The survey provides information on customers' satisfaction with their new homes. This year's survey shows a growing frustration with plumbing and electrical installations. Problems can usually be attributed to errors in ...
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News
Protecting your own
With esculating insurance premiums crippling small contractors, four trade bodies have stepped in to offer cheaper alternatives.
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Comment
A friendly suit
The claimant, Roy Hammond, sought damages of £973,264 arising out of the repudiation of a contract to provide central heating and plumbing services to the 130 cottages and other properties on the Glynde Estate in East Sussex, of which the first three defendants were trustees and the fourth defendant was ...
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FeaturesWe've got your results
The Cumberland Infirmary was the prototype PFI hospital, and therefore a test-bed for how well the private and public sectors work together. Building visited it three years after it opened and makes a disturbing diagnosis
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Features
European whole-life costs
Quantity surveyor Franklin + Andrews' cost research unit has produced its annual study of whole-life costs. Here we hold up the results against last year's figures and pinpoint fluctuations in construction, ownership and labour costs for a notional manufacturing plant in 12 European countries
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News
Wrekin back in black after business shake-up
Wrekin construction has turned in a pre-tax profit of £2m for 2002 after making a loss of £800,000 in 2001
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Comment
Death by Venice
The A-list of tourist destinations thrive on their history, uniqueness, beauty and immutability. Which is precisely what makes them so deadly
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Features
Steve Feery
Why break into the PFI market? It's too expensive and too risky – just stick to what you know
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FeaturesThe leveller
Julie Mellor, chair of the Equal Opportunities Commission, has construction's lousy record of recruiting women in her sights. But she's not out to give the industry a bashing: she has more subtle ways of making it see sense
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FeaturesRichard Rogers' Japanese school: Dream school
An elegant open-plan school beneath a sawtooth roof has been built in a Japanese village to designs by Richard Rogers Partnership
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Comment
Nil desperandum
As you know, it's a fat lot of use being right if you can't prove that you are. But are you completely sunk if you didn't keep 'contemporary records'?
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News
Six vie for £50m Edinburgh research centre
Edinburgh University has drawn up a shortlist of six architects to design a £50m research facility on the campus
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NewsDining in splendour
Norwich Cathedral has a new refectory designed by Hopkins Architects (formerly Michael Hopkins & Partners) built on the site of the medieval original. The building was topped out last week by local contractor RG Carter. The roof, which is covered in cast lead, is supported on oak columns, each with ...
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Features
Movers and makers
Building products multinational Knauf has announced it intends to spend £20m on new drywall manufacturing facilities in the UK. The company said it was optimistic about the UK market, which is one of the largest drywall markets in Europe, and it anticipated increasing demand for plasterboard products as the industry ...
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News
ODPM cracks down on airtightness testing
The government has instructed building control authorities to clamp down on buildings that leak too much air through walls and roofs because of poor construction
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News
Modernist Gwynne dies aged 90
Patrick Gwynne, a pioneer of modernist architecture, has died aged 90