22 April 2015

With its long and impressive military heritage, when the curators of the Green Howards Regimental Museum in Richmond, just north of York, needed to completely update its facilities for the 21st Century, it conscripted in the services of Quartzelec’s Manchester based building services and electrical contracting business. 

Working in partnership with York based William Anelay Limited, one of the UK's longest established construction companies that specialises in the conservation and restoration of listed and historic buildings, Quartzelec developed and delivered the M&E element of the contract, valued at £700k.

Spread over three floors, the project included the complete reconfiguration of the building with a new lift, toilets, flexible display spaces and archive stores being added. The most significant changes were to the exhibition galleries, configuring them into flexible areas in which to chronicle the history of the regiment from 1688 through to the present day, as well as meet ever changing corporate needs for the space. 

In addition to undertaking the detailed initial design that had to take into account the conservation requirements of the building, Quartzelec was responsible for the complete electrical refit which included general power, a new fire and intruder alarm system plus a state-of-the art CCTV solution. Highly flexible lighting and building management systems were also installed to ensure that all the exhibits and future additions would be appropriately lit via discreet low-voltage track lighting solutions. These feature plug in and moveable LED units to ensure the perfect ambient lighting effects can be achieved for each of the rooms and displays. On the mechanical side, Quartzelec was also responsible for developing and implementing the plumbing and heating along with the humidity control solution required to protect the exhibits for future generations to enjoy.

“This was a particularly complex project with a number of real technical and logistical challenges that had to be factored into the extremely tight and demanding delivery schedule”, explained William Prew, the project manager from William Anelay. “Not only is The Green Howards Museum a listed building with an exceptionally small overall footprint; so working space was always at a premium, access to the site was equally restricted, meaning scheduling and out-of-hours deliveries were a necessity. Even getting the team to the site, due to it being somewhat off the beaten track was a challenge, with many of Quartzelec’s engineers staying locally to avoid excessive travel and keep the project to the tight deadline.  Having worked with Quartzelec on previous projects we knew they were up to the task and the project team proved that they would always go that extra mile when needed.”

Quartzelec, in addition to being awarded a steady stream of sub £1m M&E design, delivery and support contracts, is now successfully competing and winning a number of larger and more prestigious projects. Recent wins include a £1.4 Million project for the new Wirral Met College Campus at Wirral Waters; completing a £1.58m 10-floor housing development at One Smithfield Square in Manchester’s fashionable Northern Quarter; delivering the new heating, electrical, water, ventilation, communications and lighting systems within the Sheffield Cathedral Gateway Project; and a £1.4m multi utility contract with Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh NHS Foundation Trust; undertaking all the lighting, power, containment and life safety systems as part of a £1.6m refurbishment of two buildings in the city centre for Manchester Metropolitan University.