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The Television Centre (TVC) project is a residential development containing 231 flats; a mix of 1,2 & 3 bedrooms and 20 premium & 9 luxury penthouses. We were contracted to undertake the drylining and ceilings packages throughout, ensuring meticulously high finishes with the required fire and acoustic performance.

Within the main flats there are a variety of elements that made use of our technical expertise. The lighting troughs and bulkheads in the ceilings were designed to hide the air return feature which feeds ‘fresh’ air into the rest of the flat. To facilitate this, we had to form the openings and fit the grills which is more complex than it appears. As the height of the stud ends just below the grill, we had to build down either side and above it to ensure it was fitted securely and met performance criteria. Additionally, within the flats there are light fittings which can be fully recessed within the ceiling or ‘popped out’ and used directionally. To achieve the clean plaster hairline finish, each of these circular lights has been plastered around as opposed to having it housed in a plastic casing.

A key feature of TVC is the curved corridors and ceilings running throughout the building. This visually impressive feature was challenging because of the seamless finish required and the need to set out and form the openings for the lights and other services in line with the wall.  Curved walls and bulkheads also appear within the luxury penthouses, with the kitchen, living room and some of the hallways having the remarkable feature. The curved internal hallways are particularly interesting as the skylights follow the radius of the wall. The skylights were complicated to fit from the inside, to overcome that, we fitted the top half of the skylight from the roof outside with operatives working from harnesses. The rest was fitted and finished inside which had to blemish free in the highly visible and well-lit area leading to the impressive finish.

The penthouses at TVC have a variety of different features; one of the penthouses in particular, has a reinforced ceiling which has been ply-lined and finished in MDF panel to give a 3D finish.  The ceiling in the bathroom also had a bespoke circular Fiberglass unit finish around a light fitting that required expert plastering to fit. This was installed in a bespoke bathroom that was required to be built to support 60kg of stone per square meter with multiple service routes within. Within the same apartment, there was a central freestanding, double-sided fireplace with recessed walls for TV units & hidden panels. The challenge & technical difficulty we had was supporting the recess opening which required bespoke reinforced steel frames and maintaining the needed fire-rating.

Another of the penthouses had four freestanding walls which houses the kitchen and a steel unit designed for the steel framed TV shelving unit. To achieve the recess the design required, and maintain the structural integrity, we fitted heavy duty steel posts to support the structure. Technically, this was difficult due to the requirement for a continuous grill to extend on all four sides meaning our walls could not run floor to slab & had to run from above the bottom of the grill with a soffit supported bulkhead extended to below ceiling. To deliver this, bespoke steel posts had to be fitted at calculated points & bulkheads had to be built from the cement slab to align and receive grills.  The added difficulty of this was that these walls were required to maintain the structural integrity to support kitchens, bathrooms & door openings yet remain free standing & separated from the soffit.

In addition, there were some fire-rated sliding pocket doors where the door slides completely into the wall. These doors are not typically fire rated and to deliver the needed fire ratings, we had to form a sealed unit in the shaft wall system with fire rated seals. We also delivered a continuous fire rated wall abutting to sliding door wall that had recesses formed at floor & ceiling level to receive recess lights, this had to the house light control systems behind the wall yet remain fire rated.

Phillip Lee, Measom Project Manager, speaking about the project

“TVC was a challenging job from start to finish but we excelled in all aspects of our works on-site with our excellent team, including, our Managers, Supervisors, Fixers, Tapers & Plasterers. We achieved numerous awards for Health & Safety on site, winning the award for 3 months & 5 times overall in a 6-month period – a huge achievement when we had an average of 65 operatives working on site! We also had the lowest recorded number of snags of any trade on-site, which as a drylining contractor is exceptional. The nature of our work is the seen & finished visible element of the job and it is a testament to our process and team members. I am proud of the product Measom & my site team delivered. I am looking forward to working on the next project with Measom and with this team to achieve the same outstanding results in the future”. 

TVC was a great project for Measom, it tested our ability to deliver the highest quality finishing and fitting of a variety of elements to the top specification. Also, we were one of the best subcontractors on site for health and safety, topping the league table for a consecutive 3 Months & won the award 5 times in a 6 month period on a job & period where we had an average of 65 operatives working.