Focus Consultants appointed project manager on Tatton Park scheme

Tatton Park farm entrance

Heritage experts at Focus Consultants have been appointed to help drive forward a project to showcase the history of farming and its relevance to healthy eating today at one of the UK’s most well-known country estates.

Tatton Dale Farm in Tatton Park, Knutsford, Cheshire, has received £1 million Heritage Lottery funding to develop a scheme to tell the story of food production for a large country estate from the late 18^th century to the 1950s. 

The project aims to bring alive the agricultural, architectural, technological, social and cultural heritage of Tatton Dale Farm through the ‘field to fork’ story - told through the mouths of former workers, its buildings, machinery, livestock and traditional agricultural skills.

It includes a new visitor hub at the farm’s agricultural mill building, as well as a number of site-wide hands-on experiences.

Focus Consultants, which has worked on a wide range of heritage and museum-related schemes across the UK, has been appointed to project manage the overall development alongside Cheshire East Council, which manages and finances Tatton Park on behalf of the National Trust.

Focus partner Steven Fletcher said: “Tatton Park is one of the UK’s most complete historic estates, and the team at Focus Consultants is very pleased to have been appointed to help develop the ‘field to fork’ story of the estate’s farm so that its story can be shared with future generations.

“We have extensive expertise in developing heritage attractions and are proud to be a part of the team providing a fascinating and enjoyable exploration of this uniquely well-preserved window into farming and food production at Tatton Park over two centuries.”

Focus, which is based in Nottingham and also has branches in London, Leicester, Boston and Aubourn in Lincolnshire, has been involved in numerous heritage schemes, including at many London museums, as well as at the National Museum Wales, MShed in Bristol, SeaCity in Southampton, and Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. 

Carole Mullineux, Tatton Park business development manager, said: “We’re delighted that Focus Consultants is part of our team. The ‘field to fork’ project is an exciting new initiative for us which will give us the opportunity to attract new visitors, protect Tatton’s heritage assets and ultimately realise the farm’s potential.”

Meanwhile, Cllr George Walton, chairman of the Tatton Park board, said: “This is an extremely important educational addition to the park and we look forward to working with Focus Consultants who will drive this forward.

“They have considerable experience in heritage projects of this nature and the ‘field to fork’ story will complement the many other attractions that combine to make Tatton Park one of the best visitor attractions in Britain.”

As well as providing skills in heritage development, Focus also specialises in funding and economic development including area regeneration strategies, funding applications, economic impact appraisals, business plans, and research and evaluation. Since 1994 Focus has also secured for clients more than £953 million of grants for projects and businesses across the UK and delivered more than £1.3 billion worth of projects and programmes – making it one of the most successful businesses of its kind in the country.

It also offers a range of services to the property and construction industry, including building surveying, quantity surveying, project management, and sustainable development support.

For more information, visit www.focus-consultants.co.uk

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Industrial park scheme role for Focus Consultants

Experts at Focus Consultants are playing a key role in a £2m development to build 19 new industrial units, which have scope to create or safeguard almost 300 jobs in coming years.

The company is providing a number of services for the North Kesteven District Council Blackwood Court development on North Hykeham’s Teal Park in Lincolnshire, including support project management, employer’s agent, principal designer/CDM advisor and BREEAM assessor.

Lindum Construction is building the scheme for North Kesteven District Council, which is part of the council’s commitment to attracting and supporting start-up businesses. The units will range in size from 500 sq ft to 2,000 sq ft and will be used for a wide range of uses from storage and distribution to general industrial premises.

Trevor Newton, partner at the Boston office of Focus, said: “Focus Consultants is very pleased to have been appointed by North Kesteven District Council to be a member of the team building Teal Park, which should prove very important to the economic development of the area.

“As a company, we provide a number of different services that are relevant for such developments, and professionals from both our Lincolnshire offices and our Leicester office are involved with this scheme.”

The units are due to be completed by mid-February, with lettings likely to start around the New Year.

Focus, which is based at Phoenix Business Park, Nottingham, and has offices at Boston and Aubourn in Lincolnshire, and in Leicester and at Holborn in London, offers services to the property and construction industry, including building surveying, contract administration, party wall surveying, clerk of works, quantity surveying, project management, CDM services and BREEAM assessments and energy calculations and modelling. 

The company also specialises in funding and economic development including area regeneration strategies, funding applications, economic impact appraisals, business plans, and research and evaluation.  Since 1994 Focus has secured for clients more than £953 million of grants for projects and businesses across the UK and delivered more than £1.3 billion worth of projects and programmes – making it one of the most successful businesses of its kind in the country.

Teal Park is a strategic allocated employment site, granted outline planning permission in 2011 for a total of 133,720m2 of employment floor space, a hotel, public house, leisure and trade showrooms. It is home to Siemens’ industrial gas turbine service business which occupies around a third of the space.

Under the GrowLN6 project, the wider LN6 area is a focus for coordinated partnership work by NKDC, City of Lincoln Council and the County Council to attract new inward business investment and expansion.

The photo shows partners lined up to mark the official start on site.

For more information visit www.focus-consultants.co.uk

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Focus Consultants dives into leisure centre extension scheme

East Midlands-based Focus Consultants has been appointed to project manage a £3 million scheme to refurbish and extend a leisure centre. 

Work is due to get underway this summer on the development at North Herts Leisure Centre in Letchworth and includes a new learner/teaching pool, a café with a view over the pool, dance studio, offices, a ground-sprung sports hall floor, refurbishment of the wet changing areas and more parking.

The aim of the project is to increase the life span of the centre by another 25 years and improve customer services. 

Partner at Focus Consultants, Keith Butler, said: “Focus is very pleased to have been appointed on this scheme, which is the latest in a number of similar developments the team has been involved in. 

“The new extension will not only create extra space, it will also allow the leisure centre to increase its swimming facilities, which is good news for the people of Letchworth and the surrounding area.” 

The refurbishment is being funded by North Hertfordshire District Council and the facilities are managed by a social enterprise, Stevenage Leisure Ltd, which runs the centre on the council’s behalf, and is due to be completed by the spring of 2016. 

It is being project managed by personnel in the Leicester office of Focus, which has its headquarters in Nottingham and also has teams in Holborn, London, and at Boston and Aubourn in Lincolnshire. 

The firm offers a range of services, including funding and economic development, project management, regeneration expertise, energy consultancy and chartered surveying services. 

For more details visit www.focus-consultants.co.uk

Press release issued by Nottingham PR company Perfect 10 PR www.perfect10pr.co.uk

Focus Consultants in the driving seat at museum redevelopment

Focus Consultants is playing a key role in the redevelopment of one of the UK’s most historically significant sites for motoring, aviation and engineering after helping Brooklands Museum secure a grant of more than £4.5 million. 

The company has been appointed as project manager on the scheme at the museum in Weybridge, Surrey, which is the birthplace of British motorsport and aviation, home of Concorde and the site of many engineering and technological achievements throughout eight decades of the 20th century. 

The redevelopment will transform the museum’s Grade II listed Second World War Wellington Hangar into The Brooklands Aircraft Factory; build a new annexe (the Flight Shed) to house more of the museum’s outstanding collection of historic aircraft; and restore the Finishing Straight of the Brooklands Race Track, the world’s first purpose-built motor-racing circuit. 

The Focus team was also instrumental in helping the museum to secure £4.681 million funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) for its Brooklands Aircraft Factory & Race Track Revival Project. 

Associate at Focus Consultants, Eleanor Clarke, said: “We were very pleased to hear about the HLF investment in this significant redevelopment at what is a very important site for the history of motoring, aviation and engineering. 

“The team at Focus is now working on delivering this exciting project, which also aims to inspire current and future generations to embrace science, technology and engineering, and will include a training scheme for volunteers in historic aircraft restoration and a raft of new activities on the Race Track.” 

Nottingham-based Focus Consultants, which also has offices in Holborn in London, Leicester, Boston, and at Aubourn near Lincoln, has worked on projects at a number of British museums, including the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Imperial War Museum, the Charles Dickens Museum, MSHED Museum of Bristol and Sea City in Southampton. 

Focus specialises in creative approaches to securing funding packages and delivering high quality projects across the UK. Since its creation in 1994, Focus has helped to secure more than £953 million of grant assistance for a range of projects and businesses across the UK and delivered more than £1.1 billion of projects and programmes. 

The firm works across a range of sectors including heritage, museums, arts and culture, education and tourism. It is based at Phoenix Business Park, Nottingham, and this year celebrates its 21^st anniversary. 

The Brooklands Race Track was opened in 1907 and marked the start of organised motor racing in the UK. Within a year, early experiments in aviation were taking place on the site as well. From these beginnings, Brooklands rapidly evolved into an outstanding centre for the development and operation of racing cars, motorcycles and aircraft. The first person to travel over 100 miles in one hour, Percy Lambert, did so at Brooklands in 1913. The first British Grand Prix took place at Brooklands in 1926, as well as the first public demonstration of powered flight in the UK in 1909. 

The redevelopment involves relocating the museum’s Wellington Hangar, built in 1940 on top of the Finishing Straight of the Race Track and used for the assembly of Wellington bombers and later for a variety of other industrial purposes. It now houses the museum’s famous Wellington “R” for “Robert” recovered from Loch Ness in 1985 and restored at Brooklands, and numerous other aircraft. Under the HLF-funded project, the hangar will be completely restored on a new site adjacent to its current one, allowing the Finishing Straight of the Race Track to be brought back into use for both motoring and aviation activities. The hangar itself will be presented as an aircraft factory. 

The museum has raised more than £1.9 million in match funding for the project and is currently fundraising for the remaining £260,000. Including preparation and development work already undertaken, the complete cost of the project will be some £7 million, making it the largest endeavour the museum has ever embarked on.  

For more information visit www.focus-consultants.co.uk
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