Peter Inglis
Practice Leader
Peter is passionate about innovation towards finding better solutions for the way we work and live. He has 25 years’ experience at Cullinan Studio, working with our clients to find elegant solutions to complex and technically challenging projects. He is one of three Practice Leaders, with a focus on business planning and organising project processes, alongside his keen eye for design.
Peter believes that to make better buildings, we need a fully integrated, collaborative approach between designers, clients and constructors from project inception through to occupation. Putting theory into practice, he is currently a project board member on the UK’s largest IPI (Integrated Project Insurance) project - the Institute of Technology for Dudley College. The project, currently on site, is a model of enlightened procurement that has the potential to transform how we design and construct buildings.
Peter is involved with mentoring the next generation of built environment professionals, and other companies considering Employee Ownership as part of our responsible business commitment.
Peter also likes to make things. He occasionally makes his own shirts, which he sometimes feels brave enough to wear to work.
Project Experience
Magic with rainwater in Bristol
The work we did as a team on the public realm at Bristol Harbourside really stands out for me as one of the best examples of what collaboration can achieve. Architect (us), client Crest Nicholson, civil engineer Arup, landscape architect Grant Associates, were in public artist Sans Facon’s studio in Glasgow, looking at what was to become the descending promenade to Bristol’s floating harbour.
Each discipline had been working hard on their individual elements, but the solution was not gelling. Over the course of that day, we arrived at a solution that celebrated the journey of rainwater from roof to harbour through a series of integrated elements: hoppers; stone bowls; expressed drainage rills; and a garden of water plants. The team elevated a standard ‘sustainable urban drainage solution’ into something magical.
Big complex solutions – human scale solutions
The National Automotive Innovation Centre is almost certainly the most complex and technically challenging UK project we have ever taken on (so far…). Over eight years, Cullinan Studio put in nearly 70,000 person-hours into the project, from the very first briefing meeting where there was only a broad vision of what the clients wanted to achieve, through to handover and a post-occupancy evaluation.
When the building was on site, we have had separate teams working directly with the client; the contractor – as novated architects and also supplementing their design management team on site. Separately we had an interiors and workplace team working on the fitout design. To do this, we needed first-class organisation, stamina and technical excellence.
Recently the building was opened, and I had the chance to meet the many people we interacted with over those eight years of work, and who were exceptionally warm and enthusiastic about the building. One of the senior client team remarked it was like a family reunion.
It reminded me that we have an extraordinarily talented and flexible team, able to take on the largest and most demanding projects, as well as the smallest most personal projects for our clients, but who never forget it’s always really about working with the people who will use and benefit from the buildings when our work is complete.
Not Design and Build – a better way
I am passionate about finding a better way of making buildings. The process of turning a project from a design into built reality - the procurement process – can rarely be described as enjoyable, fair or even life-affirming in any way. I believe the Integrated Project Insurance contract (IPI), which is sanctioned by the cabinet office for use on publicly funded buildings, might just be the way to change all that.
We have just started on site at Dudley College for a new Institute of Technology building, with the IPI contract value demonstrably less than a Design and Build tender would be for the same building, and insurance in place assuring no cost over-run for the client. And the process is a breath of fresh air.
This method incentivises the whole design team and contractor to work together with the client to find the best project solution for their budget. The single contract approach removes a lot of the waste and blockages associated with traditional tendering, and works with an overall project budget so that the team can invest time designing out wasteful elements that add no value in the construction process.
I’d love to work this way a lot more. It demands changed behaviours from everyone, but it’s real and it’s achievable. Please get in touch if you have an upcoming project that is crying out for a new approach.