ISG tops out at Shoreditch Village

ISG’s UK Construction London team recently ‘topped’ out at the Shoreditch Village project, as the team celebrated its latest milestone – reaching the highest point in the construction process.

The event took place with the honour of tightening the last bolt in the building’s structure given to the client; Brockton Capital’s Development Manager, Jason Evans.

Watched on by a small group of team members and the client, it was a time to celebrate the great work of the project team and partners, in reaching this important milestone.

ISG’s Project Director, Jim Knowlton said: “It is a great achievement to be ‘topping out’ at Shoreditch Village today.”

“The team has worked incredibly hard to get the project to this significant milestone, and despite the challenges we have all faced in the past year, we’re delighted with the progress made in reaching the highest point of this major development, on programme.”

The project

The team is delivering the shell and core for this scheme, which includes flexi-office space, 11 retail units and a new community market underneath. A steel frame forms the exoskeleton for the build, with its design in keeping with the local area’s architecture and heritage.

There have been a number of challenges associated with this project, namely the fact that there are a number of Victorian buildings close to the site, and that it is also situated next to a listed building.

Jim said of the project “A medieval priory sits underneath the new build, which we knew was there from during planning, so we have had to design around it, working closely with the archaeological teams.”

He added: “There is also a three metre Victorian brick sewer in the area, so again we’ve had to put a strong plan in place to work around this.”

The overground rail line which goes into Shoreditch High Street station runs just three metres from the project, so the team has had to deploy a special crane to lift materials in. The crane was situated on Shoreditch High Street, meaning the team had to closely liaise with Transport for London (TfL) and Hackney Council around bus suspensions and traffic diversions.

COVID-19 response

The project team has had to adhere to strict COVID-19 safety policies throughout the past year, and an action plan was quickly put in place to ensure the safety of all operatives on site.

All access controls have been upgraded to temperature monitoring and facial recognitions, meaning operatives no longer need to use touch entry to gain entry to the project. The site offices were retrofitted with protective Perspex screens to allow safe working in restricted areas, along with flexible working practices where possible to reduce the number of people on site at any one time.

The Shoreditch Village project is due to be handed over the client for the final fit out in late 2021.