Projects

Prestige Retail Site,
Sloane Street

Chelsea & Kensington, London

Brief

To increase retail space by opening into basement and renovating retail unit & shop fronts. Following commencement of works, the supporting steel work was found to have lost integrity and the brief was widened to allow for complete reinstallation of new support structures.

Description

This retail unit is situated on the ground floor of an Edwardian block. It was a dedicated retail shop site from inception with residential apartments above. The shop front consisted of particularly high quality construction materials with solid granite columns on the exterior and traditional ormate timber and both flat and curved glass shop front windows.

Project Details

Careful removal of shop fronts retaining the existing cast iron airflow /decorative grilles. The grilles where in poor condition, requiring expert renovation.

Space
In order to comply with building regulations, the conversion of the basement to an extra retail space meant the excavation of existing floor slabs down to another 350mm and casting of a new floor. In the process, a survey of existing structural steel showed it was defective and unsafe. New steel work commissioned and installed using heavy lifting gear to assist with installation.

Improvements/renovations
The pavement lighting (glass grilles in walkways) was alos in need of repair due to leaking. New pavement lights where cast on site.

At some point in time two of the highly attractive pink granite columns had been removed. Our clientwanted the building to be returned to its original state. Woodmand & Blount searched for4 and sourced an exact match the existing granite mined in Italy and transported to the UK to be cut to the size required. Each slab weighed 335 kgs which involved heavy machinery and significant man power to install.

Once the granite was installed the new shop fronts could be installed. These were bespoke shop fronts crafted by our joinery suppliers (SRS joinery). The shop front had a curved frontage which meant the new glass would have to be curved to fit. A template was taken of the shop front and a sand mould was made. The 'glass' was then placed on the mould and heated to fit the mould.

Electrical
Complete rewire and installation of new fire alarm system.

Decoration
The shop interior left as neat, tidy shell for incoming tenant shop fit and décor.