Here is where we feature a 5 question interview with one of our contracts and construction team. This month we’ve got one of our Contracts Managers, Jack Skinner, in the hotseat…
1. What’s the best part of your job?
I enjoy the huge variety of work that landscaping provides, the pressure of a deadline, seeing the level of skill and quality of workmanship from the site teams and also the company culture and people at Bowles and Wyer.
2. What’s your favourite landscape?
I spent a lot of time in Cornwall growing up and would say the rustic and naturalistic coastlines are my favourite landscape
3. What are you working on now?
I am working on a few projects, mostly in Hampstead – and I have a couple of projects in the pipeline starting in the next few weeks.
4. What has been your most memorable project?
The Sky Garden was the most memorable – an 18 week programme compressed into 9 weeks, due to the building works overrunning – it was the first big project that I managed from start to finish. Logistically it was very complex, as the garden is 34-36 stories high and involved working at night to import and distribute the 400 tonnes of soil using a goods lift, a spider crane and multiple conveyer belts. The large tree ferns and trees were craned into the building just before the last panel of glass was installed and were the only things not be taken up via the goods lift.
5. What has been your most challenging project?
The New US Embassy in Battersea – a large semi-public realm £2m project that I spent 2 years managing. The level of security and bureaucratic paperwork were the most difficult elements to manage and the project had a total of 15,000 plants, 150 trees and six interior gardens on various different floors of the building – each floor with a different security protocol. The soil bags for the internal gardens had to be run through an airport security scanner individually and no phones were allowed on-site!
July 3, 2020
