We are many things
That bit at the start of a job, when everyone’s still excited and wondering how we’re going to create whatever building it is we’re working on – that’s why we do what we do.
About Us
We are SPH Structures. We have drawn on extensive design and expertise within the London refurb and new build market to establish the firm. We are a young engineering firm, in personnel and history, but we aim to surround ourselves with the right people so that as a collective we can encourage, learn and build from each other to be the best engineers we can be! We are design engineers first and foremost (geeks a close second).
Our Process
We operate across stages 2-5 of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) plan of works which typically translates into planning / design and construction as shown below.
We Specialise In:
Airspace Developments
CLT
Glulam
Timber Frame
SIPS
Refurb and Listed Construction
Steel and Timber Connections
We Dabble In:
Foundations
Temporary Works
Lightweight and Steel Frame
Masonry
Concrete
Composite Design
Drainage
Where we areWe work at Ark Coworking. It’s a proper community, there’s a coworking bit next door with every business start-up you can imagine with people making that leap and doing it for themselves. We’re surrounded by what seems like mostly film producers or mens magazine people upstairs at the minute, a few charities, people writing their thesis and everyone in between. Needless to say we get our ears bent for the odd bit of advice here and there but it’s really nice being in an environment that isn’t just engineering and everyone is pushing and striving to make their own work come to life - that’s really cool.
Contact
Email Us
Call Us 0207 315 4147
M-F:9AM-5PM
Office Address237 Pentonville Road London N1 9NG
Registered AddressSuite 111, 48/48a Eaglewhard Road London N1 7ED
Sean Hanlon
Director, Founder & Engineer
A Brummie born and bred with various stints around the UK including the North-West and Wales but now based in London since 2012. Has been described as having an ‘infectious optimism’ by past colleagues - which we we’re taking as something good right?
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Temporary Works
We often work both sides of this coin. Predominantly on the principle designer side but sometimes also on the temporary works design. Even when we're not appointed to design the temporary works considering buildability of the project is so important and can often influence permanent works design decisions. We reviewed this document as a refresher for roles and responsibilities.
SCOSS
Love these documents. CROSS or Confidential Reporting of Structural Safety is a mechanism whereby Engineers can submit concerns they've seen on site or elsewhere from which SCOSS investigate and produce recommended practices. Some are project specific, other items affect the industry's approach. Each of which just as important as the last when it comes to Structural Safety.
Memberships & Affiliations
Statutory Instruments
These ones are kinda important...
Steel Vibration
This one had been bugging us for a while. We'd felt the need for a more thorough method of vibration checking on our steel elements so opened up SCI 354 and BS 6472 over the course of a couple of weeks and ploughed through both documents.
Masonry Robustness
We picked up on this as part of our robustness review. Decent. Eurocode picks up on a lot of the calcs stated within this but not all. useful little document to refer back to. Our approach has definitely been influenced by this document which are highlighted in the below notes.
Review of Robustness
No no no. This is our favourite! Took us the better part of two (2) weeks to digest it all but so good. Notes below incorporated into our calc package now.
Below Ground Structures
We're dealing with a lot more basements, both new and existing. So this was a must really.
Designing for Movement in Masonry
Ok. It started with BDA documents but then we soon lost a day after jumping onto a calc review to BS EN 1991-1-3 and eventually finishing with CIRIA 107 & the IStructE guidance by the end of the day. It all makes sense now with notes below.
Reuse of Foundations
No fancy cover. It does exactly what it says on the tin. We spent about half a day reading through this document and the various supporting BRE references as well. Useful.
Refurb
We're allowed to have favourites right? If so CIRIA 111 would be one of them. We spent a good few hours going through this document with the new staff picking out some pertinent points and refreshing some old in. Big fan of this document.
Foundation Settlement
We wanted to learn more about this so delved into the code (EC7) and guidance contained within Curtains Foundation Design manual.
Flitch Beams
These are like busses for us - and not the London kind. Don't see one for a couple of years and then suddenly their in favour again. We spent the day reviewing TRADA's guidance, EC5, EC3 and also dabbled with the New Age version and the relevant guidance on them.
Overall Stability
Sep 7, 2020 - Dec 17, 2020
As part of our continued development we've decided to review all IStructE stability documents between Sept and Christmas. Working our way through a chapter each week.
FE CPD
Writing Skills for Engineers at the IStructE
22 Nov, 2019
Writing Skills for Engineers with Penny Taylor. A great course! She was really clear, conice and engaging above all else. We learned a lot from this course and as a result will be ripping up our templates and starting again. Thanks Penny.
Thesis Publication!
11 Nov, 2019
We love this! So Vale took the decision to publish her thesis on the design of external facades in high rise buildings this week (back in Italy). She derived new equations for the behaviour and interface connections between new and existing structures. Yes Vale!!
Fire Safety Design: We need to talk about Timber at the IStructE
19 Jun, 2019
An evening lecture by Dr Angus Law who holds the Building Research Establishment Lectureship in Fire Safety Engineering and advised the UK Government Expert Panel on Fire Safety in the aftermath of the Grenfell Tower fire.
Property Accelerator
Presented by stradagroup.co.uk. Over the course of 7 months we dedicated a day per month to sit alongside established property developers seeking to learn more and understand more about every aspect of property development in a bid to better themselves and their businesses. So much learned on this course.
Solid Wood Solutions
21 May, 2019
A day long seminar and lecture event on everything solid wood related (CLT, Glulam etc). Best fact of the day when talking about a nine (9) storey structure in Finland, apparently the total amount of wood needed to construct the building is regrown in just twenty (20) minutes across the whole of Finland’s Forests during the summer – love that!
Light Scenography in Architectural Dimensions with Hideki Yoshimoto
29 Jan, 2019
Hosted by nkiliarchitecture.com. Amazing talk, blew our socks off. How Hideki gets from, say a gearbox for inspiration, to a high end fashion installation in Milan is mind boggling. He’s done some really cool installations, it was really interesting to hear his take on some of his work which can be seen on tangent.uk.com.
Two day training event on Temporary works at the IStructE
13 Feb 2019 - 14 Feb 2019
Our favourite event to date by a long way, and that was predominantly because of Mr Ray Filip of rkfconsult.co.uk. A real thorough and thought out teaching programme which covered pretty much every aspect of temporary works. Ray then added additional calc work and examples from his experience – really practical and useful. Loved it.
You, Me, CPD, Beer & Ping Pong
28 Feb, 2019
Lets be honest. We were sold on the name. A proper decent CPD by the crownstonegroup.co.uk on the practicalities of keeping water out of a basement, in addition to some technical requirements in accordance with BS 8102. And obviously we were big fans of the post CPD beers on this one.
Demolition and Structural Refurbishment at the IStructE
05 Mar, 2019
A day long event presented by Charles Treasure (wentworth-house.com) who has over 40 years experience in both temporary and permanent works, the management and coordination of the design process. Anyone with this much experience is always worth listening to, just to pick up on their experience and listen to past projects they’ve done.
Tall Timber Storeys from Scandinavia at the Building Centre
02 May, 2019
A short evening event, so a lot to cram in for a couple of hours. There were three (3) main speakers, all delivering on various aspects of Tall Timber projects their working on. Some interesting stuff going on, specifically the Skelleftea Cultural Centre which is worth keeping an eye on – 20 storey timber frame (no RC core for stabilisation).