The year that is rapidly drawing to a close - the tenth year since RMA was founded – has, I’m glad to say, been a good one for us. The team, nine of us at present, have been together much more in the office, and enjoying the beautiful grounds of Hatfield House. We have also though stretched the possibilities of remote working on occasion, with simultaneous input at one point from India, Poland and Seattle. Finding times for team Zoom meetings was challenging!

Over the last year important planning permissions for retirement villages have been granted in Tunbridge Wells and Bishops Waltham – the latter after a five year delay! – and care home applications have been approved at appeal in Chapelfield near Epping Forest and Crawley down, Mid-Sussex. Current projects in the same fields are in Surrey, Hertfordshire and Sutton – a total of 240 dwellings for older people and 110 car home beds.

On the listed buildings side we have very much enjoyed working on the spectacular 1904 house near Henley where Ian Fleming spent part of his childhood, with a setting and interiors of truly extraordinary quality. We are also embarking on work for two different churches. In Lindfield, West Sussex, we are involved with improvements to their church hall; a fifteenth century, grade two star former pub known as the Tiger, while in St Albans we are commencing a study shortly on a listed Georgian Methodist church. Two of our private house projects in Harrow and Elstree are also for listed buildings from 1910 and 1680 respectively, and are both now complete.

A third private residential project involves refurbishing, extending and adding a pool to a very fine twelfth floor penthouse in Westminster, and we are also working on major repairs to a striking, highly contemporary house in North London, a very welcome local project in Welwyn Garden City, our GP surgery in Southall where the first phase is now complete, and a major office reclad and retrofit in our old stamping ground in Clerkenwell.

Expert witness instructions have meanwhile been coming in increasing numbers for both Richard and Yarema, involving major fires, planning problems, fee disputes and a whole range of other problems. Such work can be very eye opening into the abilities and occasional weaknesses of our fellow architects.

Lastly, but certainly not least, Richard continues, as chair of RHGuk, to be involved in hugely important task of lobbying ministers to get a level playing field for older peoples housing in planning terms. Frustratingly we now have our fifth housing minister this year which makes any form of progress difficult in the extreme.

Enough! If you have got this far, thank you for your interest and we send you all our very best wishes for Christmas and 2023

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