ibp News

Richard Aylwin, MD, ACL, former City editor, Estates Times
Adrian Barrick, Editorial Consultant, former editor, Building
Giles Barrie, Managing Director, Strategic Communications, FTI Consulting, former editor
Property Week
Peter Bill, Freelance Journalist, former editor Building and Estates Gazette
Denise Chevin, Freelance editor and journalist, former editor Building
Mark Collins, Executive Director, CBRE
Tim Danton, Director, Danton Media, Consultant to Dennis Publishing
Rebecca Evans, Director of Content, De Havilland, former editor Construction News
Mark Hansford, Director, Engineering Knowledge, ICE, former editor NCE
Soraya Khan, Partner, Theis and Khan Architects
Mike Leonard, CEO, Building Alliance
Emma Maier, Freelance editor and publishing consultant, former editor Inside Housing
Dominic Morgan, Director, Ing media, former deputy editor, Property Week
Richard Northedge, City & Business Journalist, former editor, Sunday Business
Vanessa Norwood, Creative Director, The Building Centre
Peter Roper, Freelance Journalist, former editor New Builder
Dickon Ross, Editor-in-Chief, Engineering & Technology
Barbara Rowlands, Associate Professor of Journalism, London City University
David Saffin, CEO, Second Opinion Alliance
John Slaughter, Director, External Affairs, Home Builders Federation
Katherine Smale, Business Development Manager, Ferrovial, former correspondent, NCE
Caroline Thorpe, Freelance Journalist
James Whitmore, Tavistock, former City editor, Property Week
John Yadoo, Partner, Pryme Consulting

Details correct: August 2021

I think you will all agree that it has been quite a year, but hopefully we should see a return to something that is, if not normal, then closer to normal life as we begin to pick-up the pieces and engage with colleagues and face-to-face business challenges.

The lockdown has given the IBP executive board a chance to reflect and review where we are as a membership organisation, and to look at how we might want to shape the role of the organisation going forward.

The executive board has lots of ideas and you will hear more about these initiatives over the next months as we prepare for this year’s journalism awards. If you have any ideas that you would like to share with the board please let me know by email to: Harriett.Hindmarsh@aecom.com

Harriett Hindmarsh
Chair, IBP

Peter Bill, author and journalist, former editor Estates Gazette and Building magazine writes:

Graham was ‘Uncle Grumpy’ to his colleagues at Building. A nickname that captured the feelings off all who worked with a much-loved man whose irascibility never got close to covering his kindliness, gentleness and generosity. I remember him making a wooden window from scratch for a penurious sub-editor.

He was my first boss in journalism. I can see him now at Contract Journal in the early 1980’s, fag centred in mouth, hunched over a typewriter, squinting through the smoke at his copy, cursing his mistakes. (Those were days when you needed Tippex to make changes.) Then we would go to the pub and curse our employers.

At Building, in the late 1980’s, we were overpaying an outside firm of architects to produce fortnightly ‘on-site’ articles. Much better to have a trained engineer in-house, one who had worked on building sites. Graham’s maturity and experience gifting him the ability to establish rapport with nervous site managers. He would nod encouragingly as he half-whispered questions, half- apologising for asking. A style that teased out tales you would never find anywhere near a press release.

To know Graham was to be fond of Graham.

Andrew Pring, writer, editor and communications consultant, former editor Contract Journal writes:

What I remember most is how incredibly hard working and painstaking Graham was as a journalist, and how patient – until, that is, he exploded into a titanic rage when people’s idiocies (generally management’s) got all too much for him. We’d laugh about it in the pub afterwards, but he could get seriously worked up and I often thought his stress levels were too high for anyone’s good – but he got that way because he took his job seriously and wanted to do his very best each time he worked on something. A lovely bloke, and also very kind and thoughtful. Someone you could always rely on to watch your back.

Gerald Bowey, CEO IBP remembers:

A civil engineering graduate of Sheffield University Graham was an award winning journalist, being shortlisted for a IBP journalism award on several occasions and winning Technology Writer in 1988, Project Management Writer in 1990 and Building Journalist in 1996.

I first met Graham in the early 1980’s when I took over the role of director of The Campaign for Traditional Housing from Charles Knevitt, who had just moved on to The Times as their architecture correspondent. It was a controversial campaign, taking an industry dispute between the brick and block manufacturers and the timber frame housebuilders to the general public. Graham was a tough critic of the campaign but acknowledged the right of house buyers to know and understand how their home was built.

When I moved into PR and Graham to Building I remember well standing in the middle of a stone quarry with Graham pitching into the chairman of London Stone when the company had fallen on hard times and was seeking a buyer – I think I lost the account after the article appeared, but it was a great expose of failed management.

We remained good friends, he was one of IBP’s honorary auditors for several years, and we met for an annual lunch right up to last year. Graham was generous with his time and support for friends and to IBP, which will be greatly missed.

Denise Chevin, freelance editor and writer, former editor Building magazine writes:

I remember with such affection my days working with Graham. I was an eager rookie technical reporter who didn’t know a lintel from a lentil. As my boss, Graham was hugely encouraging and endlessly patient. And when I got chuntered at by the subdesk, as I invariably did, for being late with my copy on Friday evening, he would have a calming G&T or two waiting for me at the ‘Waterfront’, Building’s watering hole in South Quay. They were lovely days. I feel very lucky to have met Graham and to have worked with him.

Architectural writer and historian Jeremy Melvin gives this year’s talk on the colourful seventeenth century economist and financier, Nicholas Barbon, who turned property development into speculation and invented fire insurance.

‘It was not worth his while to deal little; that a bricklayer could do‘ an admirer wrote of Wren’s contemporary Nicholas Barbon. This  assessment contains the key to how Barbon transformed London: he turned property development from an extension of construction (bricklaying) into fully fledged speculation — where it has been ever since.

Barbon invented the concept of risk management through founding the first fire insurance company. His tracts, like ‘An Apology for the Builder’ and ‘Of Trade’, argued the benefits of continuous economic growth backed by expansion of credit. This led Karl Marx, with grudging approval, to make ‘Old Barbon’ the first economic authority he cited in Das Kapital.

Jeremy Melvin was formerly consultant curator to the Royal Academy architecture programme, he is Programme Curator for the World Architecture Festival and a visiting professor at the Bartlett School of Architecture.

The Talk and Q&A session will be chaired by Paul Finch, programme director of the World Architecture Festival and editorial director of the Architectural Review and Architects’ Journal.

Limited tickets are available to attend in person at St Bride’s, Fleet Street, and the event will also be streamed live on YouTube. Click here to register:

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/wren-talk-2020jeremy-melvin-online-in-church-registration-123350347209

The following nominations have been made in the IBP Annual National Journalism Awards for 2020.

Please note the nominations are listed alphabetically and the winner in each category will be announced at the Annual Journalism Awards streamed event on the evening of Thursday 19th November. If you have not already done so, please put this date in your diary.

Ike Ijeh, London Architecture Works
Elizabeth Hopkirk, Building Design
Robert Wilson, Architects’ Journal

Rob Horgan, New Civil Engineer
Jordan Marshall, Building
Ian Weinfass, Construction News
Fran Williams, Architects’ Journal

Peter Apps, Inside Housing
Lucie Heath, Inside Housing
Jack Simpson, Inside Housing

Peter Apps, Inside Housing
Nathaniel Barker, Inside Housing
Zak Garner-Purkis, Construction News
Martina Lees, The Times and The Sunday Times
Jack Simpson, Inside Housing
Richard Waite, Architects’ Journal

Luke Cross, Social Housing
Mike Phillips – Bisnow
David Price, Construction News

Peter Apps, Inside Housing
Nathaniel Barker, Inside Housing
Lucie Heath, Inside Housing

Lucie Heath, Inside Housing
Megan Kelly, Construction News
Thomas Lowe, Building

Architects’ Journal/Architectural Review/EMAP: W Awards and Programme
Building/Assembled Media Group: The Building Awards 2019
Dezeen: Virtual Design Festival (VDF)

Marcus Fairs, Dezeen
Jamie Harris, Freelance (formerly Building magazine)

Louisa Clarence-Smith, The Times
Joey Gardiner, Building
Jack Simpson, Inside Housing

EDITORIAL BRAND OF THE YEAR
Sponsored by Marley

Architects’ Journal
Building
Construction News
Dezeen
Inside Housing

THE IBP JOURNALIST OF THE YEAR
Sponsored by AECOM

The overall Journalist of the Year Award will be chosen from the winners of the individual categories

Adrian Barrick, Editorial Consultant, former editor, Building

Giles Barrie, Managing Director, Strategic Communications, FTI Consulting, former editor Property Week

Peter Bill, Freelance Journalist, former editor Building and Estates Gazette

Denise Chevin, freelance editor and journalist, former editor Building

Mark Collins, Executive Director, CBRE

Tim Danton, Director, Danton Media, Consultant to Dennis Publishing

Peter Day, Correspondent, BBC ‘In Business’ programme

Catherine Edmunds, Strategic Events and Content, AVEVA

Rebecca Evans, Director of Content, DeHavilland, former editor Construction News

Soraya Khan, Partner, Theis and Khan Architects

Mike Leonard, CEO, Building Alliance

Toby Lewis, CEO, Live Group

Dominic Morgan, Director, Ing media, former deputy editor, Property Week

Richard Northedge, City & Business Journalist

Andrew Pring, writer, editor, communications consultant, former editor Contract Journal

Alasdair Reisner, CEO, CECA, former journalist on Construction News

Peter Roper, Freelance Journalist, former editor New Builder

Dickon Ross, Editor-in-Chief, Engineering & Technology

Barbara Rowlands, Associate Professor of Journalism, London City University

David Saffin, CEO, Second Opinion Alliance

John Slaughter, Director, External Affairs, Home Builders Federation

Ruth Slavid, Architecture Editor & Journalist, former editor AJ Online

Caroline Thorpe, Freelance Journalist

Jenny Watt, Marketing Manager, The Built Environment Trust

James Whitmore, Tavistock, former City Editor, Property Week

John Yadoo, Partner, Pryme Consulting

Details correct May 2020

IBP JOURNALISM AWARDS 2018 – JUDGES

Claer Barratt, Personal Finance Editor, Financial Times

Adrian Barrick, Editorial Consultant, former editor, Building

Giles Barrie, Managing Director, Strategic Communications, FTI Consulting, former editor Property Week

Peter Bill, Freelance Journalist, former editor Building and Estates Gazette

Mark Collins, Executive Director, CBRE

Tim Danton, Director, Danton Media, Consultant to Dennis Publishing

Peter Day, Correspondent, BBC ‘In Business’ programme

George Demetri, Editor, Designing Buildings Wiki

Catherine Edmunds, Strategic Events & Content Director, AVEVA

Rebecca Evans, Director of Content, DeHavilland, former editor Construction News

Soraya Khan, Partner, Theis and Khan Architects

Mike Leonard, CEO, Building Alliance

Toby Lewis, CEO, Live Group

Dominic Morgan, Director, Ing media, former deputy editor, Property Week

Richard Northedge, City & Business Journalist

Andrew Pring, writer, editor, communications consultant, former editor Contract Journal

Alasdair Reisner, CEO, CECA, former journalist on Construction News

Peter Roper, Freelance Journalist, former editor New Builder

Dickon Ross, Editor-in-Chief, Engineering & Technology

Barbara Rowlands, Associate Professor of Journalism, London City University

David Saffin, CEO, Second Opinion Alliance

John Slaughter, Director, External Affairs, Home Builders Federation

Ruth Slavid, Architecture Editor & Journalist, former editor AJ Online

Caroline Thorpe, Freelance Journalist

Jenny Watt, Marketing Manager, The Built Environment Trust

James Whitmore, Tavistock, former City Editor, Property Week

John Yadoo, Partner, Pryme Consulting

This list is comprehensive and correct at the time of posting

Details Correct: July 2019

IBP’s 50th anniversary brings an opportunity both to reflect and to cast our minds forwards to the future.

The organisation’s beginnings date back to the meeting of a handful of construction industry journalists in a Rotterdam pub in 1969. Their common aim was to seek and provide “mutual friendship, help and information”. Five decades on, the core purpose of IBP remains unchanged.

Now, as then, the specialist media has a crucial role in informing, scrutinising and holding decision-makers to account. Now, as then, our members possess unique insight based on unrivalled knowledge.

The built environment is a bricks and mortar industry of huge significance to the economy. It is also socially and politically pivotal. During the past year, IBP members have continued their proud tradition of informing public discourse on topics as varied as prime ministerial hopeful Boris Johnson’s ill-fated £53m garden bridge, to the Grenfell Tower tragedy, the collapse of Carillion, and HS2.

IBP continues to support members, bringing together journalists and communications professionals from the construction, design, property and housing sectors. We recognise and celebrate excellence. We promote common interests and learning.

In 2018, the Communication and PR Awards once again celebrated the talent, knowledge and dedication of members. From London Communication Agency’s highly creative Slideatron project, which involved erecting a giant Christmas-themed slide at Wembley Park, to Liz Male’s diversity campaign at Mipim, winning entries were varied and impressive. FTI’s Ellie Perham-Marchant wowed the judges with the range, impact and passion of her work to take home the Young Communicator of the Year award.

The 45th IBP Journalism Awards opened with an address from ACE chief executive Hannah Vickers, who provided a fascinating insight into her journey crossing over from HM Treasury. The awards were once again judged by a respected expert judging panel, and highlighted the quality and value of committed, long-term investigative journalism. The national and regional media were strongly represented, alongside the built environment B2B titles.

IBP’s anniversary year kicked off with ‘Build on 50’, a series of events and activities to prompt debate about the future of the built environment media. The programme got off to a strong start with a re-launched IBP Futures Group series. Over 80 members gathered to take part in the “Investigative Impact: making investigative journalism go further and faster” and hear from two Orwell Prize shortlisted reporters: Madison Marriage, whose undercover investigation blew open the Presidents Club scandal and Jane Bradley, whose ‘From Russia with Love’ series shone a light on murders on British soil.

In the next session, Richard Fletcher, Business Editor, The Times joined a panel of young journalists and an audience of communicators to discuss the challenges we all face in engaging with Gen Z.

It is a great honour, as 15th IBP president, to have the opportunity to look back at past achievements and contribute towards shaping the organisation for the future. IBP is run for and by its members, and your involvement and input will underpin our work in the coming years. I urge all members to think about what you would like to see from IBP and get involved in creating that future.

I warmly thank all board members – past and present – for generously giving their time and expertise at meetings and working groups. On behalf of members, I thank Gerald Bowey for his commitment, service and direction over the years.

I look forward to continuing to work with members as we Build on 50.

Emma Maier
President, IBP
Portfolio director, Inside Housing, Ocean Media