Client: The Guinness Partnership
Sector: Social housing and supported living
Services: Passive fire protection – fire doors, fire compartmentation and fire stopping
Our Client
The Guinness Partnership was founded over 135 years ago and is one of the largest housing providers in England. Guinness is committed to improving people’s lives by providing as many high-quality affordable homes as possible, and the housing services that residents most need. It has more than 160,000 residents across the country, living in more than 70,000 homes.
Fire Safety Framework Appointment
The aim of this fire safety framework is to enhance the infrastructure of The Guinness Partnership’s residential assets to reduce the risk of fire and to maintain stringent safety standards to protect residents.
Trail Group was awarded a place on this framework as one of three contractors to undertake passive fire safety work for Guinness in the South of England, over four years.
All our passive fire safety works are carried out in compliance with strict FIRAS regulatory standards.
Our contract for Guinness includes installing fire compartmentation and fire stopping in both residential housing and sheltered accommodation.
Lefevre Walk Estate, London
We have undertaken fire compartmentation work for two residential buildings on the Lefevre Walk Estate in London. In each flat, our teams removed plasterboard ceilings and installed fire batts before reinstating ceilings with fire-rated access hatches.
Fire batts restore the fire resistance of walls and floors which have been penetrated by pipes and cables and are an effective solution to providing additional fire protection to help maintain the fire rating of compartment walls.
We have also undertaken fire compartmentation work in the communal areas and to seal lift shafts in both blocks.
Friendship House, Portsmouth
Friendship House is an independent living scheme in Southsea near Portsmouth. This is an older building which required upgrading work to reinstate the fire performance of compartment walls and floors. These had been penetrated by combustible pipes which required fire stopping with the use of intumescent pipe collars to all flats.
Other projects for Guinness have included:
- Fire stopping in the roof space of a care home in Rainham, Essex
- Compartmentation works in lofts, communal areas and lift shafts for 8 buildings on the Fulham Palace Road Estate in Hammersmith over three phases.
- Compartmentation of communal areas and lift shafts for 6 buildings on the Southwold Road Estate in Hackney
- Fire doors at Cowslip Court in Waterlooville.
22 Housing Blocks Across the Southeast
Our latest batch of projects for Guinness is to survey 22 buildings of residential flats and sheltered housing for passive safety compliance before undertaking the remediation works required. This will include fire stopping, fire compartmentation and fire doors – both in residents’ flats and communal areas.
The projects are located across the Southeast, from London to Ipswich, Milton Keynes and Portsmouth.
Challenges and Outcomes
- Obtaining access to residents’ homes to undertake the fire safety works
- Minimising disruption to residents is critical, particularly elderly and vulnerable people in supported living
- Providing full traceability of all work in progress and access to fire safety documentation for Guinness’s project teams.
Customer Insight
Malik Cissé, Project Delivery Manager, The Guinness Partnership:
“Fire compartmentation is critical to maintaining residents’ safety. Trail Group has a good team in place with the required accreditations to deliver this work for Guinness, and who respond promptly to our needs.
A stand-out point for us is how Trail stores data and the level of transparency that gives us. Being able to access a shared drive ensures all fire safety documentation is in one place, and it gives us full traceability for the fire compartmentation work. We can see the progress of every project at any point in time and review any comments and project images. It allows us to better manage workflows and in compliance with the latest regulations. This is helpful for the works on mid to high-rise housing blocks that I am responsible for.”
Main image – courtesy of The Guinness Partnership
