Winners of the Hill & Smith PLC Safety Leadership Award

We’re proud to be the winners of the Hill & Smith Group Safety Leadership award.

The award was established to recognise businesses that show a commitment to ensuring the safety and well-being of its employees, while upholding a consistent health and safety culture.

The process required to achieve the award was extensive, with evidence required to showcase our commitment to health and safety in many areas including leadership, cultural improvements, employee engagement, incident reductions programs, and positive interventions.

David Hull, Head of Health and Safety at Hill & Smith, commented:

“The award represents commitment, consistency and courage to challenge. Joseph Ash was able to demonstrate that safety was not just a policy but a core value.”

Well done to everyone involved!

Joseph Ash Medway were proud to win the Product Supplier of the Year category in the Steel Window Association Awards for our galvanizing and powder coating services.

The Steel Window Association (SWA) is a trade organisation which represents the great majority of UK steel window and door manufacturers, ranging in size from the smallest of craft-based companies through to large, multi-site companies.

The Product Supplier of the Year category was new for 2025, and we were nominated by Steel Window Association members based on our ability to provide high-quality goods and services that assist them in delivering award-winning projects.

Dan Lyons (Commercial Manager) and Sacha Aarons (External Sales & Account Manager) were delighted to accept the award on behalf of the company from judge John Ramshaw, Technical Editor of Architecture Today.

The Steel Window’s Association also presented Dan and Sacha with a year’s free membership for Joseph Ash Galvanizing.

Thank you to those who nominated us, and congratulations to the other category winners!

The 56th Structural Steel Design Awards (SSDA) took place in late September at Christchurch, Spitalfields, marking another year of excellence in structural steelwork. As a proud Silver Sponsor of Steel for Life (which sponsors the event), Joseph Ash Galvanizing is thrilled to celebrate the winners, commended projects, and everyone who contributed to making the event a success.

The SSDA is an annual celebration highlighting steel’s versatility and value in construction, emphasising its cost-effectiveness, sustainability, innovation, and aesthetic appeal. This year’s entries again showcased remarkable diversity and complexity, demonstrating the very best in structural steel design.

The winning projects were:

• 8 Bishopsgate, London
• Aviva Studios, Manchester
• Beaulieu Parkway Bridge, Chelmsford
• Co-op Live Arena, Manchester
• n2 Nova Evolved, London
• Sky Innovation Centre, London

Commendations also went to:

• 4 Angle Square, NOMA, Manchester
• Bishops Square, London
• Clarice Pears Building, Institute of Health and Wellbeing, Glasgow
• Haymarket, Edinburgh
• Lucent, London
• One Great Cumberland Place, London
• Paddington Square, London

A Merit went to:

Holbein Gardens, London

National Finalists included:

• Allerdene Bridge, Gateshead
• Battersea Power Station Phase 3B, London
• Devon Place Footbridge, Newport
• Maggie’s Royal Free Hospital, London
• Plot 7B New Bailey, Salford
• Sky Studios Elstree, Borehamwood
• Tommy Taylor Memorial Bridge, Barnsley

Professor Roger Plank, Chairman of the Judges Panel said:

“The Awards scheme provides an opportunity for the sector to showcase excellence in the use of structural steel across a wide range of projects varying in nature, scale, regional location and budget. We were pleased to see the inclusion of so many large prestige commercial buildings this year, but we are just as interested in small projects of any type and would like to encourage a greater number of submissions across the widest range of structures.

“In conclusion I can say, on behalf of all the judges, that the awards, commendations, the single merit, and national finalists recognised in the Structural Steel Design Awards this year, reflect the impressive quality of the current steel construction industry, and everyone involved should be proud of what has been achieved.”

To read about each winner in detail, view the SSDA Winners Brochure.

The 55th Structural Steel Design Awards recently took place in London, where the much-anticipated project winners were announced and applauded. The 2023 SSDA Awards were open to steel-based structures situated in the United Kingdom or overseas built by UK or Irish steelwork contractors. Once more, the submitted projects displayed exceptional quality, celebrating structural steelwork at its finest.

Jointly sponsored by the British Constructional Steelwork Association and Steel for Life, this event was a magnificent celebration of steel’s manifold virtues, encompassing cost-effectiveness, sustainability, innovation, and aesthetic appeal.

Five outstanding champions emerged triumphant from a meticulously curated shortlist of contenders. Six projects also received commendations, and three received merits.

The five winners are as follows:

• Battersea Power Station, London
  
• Copr Bay Bridge, Swansea
  
• One Centenary Way, Birmingham
  
• Stockingfield Bridge, Glasgow
  
• HYLO, London

According to the BCSA website, Chairman of the Judges, Professor Roger Plank said: “The awards, commendations, merits and national finalists recognised in the Structural Steel Design Awards this year reflect the impressive quality of the current steel construction industry, and everyone involved should be proud of what has been achieved.”

Click here to read about each winner.

Congratulations to the winners and everyone who took part.

(Photo of Battersea Power Station by Edson Rosas on Unsplash / Award night photos provided by Steel for Life)

The annual Galvanizing Association Galvanizers Awards (GAGAs) will be announced next week (Friday 1 July), and we’re looking forward to it, especially as it’s a face-to-face event again.

Some amazing entries have made the shortlist, and we’re proud that some of the projects have been hot dip galvanized by Joseph Ash Galvanizing and Premier Galvanizing: The Hothouse by Cake Industries, The Whitby Trail by Emma Stothard Sculpture, the Swing Bridge by Tonkin Liu and Cake Industries, and Nest by Ian Gill Sculpture.

Here’s the full shortlist.

If you’re heading to the Ceremony next week, we wish you luck in winning one of the awards!

Great news! Joseph Ash Galvanizing has been awarded ISO14001, the international standard for designing and implementing an environmental management system.

The award has been granted to Head Office, as well as five of the plants: Joseph Ash Bilston, Joseph Ash Bridgend, Joseph Ash Chesterfield, Joseph Ash Telford, and Joseph Ash Walsall.

An environmental management system, often called an EMS, comprises the policies, processes, plans, practices, and records that define the rules governing how a company interacts with the environment.

Preventing companies from causing negative impacts on the environment are two of the most critical challenges facing businesses today. Achieving the ISO14001 standard shows we’re amongst the world’s businesses that care enough about the background to reduce our environmental footprint.

Congratulations to all our team members for achieving this latest standard!

Michael Worth, Head of Technical and ESG at Joseph Ash Galvanizing said “Everyone should be incredibly proud of their contributions to this achievement. This clearly demonstrates that our approach to managing our environmental impacts and our strategy to maximise environmental opportunities are on the right trajectory to delivering continual improvement in this area.”

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See some of the steps we take to minimise our impact on the environment in our Green Future plan.

We’re celebrating across the Joseph Ash Group, after landing another RoSPA Gold Award – the internationally-recognised award for demonstrating high health and safety standards.

We have received the RoSPA Gold Health and Safety Award for working hard to ensure our team members, customers, clients, and contractors get home safely to their families at the end of every working day.

Organisations receiving a RoSPA Award are recognised as being world-leaders in health and safety practice. Every year, nearly 2,000 entrants vie to achieve the highest possible accolade in what is the UK’s longest-running H&S industry awards.

The RoSPA Awards scheme is the longest-running of its kind in the UK, and receives entries from organisations across the globe.

Julia Small, RoSPA’s Achievements Director, said: “This is a fantastic and well-deserved accomplishment. All our award entrants demonstrate their unwavering commitment and passion for keeping people safe at work. By receiving this recognition Joseph Ash Galvanizing joins like-minded businesses and organisations worldwide, who represent the very best in their approach to Health and Safety. I would like to add my personal thanks for all the work that it has taken to secure this well-deserved award – congratulations to all those involved, who champion and drive up Health and Safety standards every day. You are a fantastic example to others in your sector.”

For more information about the RoSPA Awards visit www.rospa.com/awards

As we’ve moved into October, we’re pleased to reveal the SSDA 2020 winners, as announced by the British Constructional Steel Association (BCSA) last week on the Steel Construction website.

The winners are as follows:

• Tintagel Footbridge, Cornwall
• 52 Lime Street, London
• The Curragh Racecourse Redevelopment
• A14 Cambridge to Huntingdon Improvement Scheme
• Bath Schools of Art and Design
• Brunel Building, London

Commendations also went to:

• Mary Elmes Bridge, Cork City
• The Post Building, London
• Centre Building, London School of Economics
• Waterloo Station Roof Infill
• One Bartholomew Bart‘s Square, London
• The Standard Hotel, London

Merits went to:

• Scarborough Footbridge, York
• The Gravity Bar, Guinness Storehouse, Dublin

Congratulations to all the SSDA 2020 winners! Great achievements!

A special SSDA 2020 brochure (produced by the BCSA and Trimble Solutions (UK) Ltd in association with Kovic Design Limited) is available.

Matt Green and Myles Durward from Joseph Ash nominated for In-Comm Training and Business Services Awards

On 7 June 2019 the annual In-Comm Training and Business Services Awards were held at the ICC in Birmingham. The Awards celebrate and reward young apprentices and adult learners across the West Midlands, and this year team members from Joseph Ash Chesterfield were there to celebrate their training achievements.

Matt Green and Myles Durward have both been completing JAC Level 2 of In-Comm’s BIT training. As part of this course they are learning new skills to take back to Joseph Ash Chesterfield. Skills include looking at ways to be more efficient (and remove wastage) in the following plant processes: Overproduction, Transportation, Waiting, Inventory, Defects, Motion and Process.

Myles and Matt were both nominated for the ‘Learner of the Year: Continuous Improvement’ award, and on the night, Matt walked away with a ‘Highly Commended’ accolade.

Six other team members from Joseph Ash Galvanizing have also completed their Level 2 training, and alongside Matt and Myles, will be moving onto Level 3. A new team from Joseph Ash will also start Level 2. (Back row left to right: James Crookes, Matthew Phillips, Dean Holland, Matt Green. Front row left to right: Mark Payne, Myles Durward, Dave Foster (In-comm trainer), Wayne Smith)

Congratulations to all our team members endeavouring to learn new skills, improve our plants and further their careers. The commitment to learning is great! A special congratulations to Matt and Myles too.

Thanks for such a great event In-Comm!

‘BE, Well’ at Clerkenwell Design Week

We recently spent four days at Clerkenwell Design Week, showcasing the aesthetic beauty and sustainable benefits of galvanized steel, with the ‘BE, Well’ installation in St. John’s Square. The 9 x 3 x 4m pavilion shaped structure was built as part of a collaborative project between partners Haines Watts (who sponsored the project), WR-AP Architecture, John Cullen Lighting, Lionweld Kennedy, Berry Systems, and Joseph Ash Galvanizing. The event was a great success, with many people stopping by to interact with the installation and leave their ‘thought of the day’ in the well. In a week forecast for rain, we were also amazingly lucky with the weather. The sun shone all week, the steel glistened, and visitors to the event were able to enjoy all the Clerkenwell designs, inside and out, at their very best.

As we’ve now come to the close of such an amazing project, we thought we’d share some of the thoughts behind the installation from Sean Weston and Max Rengifo at WRAP Architecture, the architects leading the project.

Why were you attracted to the project?  

As an emerging architecture practice, we were excited to participate in Clerkenwell Design Week – such a renowned international design festival – and be given free reign on the design content by our sponsoring partners Haines Watts. Also, many of the installations at Clerkenwell Design Week in previous years had focused on the craftsmanship synonymous with the area. With our design we felt it was an interesting opportunity to focus on a more finite aspect of design and to work with one specific material – galvanised steel – to showcase its potential to the design world and to allow an alternative type of craftsmanship to be featured.

Can you describe the installation and its defining features?  

The ‘BE, Well’ pavilion is an investigation into the design potential of galvanised steel. In an age where sustainability is on the agenda of all design disciplines ‘BE, Well’ showcased the whole life longevity and potential beauty embodied in the galvanising process. The pavilion took visitors on a journey from utilitarian building products through to bespoke architectural elements, all showcasing the detailed beauty of galvanising.

As Clerkenwell Design Week was celebrating its 10^th anniversary, the pavilion featured a galvanised steel well as its centerpiece. We felt this was important as it would remind visitors that Clerkenwell originally had a well (hence the name!). The well within our installation acted as a place where visitors were asked to comment on the design industry, or simply leave their ‘thought for the day’.

What were your biggest challenges during the project?  

The biggest challenge we wanted to overcome was to ensure that a material – galvanised steel – that is usually used in either a utilitarian or industrial manner could be showcased with finesse and elegant detailing to promote its innate aesthetic properties. We believe we achieved this with the ‘BE, Well’ installation.

What is the meaning behind the pavilion’s name ‘BE, Well’? 

The ‘BE, Well’ name represented all the good things that the pavilion characterised: the protection and long-life expectancy that galvanising provides to steel; and a new physical well for Clerkenwell to attract positive thoughts about the design industry, Clerkenwell Design Week, or simply good ‘thoughts for the day’.

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Partnership roles

Haines Watts London, a top UK accounting firm, is sponsored the project. With decades long experience of working with some of the UK’s most prestigious architecture firms, they wanted to share their support for the architecture industry by sponsoring an up-and-coming young architecture practice to design the installation.

They chose WR-AP Architecture as the designers, a young London-based practice set up by Sean Weston and Max Rengifo in 2018, which specialises in creating beautiful buildings with delightful, memorable and enjoyable experiences for their clients and the environment.

As the installation was made from steel, Joseph Ash Galvanizing protected the metal using a batch hot dip galvanizing process from one of our plants.

Joseph Ash Galvanizing is part of Hill & Smith Holdings PLC. Two other companies within the Hill & Smith group – Berry Systems and Lionweld Kennedy – also made up the partnership. Berry Systems fabricated the steel, and Lionweld Kennedy fabricated the mesh grating.

The final company in the collaboration was John Cullen Lighting, the award-winning lighting specialist, who enhanced the installation with a variety of stunning lighting techniques.