A year in review with Clancy’s specialist heritage engineering consultant
Article posted on: 13 February 2023
12 months ago, Claudio Corallo joined us as Divisional Director based in our London office to lead the heritage engineering team.
Chartered with both the ICE and IStructE, and holding the specialist heritage and conservation accreditation, CARE, Claudio’s experience is wide-ranging and includes several prestigious, award-winning schemes such as the Queen Diamond Jubilee Galleries at Westminster Abbey. Past projects vary from listed residential buildings and commercial properties to historic bridges, and world heritage sites through to cathedrals and ecclesiastical buildings.
A year into his role, we took the opportunity to catch up to ask how his first year at Clancy has been and his future plans for the heritage engineering team.
How has your first year at Clancy been? What’s been your proudest moment?
This first year has been very exciting and extremely multi-faceted in my role and functions. I have divided my time between developing the business and leading and delivering our technical services, while at the same time contributing to the running of the London office as Divisional Director. Clancy’s buy-in into the vision for the heritage division has been fundamental, and I have worked closely with the marketing team, finance and commercial team, and regional offices to embed the heritage function in Clancy’s systems and leverage the internal know-how to deliver on the business plan.
Image credit: Dean & Chapter of Westminster
My proudest moment has been the recent appointment to the Westminster Abbey Fabric Commission as the only structural conservation engineer amongst a group of exceptional advisors to the Abbey. The appointment was publicised by the Institution of Civil Engineers and received great interest from many in the sector and from my extended network. This has strengthened our reputation in ecclesiastical engineering, and I am already seeing signs of a surge of enquiries in this field.
As one of only a handful of CARE Accredited engineers in the country, how does this influence your project working/development of your schemes? How does this make a difference to projects?
The CARE accreditation is based on successfully demonstrating a good mix of both theoretical knowledge and practical experience in the conservation of architectural heritage. For our clients this is a reassurance that we will look at a project holistically, for example, going beyond the engineering aspects, giving due consideration to the significance of the structure, understanding the history of a building, and assessing how safety has been provided to date.
In practice, this translates into more time and attention dedicated to the structural and safety assessment in the early stages, and a more detailed and sensible approach to the calculations later on. As a result, our schemes are normally more sympathetic to the heritage asset, make greater use of the existing structure, and are generally less invasive.
This benefits our clients in achieving a speedier approval process, improved buildability on site, and reduced costs due to the re-use of the existing structural elements.
What are the top three projects you’ve worked on since joining Clancy?
The National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF) funded Union Chapel Sunday School Project has been the first NLHF project of the year, and I am delighted to have returned to the Chapel over 10 years after completion of my first project for this enchanting Grade I and II Listed complex of buildings. The project aims are centred on the local community, and I believe this is a great example of how our heritage can improve people’s lives and contribute to the social fabric of an area.
Sunday School Stories, Union Chapel, Islington: Before (Image credit: Daniela Sbrisny)
Sunday School Stories, Union Chapel, Islington: After (Image credit: Natalia Zwardon)
In the ecclesiastical sector, I have inherited two very different but equally exciting projects in St Lawrence Jewry next Guildhall for the City of London (CoL) and St Mary Mundon for the Friends of Friendless Churches (FoFC), both Grade I Listed. The former is a multi-million-pound refurbishment of a grand church built by Christopher Wren after the Great Fire, which included re-roofing, re-servicing, and general conservation work to the stonework. The latter is a charming remote countryside medieval parish church which was dilapidated in the 1970s when it was taken in the care of the FoFC, and which we rescued from severe subsidence thanks to the Covid19 Culture Recovery Fund.
In the residential sector, we have secured some very interesting extension and refurbishment projects of listed buildings, all comprising subterranean developments. For these projects we have been able to combine Clancy’s heritage, geotechnical, and civil engineering services to deliver robust, viable and effective engineering solutions, assisting our clients to navigate through the many hoops of the statutory consents required.
Tell us a bit about how you got into heritage in the first place and how you’re developing your career.
My Structural Engineering Masters degree course in Italy had one exam on the safety assessment and rehabilitation of structures, with a focus on brick masonry. I was immediately fascinated by the subject and felt, and still strongly feel now, that this is a field where the skillset and experience of the engineer can make a significant difference on the outcome of the project. I enjoyed the subject so much that I completed a second Masters degree in Structural Analysis of Monuments and Historical Constructions, which set the trajectory of my professional career.
Since 2018 I have concentrated my efforts on the wider societal and market aspects of the heritage world, for example, how the sector is evolving and how this profession will change in 10 or 20 years, how we position a successful team in this market, how we embrace change, and continue to deliver value for our clients. I explored these themes as part of my Executive MBA at Warwick Business School, which ultimately led to the business plan for Clancy’s heritage team.
More recently I have been focusing my attention on the environmental aspects of our heritage projects, particularly in light of the net zero targets, the discussion about prioritising retrofitting to rebuilding, and the shifting society and industry attention to carbon emissions. This is where I believe our upskilling will have to concentrate in the next few years, to make sure of being ready to lead in the delivery of the change that society expects of us.
A look ahead – in three years’ time what are your ambitions for the heritage team at Clancy?
Our ambitious three-year business plan is to lead Clancy to sit amongst the top heritage engineering consultants in the country by delivering engineering solutions of the highest quality. We have a steep ramp ahead of us to achieve this, but have in year one climbed this steadily, securing prominent projects which will be key in forming a base for growing and consolidating our presence in the next few years.
We aim to become an employer of choice for talented heritage professionals, and we are striving to nurture the environment and culture to allow this.