McLaughlin & Harvey: a 170-year legacy

After first meeting in 1850 as Foreman Mason and Foreman Carpenter during the construction of Crumlin Road Court House, Henry McLaughlin and William Harvey established a business as Builders and Contractors at York Street, Belfast in 1853.

Interestingly, there were no formal contract documents or deeds of partnership, but instead the partnership relied upon each other’s good faith. Throughout the last 170 years, McLaughlin & Harvey has continued to build its name as a trustworthy contractor with a reputation for high-quality projects.

Close to home

One of McLaughlin & Harvey’s first notable projects, Coleraine Town Hall, was not just personally significant to Henry McLaughlin – it was his hometown. It also marked a major occasion for the townspeople of Coleraine with a public holiday declared on 21 July 1857 when the first foundation stone was laid.

McLaughlin & Harvey successfully handed over the project to the Commissioners in February 1859, with a formal ceremony held in 2009 to celebrate 150 years of the building with employees of McLaughlin & Harvey in attendance.

148 years of healthcare experience

McLaughlin & Harvey’s first healthcare project, a three-storey Hospital for Skin Diseases in Belfast, was completed in 1875 and cost ￡3,000, which is equivalent to ￡442,883 in 2023. At the time of construction, it was regarded as the most complete of its kind, equipped with the best appliances and a suite of baths of every description. The hospital was supported by voluntary contributions for sixty-six years until in 1941 it was destroyed in the Blitz.

Other notable healthcare projects which pre-date the NHS include Belfast Maternity Hospital and St Luke’s Hospital in Armagh; where the original floor springs in the entrance hall are fitted with brass cover plates inscribed “McLaughlin & Harvey”, leaving a lasting legacy.

When the NHS was founded in 1948, it was the first universal healthcare system available to all and free at the point of delivery. Throughout the years, the NHS has adapted and evolved to suit the needs of each successive generation. To accommodate these innovations, the healthcare buildings themselves have also had to adapt.

Some of our more recent notable healthcare projects include Omagh Hospital & Primary Care Complex, the first of its kind in the UK; bringing together a range of primary, secondary and community healthcare services. As well as Altnagelvin Radiotherapy Unit in Londonderry, a unique cross-border service project which improved patient travelling times and provided more locally accessible services to patients from Western Trust area and the Republic of Ireland.

Another significant project, constructed during the COVID-19 pandemic, was the multi-phased redevelopment of the 5th-floor Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and 3rd-floor Neo-Natal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at the existing Chelsea & Westminster Hospital in central London. The hospital remained live and fully operational, making it a particularly sensitive and complex project due to the 24/7 critical nature of the environment. The redevelopment was one of the largest and most complex projects undertaken in the Hospital’s history.

Our current healthcare projects include a ￡16m hospice facility in Ayrshire, which involvesthe refurbishment of a listed building as well as new build elements, and a new ￡84m Critical Care Facility and Helipad at King’s College Hospital, London.

Building for business

Over the last twenty years, McLaughlin & Harvey has delivered over 11 million sqft of commercial space.

Some notable projects include the major redevelopment of the iconic Grade ‘A’ listed G1 George Square in Glasgow, and Barclays’ new state-of-the-art flagship headquarters in Glasgow which was completed in 2021. In 2020, we completed a new 18-storey office building which became BT’s new global headquarters, in central London.

This year, we completed the refurbishment and rooftop extension of a nine-storey building with two basement levels in central London, as well as the restoration and structural repair of Annexe Building for City of London Corporation.

Another London project currently on-site is our Eden Campus development which involves the construction and CAT A fit-out of two office blocks providing 280,000sqft of commercial accommodation along with a multi-storey car park. When completed, the buildings will be the new headquarters of the British-Dutch multi-national consumer goods company Unilever, bringing together employees from four other sites.

Not far outside of Oxford, at Culham Science Centre, we are currently undertaking our fourth project, the construction of a Main Gate facility alongside the associate infrastructure works, for United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA).

This year, we also completed a 2,560sqm extension to the current Oxfordshire Advanced Skills (OAS) facility to allow the expansion of their training programme to include Level 4-7 Apprenticeships in Space, Robotics, Nuclear Design, Energy Storage and Power Engineering.

Next year, we look forward to handing over UKAEA’s new office building, as well as New Bridge Street, a CAT A office refurbishment of a 1900's building in central London.

From beer to BMW

Throughout the 1880s, McLaughlin & Harvey continued to grow with various industrial projects across Belfast for a wide range of manufacturers, from linen and thread to tobacco and biscuits.

Throughout the first half of the twentieth century, McLaughlin & Harvey undertook contracts for Arthur Guinness Son & Co Ltd and constructed some of the iconic buildings still used today by the brewery.

In 1904, a fermenting house known as the Market Street Storehouse was constructed for ￡49,690, which is equivalent to ￡5m in 2023. After its closure in 1988, the storehouse was reopened to the public in 2000 under a new name – Guinness Storehouse at St James’s Gate Brewery – which has proved to be one of the most popular attractions in Dublin, hosting over 22,900,000 visitors since it opened.

In 1946, McLaughlin & Harvey continued their collaboration with the world-famous brewery, constructing the Guinness Power House. Due to their exceptional reputation and long-standing relationship with Guinness, McLaughlin & Harvey was the specifically selected for the project. The facility remained in use until 1993 when it was replaced by a gas-fire CHP plant. In 2018, the Power House was converted to a whiskey distillery for Roe & Co.

McLaughlin & Harvey’s involvement with some of the world’s most iconic distilleries and breweries continues to this day, with the company completing a variety of projects for long-standing clients Old Bushmills Distillery and William Grant & Sons, as well as Clydeside Distillery for Morrison Glasgow Distillers.

McLaughlin & Harvey has expanded its capabilities in the automotive industry, completing projects for notable clients as BMW Group, DeLorean, Lookers / Charles Hurst and Michelin Tyre.

In 1978, McLaughlin & Harvey was joined by Farrans in a joint venture for the DeLorean factory in Dunmurry, outside Belfast. The development was completed in April 1980 on a fast-track programme, with the first DeLorean rolling off the line in January 1981. Unfortunately, production was cut short and only approximately 9,000 were made before operations ceased in late 1982. That didn’t stop the DeLorean gaining a cult-like following for car enthusiasts after appearing in the Back to the Future movies.

In recent years, we have also worked collaboratively with BMW Group completing a number of projects including a new MINI steel pressing facility in Swindon in 2020.

Movie premieres to the Premier League

McLaughlin & Harvey’s cinema experience spans from the ‘silent’ cinemas of the 1910s, to the ‘talkie’ cinemas of the 1930s, up to the multi-screen cinemas we know today across a range of locations from London to Glasgow and Liverpool to Sunderland.

In the 1960s, we also moved behind the camera with a contract to construct indoor filming accommodation for Associate British Productions Ltd at Elstree Studios. This included construction of three new stages for the studio, as well as a new dressing room block, canteen block and a deep basement car park.

Twelve years later, the new stages were used to film scenes for Star Wars, as well as TV shows like Birds of a Feather, The Avengers, and The Tweenies. Elstree Studios was partly demolished in 1990 resulting in the loss of all stages except for 7,8 and 9.

In 2018 McLaughlin & Harvey commenced work at Liverpool Football Club’s AXA Training Centre in Kirby. The state-of-the art training centre brings together the club’s first team and academy operations for the first time.

This was not McLaughlin & Harvey’s first foray into the sports industry having previously completed projects for Bristol Sport, Leyton Orient Football Club, and Southampton Football Club. As well as numerous stadiums for the major sporting events such as the 2012 Olympic Games and the 2014 and 2022 Commonwealth Games.

In 2012, McLaughlin & Harvey completed a temporary stadium for the London 2012 Olympic basketball, handball, wheelchair rugby, and basketball tournaments. It was one of the biggest temporary venues ever erected for any Olympic and Paralympic Games, and the third largest venue in the Olympic Park.

Last year, Alexander Stadium was redeveloped for Birmingham City Council, which acted as the main venue for athletics, para-athletics as well as holding the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2022 Commonwealth Games.

Bridges and harbours

Our civil engineering capabilities have grown exponentially since handing over our first project in 1863, the construction Ormeau Bridge which spans the River Lagan in Belfast.

In the first half of the twentieth century, we worked on a number of notable projects within Belfast Harbour including a new shed for Harland and Wolff in 1897, the construction of a new graving dock in 1902 which was later used for the completion of the Titanic and her sister ships Olympic and Britannic. As well as the reconstruction of Musgrave shipyard delivery wharf in 1950.

In recent years, we constructed and fit-out a new port facility, Victoria Terminal 4, on an existing reclaimed 32-acre brownfield site within Belfast Harbour, and refurbished the existing Victoria Terminal 1 and Albert Quay linkspan in 2021.

Travellers on the Stena Line Ferry from Belfast to Cairnryan will be seen off by our Victoria Terminal 4 facility and welcomed to Scotland by another McLaughlin & Harvey project, the Loch Ryan Terminal & Port Development. Completed in 2011, the facility included the construction of the new 21,528sqft three-storey terminal, as well as the design and construction of 220m x 18m suspended jetty, and the realignment of A77 trunk road and construction of an at-grade roundabout. At its peak, the port had 149m travellers passing through.

Other notable projects which are currently on-site include Stornoway Deep Water Terminal, which will provide modern facilities to accommodate on and offshore wind farm vessels and support other energy sector activity, as well as some of the largest cruise liners, which will help boost the islands’ important tourism industry; and our DP World London Gateway Port Berth 4 Extension. Due to increasing container trade and container vessel visits, the current port development had reached capacity and the quay needed to be extended and a fourth berth created.

Another iconic coastal project undertaken by McLaughlin & Harvey is the reconstruction of the scenic tourist cliff path called The Gobbins in Larne. The original Gobbins path, opened in 1901, ran along the base of the cliffs of the scenic Antrim coast. It became a major attraction with a series of bridges, caverns and winding paths carved into the rock. However, it fell into disrepair and closed in 1951. Elements of the original structure remain, some of which have been removed for display in the visitor centre.

The reconstruction project consisted of the design & build of a series of twenty-three footbridges, and cantilevered walkways forming a 1km long pathway along the base of the 60m high cliff spanning between rock out-crops over the sea. It follows the original route and the iconic bridges, Tubular Bridge and Gordon’s Leap Suspension Bridge, have been reconstructed to match the originals, with the original steps carved into the rock and walkways retained.

Planes, trains and flood protection

McLaughlin & Harvey’s civil engineering expertise also includes the aviation, rail, and flood protection sectors.

The roots of which can be traced back to the spring of 1893 when works were completed at Portrush Railway Station. The original station, which was erected in 1855, was unable to deal with the increasing summer holiday traffic and had to be expanded. The new station had three platforms, each 600ft long, as well as railway offices, public rooms and travelling facilities, including a chalet-style newsagent’s sales kiosk.

In 1974, Portrush Station was the first building to be statutorily listed by the Historic Monuments and Buildings Branch of the Department of Environment for Northern Ireland.

Over the last 170 years McLaughlin & Harvey has been involved in a range of commercial aviation and air defence projects, including Project Curium at London Luton Airport, George Best Airport in Belfast, and Sumburgh Airport Revetment Remedials in Shetland. We are on-site at Farnborough Airport, increasing their overall hangar space by over 70% by constructing a new 175,000sqft state-of-the-art hangar facility.

In recent years, flood protection has been a priority for many local councils as a counteraction to flood risk their communities face. The risk of flooding is being accelerated by climate change causing milder and wetter winters. This year, we have completed flood protection schemes in Stonehaven for Aberdeenshire Council, Upper Garnock for North Ayrshire Council, and Broughty Ferry for Dundee City Council. We are due to complete works at Hawick for Scottish Borders Council in 2024. In total we have provided 13,428m of flood protection infrastructure and protected 1,553 businesses and 1,572 homes.

As we close out our 170th year celebrations, clients are still trusting McLaughlin & Harvey with their construction and civil engineering projects.