Timeline - Bray & Slaughter

Demonstrating an exceptionally long standing history of working within the south west, our timeline provides an insight into where it all began for Bray & Slaughter and the continuation of our success in delivering high quality construction projects for our valued customers.

Formed in 1900 as a collaboration between the successful general building contracting business of Sydney Slaughter and building services engineer Percy Bray. From its original base on the south side of the River of Avon the business traded successfully as a partnership throughout the beginning of the nineteen hundreds.

1900

The founders lineage was preserved when Percy J Bray and Sydney Richard Slaughter joined the business, shortly after the famous Wall St crash of 1929. Changes in legal structures and corporate governance saw the partnership become a limited company in 1934, with premises on Kingston Road, Bedminster. During this period the company constructed many well known, commercial, municipal and ecclesiastical buildings across the region, including Knowle Racecourse, Brooks Dye Works, Church of the Holy Nativity and the development of properties along Frayne Road. Brooks Dye Works Chimney just off the M32 and the green patina of the spire on Wells Rd have been landmarks on the Bristol skyline for over 100 years.

1934

The company continued to prosper late in to the 1930’s, however its resilience was severely tested when the new premises at Lydstep Terrace were directly struck during German bombing on the night of 22nd April 1941, an event which became known as the Bristol blitz.

Determined to continue to trade and support the war economy, the company set up business in the adjacent premises of Holy Cross Church on Dean Lane.

1941

Post war the business took the opportunity to acquire a new freehold, moving to Parson Street, which provided offices, storage for plant and materials plus a joinery mill dedicated to supporting our sites with high quality bespoke manufactured items.

We continue to serve our clients from this location and our head office functions and plant store remain on the site, supporting projects across the south west and wales.

As the economy stabilised our client base diversified to include large international businesses such as Masson Scott Thrissel and The Westminster Bank, augmented with local hospitals and schools, where our ability to work in occupied buildings to demanding programmes were highly valued by clients.

1946

Following the retirement of Sydney Richard Slaughter in 1976 the ownership of the business was divested to private individuals and we have remained a closed limited company since this point. During this decade our working relationship with what became NatWest Bank flourished and our workload grew to match the boom in the financial services sector.

Our ability to retain control of the construction process through directly employed tradesman and careful planning made us a natural choice for fast track refurbishments, ATM roll outs, self service banking and cat b fit outs. The high level of collaboration, focus on the customer and quality of product foreshadowed the latham and eganite principles which would re shape the industry at the end of the 20th Century.

1976

At the start of the new millennium, which marked 100 years in business for B&S, the company was well placed to deliver schemes in the rapidly developing HE sector, the culture of timely delivery and customer focus led to a steady pipeline of projects across University estates. As our expertise grew and the HE landscape devolved, we have been able to leverage this knowledge to deliver student accommodation schemes for the private sector and PBSA remains a key sector for the business.

2000

In recent years our track record of repurposing old stock and the relaxation in planning policy around change of use have seen us bring a number of high end residential and mixed used schemes to market across the region, this culminated in 2017 with the delivery of One Bristol, a landmark project incorporating sky gardens, exquisite penthouses and 148 centrally located apartments.

Complimenting our portfolio has been a steady stream of manufacturing and science/technology focused projects for the likes of Lucozade Ribena, Yell.com, Horizon Nuclear and Dyson. In recent years we have seen a rapid increase in collaboration between our HE clients and the private sector, through start ups incubators and innovation hubs. This crossover and blurring of lines between diverse stakeholder groups places an emphasis on contractors who can manage change while collaborating with specialists during the pre construction phase.

2017

As we enter the new decade our purpose remains aligned with those of our founders, which is to focus on the provision of a first class service to our clients in the healthcare, education and commercial sectors of the market, with an emphasis on repurpose and re use of the existing building fabric where possible.

2020 and beyond