Architect agency employed to design Grenfell refurbishment closure blocked

The architect firm, who were hired to design Grenfell Tower refurbishment and saw flammable cladding wrapped around building, has been blocked from shuttering. 

Studio E – the firm who led the design of Grenfell Tower’s refurbishment – has been in the process of closing down for more than four years. 

But despite the business being in liquidation it cannot shut as long as investigations into the fire, which devastatingly tore through the block and killed 72 people, are active, The Times reports. 

During this week’s public inquiry into the disaster, it emerged Studio E holds a ‘very significant degree of responsibility’ when it comes to the tragedy of Grenfell.

This is due to the company’s part in decisions made on materials used among other failings, where they prioritised cost-cutting over safety, leaving the block encased in highly flammable cladding. 

Studio E’s ‘cavalier attitude’ concerning fire safety rules was also laid bare during this week’s public inquest.

It also emerged that the managing architect, Bruce Sounes, had no prior experience in overcladding residential towers, The Times reports. 

The public inquiry revealed they were ‘troubled’ by his lack of due diligence when fully reading product certificates. 

The official guidance from the Crown Prosecution Service on corporate manslaughter states that, even if a company is in liquidation, there is no legal obstacle to initiating prosecution, and steps can be taken to prevent the company from being dissolved.

According to the advice, when the company is dissolved and withdrawn from Companies House – a procedure that can take up to a year – a company can’t be prosecuted.

In his withering 1,700-page report, chairman Sir Martin Moore-Bick condemned ‘unscrupulous’ firms and ‘deliberate’ lies about fire safety tests. 

He also placed blame on a culture of ‘systematic dishonesty’ among building firms who supplied cladding, as well as politicians, who failed to act on safety warnings over the course of 20 years. 

He also deemed contractors Rydon along with architect Studio E took ‘a casual approach and believed another firm was responsible for fire safety regulations. 

Andrzej Kuszell, one of the founder’s of Studio E, has extended an apology to the survivors of Grenfell, as well as those who lost loved ones during the inquest. 

Reiterating he was ‘really, really sorry’, he said: ‘Absolutely every one of us would wish to turn the clock back.’ 

He continued: ‘I have to say that if we had understood that building regulations were not robust … this is so sad to say but I don’t think this tragedy would have happened, and it really cracks me up, because it shouldn’t have happened.’ 

Police and prosecutors were under mounting pressure to speed up their Grenfell investigation yesterday.  

Angela Rayner demanded that they act ‘as quickly as possible’ after it emerged it could be ten years after the 2017 blaze before bereaved families see any justice. The Deputy Prime Minister said: ‘Justice delayed is justice denied.’

In May 2020, Studio E went into voluntary liquidation but has still not closed and remains on Companies House. 

A liquidator of the business’ has said its shuttering is ‘entirely’ dependent on the conclusion of the inquiry, according to The Times.

Legal sources told the publication there was ‘little point’ in placing corporate prosecutions against liquidated companies as there would be no assets to recoup.

The Metropolitan Police have warned it will take them 12 to 18 months to examine Sir Martin’s report ‘line by line’, with charges of corporate manslaughter, as well as ross negligence manslaughter, being considered.

Nineteen companies as well as 18 individuals are currently under investigation, according to the force, but no suspects have been named. 

There is growing anger at the shocking details exposed by the long-running inquiry into the ‘systematic dishonesty’ among building firms involved in the fatal refurbishment of the west London tower. as well as ross negligence manslaughter. 

The inquiry report revealed that a senior employee at insulation firm Kingspan told a colleague that ‘all we do is lie’ when discussing concerns their product was not fire safe.

Bosses at main contractor Rydon gleefully told each other ‘We are quids in!’ after hoodwinking the local authority over the true costs of the project.

And an employee at cladding provider Arconic told colleagues the company was ‘not clean’ when it came to fire tests.

A worker at insulation firm Celotex wondered in an email whether its product ‘realistically shouldn’t be used’ because ‘in the event of a fire it would burn’.

The inquiry exposed disturbing emails between Kingspan’s employees, including one in which Arron Chalmers told Peter Moss that he knew the insulation panels did not pass fire tests, and Mr Moss replied: ‘WHAT, We lied? Honest opinion now.’

Mr Chalmers wrote: ‘Yeahhhh’. Mr Moss said: ‘S*** product. Scrap it’, and his colleague replied: ‘Yeah all lies mate,’ and ‘Alls [sic] we do is lie in here.’

And in a separate email in 2016, Mr Chalmers admitted it ‘does seem a bit of a cheat’.

Philip Heath, a technical manager at the company, said a builder who questioned its product’s fire safety should ‘go f*** themselves’. He also told friends that builders asking questions were mistaking him for ‘someone who gives a dam [sic]’.

During the inquiry, it emerged that Rydon, the lead contractor on the Grenfell project, had told the block’s management organisation it could save it up to £376,175 on the cladding, whereas in fact there were far greater savings being offered to Rydon by a sub-contractor – as much as £576,973.

Simon Lawrence, contracts manager at Rydon, suggested to the inquiry that ‘Rydon took some of the saving for themselves’.

An email from Zak Maynard, Rydon’s commercial manager, in 2014, was more blunt. ‘We are quids in!!’, he wrote, although he told the inquiry he was ‘joking’.

At Arconic, the France-based firm which made the combustible cladding panels, internal emails about a failed fire test were damning. Claude Wehrle, its technical manager and a part-time firefighter, wrote in 2010 that it was ‘hard to make a note about this because we are not clean’. Mr Wehrle dodged the inquiry, citing an obscure French law.

Arconic has rejected any claim an unsafe product was sold. Kingspan said its failings were ‘in no way reflective of how we conduct ourselves as a group, then or now’. Celotex said it had ‘reviewed and improved process controls, quality management and the approach to marketing’.

MailOnline has approached Carter Clark, who is the liquidator for Studio E Architects Ltd for comment.