We have been married and business partners for 26 years, and preserved in stone together as this pair of gargoyles for ten. Apparently they depict us as the Fierce Guardians of Heritage on one of our restored monuments according to the masons who carved them. We are flattered because this zealously guarded honour is traditionally reserved for self deprecating effigies of themselves.

 

Paula Wright

In real life Paula was the first female architect to win a scholarship to the British School in Rome.

This Rome Scholar spent her time in Italy studying Renaissance architecture.

Here she is 26 years ago with the woodcarver of our first ever ornamental commission- a new sign for a London pub. We are still attached sentimentally to our early pub work in London because it enabled us to set up in practice in the first place.

 

Russell Wright

When we did this in 1984 Russell was Research Fellow in Conservation at the Institute of Advanced Architectural Studies completing a programme of work for central government. The two key national guidance documents for all conservation work in this country, PPGs 15 &16, came out of his 5-year Research Fellowship at the IoAAs.

Every planning authority uses them to formulate their own conservation policies and to decide about local listed building consent applications and those affecting conservation areas.

Here he is 25 years ago welcoming HRH Duke of Gloucester to our first exhibition at the London Building Centre.

It was timed to coincide with the completion of Russell’s other research work on the early Materials of Modernism and their influence on Art Deco architecture and the emergent International Style. This work anticipated the listing of innovative examples by English Heritage, and HRH opened our exhibition as a commissioner of the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments.

Russell was awarded his IoAAS Diploma in Conservation Studies, with Distinction, in 1977.