Transforming Rose Street Foundry into a Vibrant Bar:

The Foundry

Inverness, Highlands · 2020

Our role: Principal contractor
Client: Cairngorm Breweries
Architect: Makar
Structural engineer: Fairhurst, Inverness
Value: £1m to £2m
Programme: 2018 to March 2020
Scope: Soft strip and fabric survey, structural timber and steel repairs, new floor slab, stone cleaning and repair, mosaic recovery and reinstatement, lime pointing and harling, reroofing and leadwork, full interior fit out

The former Rose Street Foundry was designed in 1893 by Ross and Macbeth for the Northern Agricultural Implement and Foundry Company. Its Category B listed sandstone frontage carries carved friezes, mythical beasts and three mosaic tympanums of men at work in the foundry, while behind it a rubble-built workshop is carried on cast iron columns. As principal contractor for Cairngorm Breweries, we repaired the building and converted it into a bar and restaurant, as part of the wider regeneration of Academy Street.

Before & after

Drag across the image to compare the building before our work and after completion.

The Foundry after restoration by LTM Group

BeforeAfter

The Foundry, 96 Academy Street, Inverness — photograph 1

The Foundry, 96 Academy Street, Inverness — photograph 2

The Foundry, 96 Academy Street, Inverness — photograph 3

The Foundry, 96 Academy Street, Inverness — photograph 4

The Foundry, 96 Academy Street, Inverness — photograph 5

The Foundry, 96 Academy Street, Inverness — photograph 6

The challenge

The building had stood empty for years and water had found its way in. Once modern linings were stripped out, rotten timber beams, joist ends and safe lintels were exposed, some spanning 4m above the windows and mosaic panels, along with dry rot and washed-out wall cores. The roof structure bore on cast iron columns that had to stay in place throughout. The site sits on a busy city centre junction, with a pedestrian route on Academy Street, a narrow Rose Street frontage and housing association flats just 1.5m away to the rear, leaving almost no room for site set-up, storage or deliveries.

Our solution

We planned the site in detail and agreed it with the roads authority, the housing association and neighbouring businesses. A crash-decked scaffold kept Academy Street open to pedestrians, and welfare and office units were stacked into the scaffold within a compact compound at the rear. After a full soft strip we surveyed the fabric and produced stone repair schedules and mortar analysis in house. Working with the engineer and a temporary works designer, we propped the roof and columns while rotten beams were replaced with new steel and timber bolted together, joists were repaired or renewed and failed safe lintels were replaced. The concrete slab was replaced with a new insulated slab carrying drainage and service ducts. Externally, the stonework was DOFF cleaned and repaired, carved finials and urns were reinstated, the masonry was repointed in hot-mixed pozzolanic lime mortar and the rubble elevations were lime harled. The mosaic tympanums were carefully removed, crated and repaired off site, and lettered mosaic signage found under layers of paint was stripped, lifted in sections and reinstated. Salvaged timber, corrugated iron, light shades and cast iron radiators were reused in the new interior.