Peter Candler: Life at a stretch

Aug 21 2009 By Alastair Gilmour, The Journal

DESPITE his deep Sunderland roots, Peter Candler confesses to having "an American mentality". On the other hand, it could be because of his deep Sunderland roots.

His "quiet" leadership style also underpins the energy and impatience that US businessmen take for granted.

Peter is managing director of Rivergreen Developments, a Durham-based property company specialising in high quality residential and commercial projects that have environmental considerations at their heart. This approach has earned the company a mass of awards and commendations from professional bodies such as the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors, the Royal Institute of British Architects and the Civic Trust. In 2007, Peter was personally recognised by Constructing Excellence in the North East for outstanding achievement.

"We are more cautious; Americans get things done," he says. "They set a target and go after it, they’re relentless.

"In Britain you have two camps; very theoretical academics and practical people. In America the cross-over is much greater and you can have engineers who are very practical men who can build a house with their own hands."

It’s little wonder his purposeful direction has been so influenced. Peter worked for San Francisco-based project management giant Bechtel, the seventh-largest privately-owned company in the US. One of its most high-profile projects was the Channel Tunnel.

He says: "I worked throughout the world and in London for about 12 years. I saw it as my apprenticeship in terms of the skills I learned. I also worked very briefly for Morgan Grenfell in the City, so between the two they gave me the toolkit to do what I do now. Getting involved in property is a risky business; there are skills you need to minimise the risk of anything going wrong."

The company headquarters at the Rivergreen Centre, Aykley Heads, won The Journal’s prestigious Landmark Award in 2006. A collaboration with Newcastle-based architects Jane Darbyshire and David Kendall Limited produced an environmentally low-impact building with innovative features such as a "green" sedum roof to attract wildlife as well as reduce rainwater run-off and a comprehensive energy management system. Solar roof panels provide hot water, the boilers use wood pellets for fuel (the ash is used for compost), lavatories use recycled rainwater and it has an intelligent lighting system. Unusually for an office building, there is no mechanical ventilation; circulating fresh air is provided by windows and louvres.

The car park doubles as an orchard, with low-level fruit trees grown "espalier" style dividing and screening areas and, rather than the standard manicured lawn, wildflower meadows and a pond create "a benign neglect". Star of the show, though, is an internal double-height rammed-earth wall that moderates temperature and humidity.

Rammed earth is an ancient building method traditional in arid regions of the world where wood is in scarce supply. It involves a process of compressing a damp mixture of earth that has suitable proportions of sand, gravel and clay added. The composition of the Rivergreen Centre’s six-metre high construction is 60% sand and soil – dug directly from the site – 10% powdered clay and 30% mixed gravel.

"I’ll probably be best remembered for the wall," says Peter. "It must be one of the few building components that gives people the irresistible urge to touch it. Tony Blair touched it when he opened the building – it’s about questioning basic assumptions. To me it’s a work of art and the building is a work of art because it’s also about inspiring people.

"But I wouldn’t want this to be categorised as a fad or a fashion – it’s just being a responsible developer doing things because they’re the right things to do rather than doing them because the rules say you should.

"I believe that if you do something you do it to the best of your ability. When you stretch yourself you stretch the big world around you.

"It’s one of the things I say to my two sons that whatever you do in life – even if it’s not necessarily the occupation that’s going to look after you the best – whatever you choose, do it to the best of your ability and stretch yourself." One son works in the film industry in Glasgow while the other studies music in Edinburgh and though Peter is an enormously successful businessman he offers more than a nod of pride towards their chosen paths. Not so deep down, he’s an artist himself (with a hankering after writing comedy scripts with Mel Brookes), but for him, creativity surfaces in entrepreneurial action and enterprising thought.

"Some of the people who work around me are similarly creative," he says. "It’s a balancing act with the commercial and the more mundane part of running a business, keeping the ship stable. It just makes the whole thing that bit more challenging. You’ve got to have imagination and vision to do something like this, but you can’t ignore the commercial disciplines that are needed.

"You can’t just be creative without any commercial responsibility or financial discipline – the challenge is to reconcile the two. Have a vision and pursue an imaginative agenda at the same time as doing something that works eventually. It’s not an easy thing to do."

Much of Rivergreen’s success is down to clever management of projects. Groups and teams are assembled so that academic and theoretical characters work alongside very practical people with everyone granted an equal say. This creates a group of equals right across a variety of disciplines and usually ends up heightening creative activity.

"Some of it is professional – project management – skills," says Peter, "and a lot of it is about inspiring people, having energy, enthusiasm, the vision and getting them to follow you out of their own volition, not because you’re forcing them to. We try and get the best out of people. Some people have done very well because I’ve pushed them – but in the end they’ve done it themselves within the framework. I’m very proud of that.

"On the development side, we’re involved in a regeneration project in Hartlepool and are about to let a unit to a company that produces diagnostic kits for the NHS and for export. It’s a small company making a big commitment to Hartlepool and they wanted prestigious accommodation for visitors to be impressed. Alongside our glamour projects like Jesmond Dene House in Newcastle, it’s just as important to make an impact on places like Hartlepool where there’s been very little private development in recent years.

"Probably the most exciting thing we’re looking at now is the greenest office building in Europe to be built at Stannington in Northumberland. What we’re looking to do is learn from our experience at the Rivergreen Centre and take it even further, taking on the new technologies that have come along since.

"We’ve already created an orchard – a very satisfying thing to do. I’m not just talking about a few apple trees, I’m talking about a 165-tree orchard over a couple of acres. We’ve put quite a lot of science into it, a lot of horticultural thinking with experts from North Yorkshire. Again, it’s creativity at work, but if you’re doing something you do it properly. I don’t want to do mediocre things. Don’t get into tunnel vision, question what you’re doing all the time. I think the older you get the more you feel like that."

Twenty years ago, Peter had the opportunity to settle in San Francisco, but chose to return to the North East – with not a shred of regret. This proves his oft-stated point. If you’re going to do something, do it properly.