Marketing people call it a strapline. To us it’s a simple, two-word idea of what Price & Myers is about. It’s a way of helping us talk about who we are. But how did we arrive at ‘Design:Life’?
Around the middle of 2020, as the severity of the global pandemic was dawning on us all, we decided to treat the constraints of an unusual year as an opportunity. An opportunity to ask ourselves who we are, and what makes us different. An opportunity to tell the Price & Myers story better than we have done.
The practice was established by Sam Price and Robert Myers in 1978, so we had decades of experience on our side, and a raft of long and important relationships. But there was a sense around the practice that maybe we weren’t being as clear about the P&M way of doing things as we should be.
So as a practice, we set about finding out. The leadership team was surveyed. Workshops hosted. The Price & Myers team talked about what we share as a group of people. And we all listened.
It wasn’t always an easy thing to do. There was a real sense of wanting to avoid ‘corporate-speak’, to make sure that we weren’t trying to squeeze square pegs into round holes. Some felt the exercise itself was a bit corporate for us. By the time we were done, we could see the sense of the venture.
The result is a booklet – let’s not call it a manifesto, but a guide to the things that unite us at Price & Myers. The stuff we agree is important and the stuff that helps to differentiate us. It’s mainly an internal document, intended for our team, but we’re happy to share with you the six central themes.
As a profession, engineering doesn’t have a famous reputation for diversity. But at Price & Myers, we come from all over the world. Everyone that wants to contribute to great engineering is welcome.
We committed to treating the environment as a stakeholder in our practice. To do more than simply lead on matters of sustainability in construction, but to advocate and take action. The environment will be considered in every decision we make.
We think we are well known for the level of care we take with our work. It’s evident in the projects we’ve completed for over four decades. We also care for each other, our collaborators and the communities we live and work in. Sure, it’s a bit sentimental, but it’s really important to us.
It might seem obvious, but we think it bears repeating. We take our place beside our collaborators and we help to create a better world. We understand the importance of original engineering thought and we’re driven to elegant and efficient design resolutions that help the architect bring their vision.
We haven’t always been great at telling our own story. Perhaps even a little bit reticent. Price & Myers is not a place of big egos. We like to let the work speak for itself, and for the people who work with us to know us for our actions. We’ve committed to being a little bit louder than we have in the past.
A bit of a light-hearted one to finish. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy? Not at Price & Myers. We share the responsibilities of our work and we share in our successes. We are a group of people who like to enjoy themselves.