Grounds Maintenance at Gunwharf Quays Designer Outlet, Portsmouth, Hampshire
Tony Benger Landscaping was appointed to manage the landscaped grounds at Gunwharf Quays commencing in February 2018. The stated aim was to reinvigorate a good landscape design where the planting had become tired over time.
The first year of the contract focused on basic improvements such as removing over-grown planting, some major formative pruning and fresh planting to fill in gaps. The effect of these works has had a major impact on the landscaping and has helped to create the feel of a landscape which is cared for by staff taking real pride in their work.
The site comes with some real challenges being located 106 miles east of our base in Dalwood. Being able to provide quick and efficient responses for an ever-changing environment was a major concern along with the logistics of staffing and running a site where the travelling can often take 3 hours each way.
Another constant challenge of the site is the ever present public - Gunwharf Quays is open 24 hours a day and more than 8 million visitors pass through the site each year.
Initially we began the contract sending staff from Dalwood to stay overnight in Portsmouth and run the site while we looked to recruit a locally based person for the role. Fortunately, we had several good candidates and were able to offer the role to our current team leader Jamie back in March who impressed us immediately with his passion and attitude. After several months of training with our team on site he is now taking care of the day to day maintenance on the site to a very high standard. In summer 2019, he was Joined by Josh who has quickly picked up the high standards and attention to detail necessary on site. Being based in Ringwood, Hampshire, Jamie and Josh give us the opportunity to not only be the dream team at Gunwharf Quays in Portsmouth but also other sites in the area and we have now keenly grown our portfolio and run a branch in Salisbury too.
The scope of the work includes lawn maintenance, maintenance of all planting around the site, maintaining the numerous planters around the site including provision of seasonal planting to provide colour and interest right throughout the year.
Various ecologically beneficial features have been added during the time of our maintenance, this has been an interesting challenge trying to strike a balance between the ecological requirements and the standard of presentation visitors to the site expect. We are very pleased with the way this has been achieved, blending the recommended plants from the site’s biodiversity report with others to create attractive areas of planting while still delivering the ecological benefits desired.
We are now a number of years into the maintenance and the landscaping has come on well, the new plants are establishing well and the older plants are responding as we had hoped to the pruning earlier in the season. We have great plans to continue the development of the landscaping and working with the site team we are excited about the opportunities to come.