Following the unexpected collapse of Buckingham Group Contracting, who entered administration back in August 2023, our work at West Drayton Leisure Centre had been placed on hold. Thankfully the London Borough of Hillingdon has revived the project and BCL have been engaged directly to complete the works as before, delivering 1600sqm of faux wood slat ceilings and slatted walls.

We are going to be using our new fire-resistant timber system in PPC coated Aluminium faux wood slats, fully tested in accordance with EN13501-1 – allowing the creation of incredibly realistic non-combustible wood finishes for large commercial projects.This system has recently been used to great effect at the Ashley Centre in Epsom.

The project will also feature acoustic wood panels in solid FSC certified Thermo-Pine, taking full advantage of BCL’s design-flexibility for slatted panel systems – and helping to lower overall carbon footprint of the building.

The Platinum Jubilee leisure centre design at West Drayton has been designed to be a modern and sustainable hub for the local community, offering a range of facilities and amenities for all ages and abilities and the use of BCL wood slatted panels brings warmth and character to this much needed refurb of the original 1960s building, which no longer meets the demands of the growing population of residents of Yiewsley and West Drayton.

The project was approved by the council in 2020, includes a 25-metre swimming pool, a learner pool, a state-of-the-art gym, a sports hall, a fitness studio, a café, and other amenities, which will use BCL acoustic wood panels in a combination of configurations, providing varying acoustic performance from Class C up to Class A in accordance with BS EN ISO 11654. The design also incorporates sustainable features, such as a green roof, solar panels, and rainwater harvesting systems, to reduce energy consumption and carbon emissions as well as our sustainably sourced wooden ceilings.

To find out more about BCL’s slatted timber ceilings or wooden wall panels, please contact us directly on 01189 344 155 or alternatively email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

With the increased popularity of timber panel systems in commercial design and now, the wider use on smaller domestic projects, there is a huge range of wooden slatted panels on the market to choose from.

Many of these use veneers or MDF and will often be manufactured overseas, usually in the EU or China – and whilst appropriate for private home improvement and small builds, sometimes upon closer inspection and due to the often limited or incomplete fire testing of these wood panel products, they are not actually compliant for large UK commercial projects.

A key stipulation of Approved Document B, including that all products be tested ‘fully assembled’ and in-line with their ‘field of application’, is that all assessment be carried out by ‘organisations listed as notified bodies’ in accordance with the European Construction Products Regulation or laboratories accredited by the United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS).’

Further to this, the Hackitt Report (the key government led review of Approved Document B and UK fire regulation after the Grenfell disaster - ‘Building a Safer Future: The Final Report’) states clearly that moving forward ‘all laboratories should be UKAS accredited’.

BCL recommend checking the details of fire testing for any acoustic timber panel product or wood cladding panels that are planned to be used on a major commercial UK project to ensure it aligns with the requirements of prevailing regulation. This is to avoid serious commercial risk towards the end of a project, as Building Control and 3^rd party Fire Assessment sign off on the final products used and installed within a building, avoiding forced change of products, delays and significant costs that are incurred if a product is deemed non-compliant, prior to hand over.

BCL undertake full systems EN13501-1 fire testing of our wood ceilings and timber wall panels for any project and provide a constantly growing library of pre-tested panel options, exclusively in UKAS laboratories only. We can also provide full classification reports, videos of specific fire burn tests and full transparency on our range of tests (including acoustic, fire and blast) – to provide the degree of assurance and traceability that is recommend for UK building products for the future.

BCL are almost complete at The Ashley Centre in Epsom! Comprising of approximately 1000sqm of 250x50mm beam casings, vertical fins and rooflight linings in our Aluminium ‘TIMBER EFFECT’, with an American Black Walnut faux wood finish.

Such large sections would not be possible in timber, mainly due to the weight but also the difficultly in keeping timber profiles straight after fire treatment. Therefore, a BCL non-combustible timber effect aluminium extrusion provided the ideal solution for the main contractor, ISG.

In order to meet several design challenges and provide increased efficiency, BCL also designed a bespoke, custom die extrusion. Because the extruded baffles are hollow, they required an endcap where the end was visible; we had these purpose made and finished to match the same fire resistant wood finish. 

With the help of our supplier, we overcame some tricky design concepts specifically the mitred corners on the upstands to existing skylights. The main challenge being keeping the mitres tight during transport and installation, without the use of unsightly surface fixings and maintaining the same consistent realistic wood effect finish. 

The team had to work nights in order to perform the work outside of shopping hours as the centre was still operational over the busy Christmas period. The program period was 14 weeks which was comfortably achieved by the team onsite.

We have had great feedback from our client ISG and the architect Leslie Jones. It is always great to receive positive feedback for hard work. We are excited to get photos of the final product with the recessed lighting on.

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Here we take a quick look at the installed BCL wood ceilings and timber wall panels that form part of Rotherhithe School, completed last year by Farrans construction. The project uses Siberian Larch slats, FR pressure impregnated and coated in FR lacquer for fire retardancy to provide Class B En13501-1 performance and delivers beautiful warmth throughout the main circulation spaces and external soffit areas of the building. 

As per all BCL acoustic timber panels, the areas were fully designed in Revit to BIM Level 4 and delivered to site with dedicated panel location references that correspond to the panel layouts & setting out drawings provided as part of the full design package included in any supply only BCL timber panel system. 

All strip lighting and services were fully designed and prefabricated into integrated service panels by BCL during manufacture stage in our ISO 9001 accredited factory, which has rigorous production & timber quality protocols to ensure not only accurate design & manufacture, but also full 'chain of custody'  FSC certification. 

BCL are delighted to have designed, manufactured and supplied these beautiful wooden slatted walls and timber slat ceilings for the end client, Farrans and look forward to the next key education project we can add value to through our fully design-flexible timber panels, that drastically reduce on site waste and installation time, to make large areas of timber walls & ceilings more efficiently deliverable, whilst meeting all key required fire & acoustic performance targets. 

For more beautiful examples of our work, check out our Projects page on our website by clicking here. 

Keep your eyes on our news page, twitter and Instagram for more projects like this.