Working on listed buildings is rarely about doing more. More often, it is about doing just enough — with precision, patience and a deep respect for history.

For building services engineers, that balance is particularly acute. The challenge is not simply to make systems work, but to do so while leaving the lightest possible footprint on fabric that has endured for generations. While the fundamentals of good building services design remain unchanged, heritage constraints introduce a level of complexity that demands a more considered, collaborative and detail-driven approach.

Understanding the hierarchy of heritage

The listed status of a building is not a formality; it fundamentally shapes the engineering response.

• Grade I buildings are of exceptional or international importance, where intervention is minimal and scrutiny intense.
• Grade II* buildings, such as 38–42 Mosley Street, are particularly important buildings of more than special interest.
• Grade II buildings are of special interest and warrant careful preservation.

Each step down the hierarchy offers marginally more flexibility — but none remove the need for early, informed engagement with planning and conservation officers. Assuming that services can be “value engineered later” is often the first mistake.

Navigating complexity with care

Every listed building carries its own story, and its own constraints. Our work across the Grade II* listed Martins Bank in Liverpool and the Grade II* 38–42 Mosley Street in Manchester highlights just how varied — and project-specific — those challenges can be.

Built around 1880 for the Manchester and Salford Bank, 38–42 Mosley Street has lived several lives. Bomb damage during the Second World War led to partial reconstruction at the rear, while later occupation by the Royal Bank of Scotland left behind a layered legacy of alterations. The building achieved Grade II* listed status in 1952 and, after being mothballed in 2018, is now being brought back into productive use by Bruntwood.

We were appointed in 2019 to develop RIBA Stages 2 and 3 designs for an office-led refurbishment. At planning stage, this required:

• Avoiding new wall penetrations wherever possible
• Restoring decorative ceilings to original standards
• Producing highly detailed service routes far earlier than would typically be expected

In practice, the design process began well before technical modelling — through sustained dialogue with conservation officers, collaborative walkthroughs with the architect, and detailed drawings that provided clarity around proposed interventions.

This can be a level of specificity that goes far beyond a typical RIBA Stage 3 performance design. It’s crucial to provide much more detailed service routing and design concepting which are sensitive to the building’s features. This is essential to protect the architect’s and Conservation Officer’s vision, providing a detailed, enforceable framework for Stage 4 development.

Mosley Street, Manchester: Balancing modern performance expectations with heritage limitations

A recurring challenge on heritage projects is the tension between modern operational requirements and what historic buildings can realistically accommodate. A bespoke response is often required.

At Mosley Street, this led to an exposed-services strategy within the office areas, carefully integrated to respect the building’s historic character. This approach was broadly accepted by conservation officers. What mattered most was not the visibility of services, but the protection of decorative plasterwork, timber panelling and historic proportions.

In the basement, services had to be coordinated within extremely tight spatial constraints, with fresh air and smoke extract systems requiring on-site coordination measured to the millimetre. As the building was soft-stripped, previously concealed conditions were revealed, reinforcing the importance of combining technical rigour with practical site awareness.

Today, 38–42 Mosley Street is beginning its next chapter as Bond, Bruntwood’s mixed-use workspace and hospitality concept. Spaces have been designed to encourage collaboration, social interaction and shared amenities, while preserving the architectural features that define the former banking hall and office floors.

Martins Bank, Liverpool: complexity at a different scale

Martins Bank in Liverpool illustrates how the challenges of MEP design intensify with scale. The Grade II listed, 210,000 sq ft building — designed in 1932 by Herbert J Rowse — has been vacant since 2009, with recent works focused less on visible transformation and more on enabling future redevelopment.

From a services perspective, the building combines deep floorplates, large internal volumes and highly sensitive historic fabric, significantly limiting routing options and long-term flexibility. Uncertain end uses — particularly potential hospitality within the former banking hall — further complicate early-stage MEP strategies, where capacity assumptions can have lasting consequences.

The project’s delivery approach reinforce a key lesson for heritage-led regeneration: technical ambition must be aligned with commercial realism. In landmark listed buildings, achieving balance between conservation, buildability and cost certainty is often the greatest challenge of all.

Why collaboration matters more on listed buildings

Listed buildings demand closer and more continuous collaboration than conventional schemes. Outline strategies are rarely sufficient; detailed coordination and clear justification are required much earlier in the process.

Early engagement with conservation officers is essential to establish a shared understanding. Close collaboration with contractors also proved critical, allowing complex coordination issues to be resolved before installation. Clear, consistent documentation helped maintain continuity, particularly during conservation officer handovers.

What listed buildings teach engineers

MEP design in heritage contexts strips engineering back to fundamentals. It demands:

• Earlier decisions, often made with incomplete information
• Deeper collaboration with planners, architects and contractors
• Acceptance that not every operational aspiration can be accommodated
• A willingness to design around the building, not through it

Across Grade I, Grade II* and Grade II buildings, experience consistently shows that successful heritage MEP design depends as much on judgement and collaboration as on technical expertise. Each project requires a tailored response, shaped by the building’s significance, constraints and future use.

For owners and project teams seeking to unlock the potential of historic assets, the journey is rarely straightforward. Navigating planning, conservation and modern performance expectations requires early engagement, clear priorities and a willingness to work with the building rather than against it. When approached in this way, sensitive services design can play a quiet but crucial role in ensuring these buildings remain relevant, functional and valued for generations to come.