106 | “We like to get alongside the client no less than the architect, and the clients like to meet the people that are going to do the actual building for them.” Young firm reaching for the peak Peaky Builders works all over the Wellington region. BUILDING Peaky Builders T T Hugh de Lacy PROVIDING QUALITY PAINTING SERVICES TO THE WELLINGTON REGION – WITH CARE AND ATTENTION TO DETAIL, ENSURING A QUALITY FINISH TO YOUR PROPERTY Proudly Supporting Peaky Builders Interior & Exterior Painting | Repaints | Paint & Wall Paper Stripping Roof painting | Staining | Varnishing/polyurethaning | Rust Treatment Concrete coating | Floor sanding/coating | Water blasting Painting.jsg@gmail.com 027 772 5797 www.jsgpainting.com They got the name of their Wellington company, Peaky Builders, from the British television crime series “Peaky Blinders,” of which they were both fans, and if it was a bit cheeky to name a building company Peaky, it’s done nothing to limit the success of Terence Dickinson’s and Denym Scott-Greenfields residential construction company. In fact Peaky Builders is as flat out building houses as Tommy Shelby (played by Cillian Murphy) was in terrifying Birmingham in the six-part series that ran from 2013 to 2022. “We reckoned the name was appropriate for the company because it gave the business the theme of ‘reaching for the peak’,” Terence says. And the company has certainly scaled a promising peak since being founded “at the worst possible time,” in 2021 in the worst of the post-Covid economic disruption. But three years after launching, Peaky Builders has just completed 15 houses in the Silverbrook sub-division of Whitby, north of the capital, and is due to deliver two more before Christmas. The company is a member of the Certified Builders Association and, apart from the odd renovation, it mostly builds new houses, all covered by the association’s Halo guarantee. While it’s got its order book crammed for months in advance, Peaky Builders is aiming to build its business further by getting alongside architects and designers, to the point of meeting their clients to give assurances that the project is as well built as it is designed. One small job the company has underway under this strategy is the renovation of a bathroom in a house in the Wellington suburb of Newtown for interiors designer Stacey Middleton who was recently a player on Television One’s “The Block,” an interior design teams competition based on the Australian series of the same name. “We like to get alongside the client no less than the architect, and the clients like to meet the people that are going to do the actual building for them,” Terence says. Peaky Builders has a staff of six, including Terence and Denym, and all work on-site except when the principals have to spend time on the book-work. The pair used to work together for a Wellington builder before deciding they were up for the challenge of forming their own company, though there were plenty of people happy to tell them it was a bad time to do it. “We coped all the problems that Covid brought with it, the squeeze on labour and materials, but with both Denym and me onsite we were able to work our way through them, and the experience has given us a lot of confidence for the future,” he says. Terence started out in the industry in Wellington 20 years ago as a labourer before doing his time as a carpentry apprentice, then heading away for the obligatory overseas experience. Denym, also a Wellington local, completed his carpentry apprenticeship eight years ago. The company works all over the Wellington region, and while the market there had definitely slowed in the first half of this year, Terence says he sees signs of it making a comeback. “I’m sure demand is on the up, but the big constraint is interest rates, which have meant that at the moment people feel safer with their money in the bank,” he says.
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