Ridgeline started in 2012, in a garage in Guildford, with one bricklayer, one architect, and a single extension job on the Hog's Back. The work went well. The next three came by referral. Thirteen years later we are still in Surrey, still working one project at a time, and still taking jobs because someone picked up the phone on a recommendation.
What has changed is discipline. The modern Ridgeline is a small practice of twelve full-time staff and a trusted roster of eighteen trade partners, all of whom we have worked with for at least six years. We have turned away work in better economic conditions than this in order to protect that rhythm. It is the only thing that lets us commit to fixed-price specifications and weekly walks without fraying.
We do not advertise. We do not enter industry awards. Our clients find us because their neighbour, their architect, or their solicitor told them to call. That is the version of this business we would like to protect.
Before founding Ridgeline, Thomas spent eleven years as a site manager on Home Counties restoration work, including three years with Adam Architecture on listed estate projects. He trained in civil engineering at Bath, apprenticed with a Surrey-based builder his family had used since the 1970s, and carries a standing grudge against sloppy pointing.
He still walks every Ridgeline site at least twice a week and personally signs off every fixed-price specification before it goes to a client. This is not a ceremony. It is the reason the specifications hold.
The four below run the majority of client-facing work. The rest of the studio, site supervisors, finance, aftercare, and our roster of trade partners, we will introduce in person.
Project director
Twelve years running Home Counties builds. Runs every Ridgeline project from consent to handover.
Design lead
Trained at the Bartlett. Leads design coordination between architects, engineers, and trade partners.
Senior site manager
Thirty years on site, twenty in Surrey. Holds the trade standard. Walks every site on Fridays.
Studio operations
Runs the budget dashboards, client reporting, and the aftercare programme. Unflappable.
A five-minute walk from Guildford station. Visits by appointment. There is always decent coffee and somewhere quiet to spread drawings out.
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