How Wates founder overcame childhood disability and built a 127-year legacy

In 1897, Edward Wates set up the first Wates Company. Three years later, Edward, aged just 27, and his brother Arthur became the proprietors of a furniture shop down Mitcham Lane in Streatham, South London.

From humble beginnings, the Ipswich-born son of a carpenter and joiner, Edward and family would often move several times throughout the course of his father William’s career, before finally settling Mitcham Lane.

According to a brief history of the E & A Wates company, though the pair got on well, during a school-boy-scrap “boiling water was knocked off the living room stove over half of Edward’s face resulting in acute deafness in one ear.”

The impairment meant Edward was taken out of school aged 11, and having to find gainful employment with a Croydon fishmonger.

Beginning his career at such a young age, Edward found himself finding new work later on working in a Shepherd’s Bush furniture store, and soon as a salesman in a furniture store in Kennington.

Developing a knack for business and ambition to succeed, Edward took on a refurbishment order at the furniture store with a commission his employer said was too high to pay.

Edward handed in his resignation right there and then, and no sooner did the Wates boy strike out on his own.

In 1902, Brothers William and Herbert, having been recently laid off from their jobs as builders, quickly followed behind Arthur in joining the company.

Persuading their big brother to invest in some land in Purley, it is believed the first two Wates houses were built there, in 1904.

As a housebuilder, Edward wanted to create better homes for people and build the communities in which they worked. By 1914, 139 houses were built, as the creation for new suburbs drove demand for new houses.

During the 1920s and 30s Edward’s sons, Norman, Sir Ronald and Allan, expanded the company by speculative house building which then grew into general contracting.

Shifting focus during the second war, the Wates company began taking civil engineering and infrastructure jobs, which saw them building aerodromes, army camps and factories at home and overseas.

Having developed a specialty in pre-cast concrete structures, like Costain, Wates supplied major parts for the Mulberry Harbours instrumental during the D-Day invasions.

A year before the end of the war, Edward Wates died on the 18th May 1944 in his home town of Streatham, leaving an estate of £291,000 (£11 million in today’s money).

Then in the post-war period the firm took the innovation and skills learned during the war and applied them to developing a new “system build” model for high-rise and low-rise housing, which saw more than 60,000 homes built.

As the demands for new housing started to slacken in the 1960s, the family-firm once again shifted focus towards general contracting and construction services. New opportunities were found across the Atlantic.

In 1962, Wates built London’s then-tallest tower block in Elephant and Castle.

These included the Church Commissioners and Grosvenor Estates in the UK, and the Rowse corporation in the U.S.

The 1980s saw a period of further growth, finding new work with the construction of landmark office space and the emergence of new shopping superstores across the UK.

Then just before the turn of the new millennium, Wates completed refurbishment of the National Gallery and Somerset House in 1998, before building the Queen’s Gallery at Buckingham Palace in the year 2000.

After beginning work on the refurbishment of St. Paul’s Cathedral in 2003, Wates launched its affordable workspace provider Needspace? in 2005.

Now, 127 years on, the firm remains in the hands of the third and fourth generation of Wates family, with the fifth generation expected to continue to support growth further.

In September, Wates Group announced the death of its former chief executive Sir Christopher Wates, aged 88.

The group shared in a statement: “His leadership was instrumental in steering Wates through the challenges of the 1980s and 1990s, working closely with his cousin Michael until their joint retirement at the end of the century.”

In 2021, E & A Wates shut its doors for good, after 120 years, due in part to the onset of COVID-19.

MD Roger Wates wrote: “Over the last 120 years we have greatly enjoyed furnishing thousands of local properties.

“Together with our community involvement, we would like to believe we have left our mark in a positive way.”

But the legacy that began with Edward Wates, lives on. Eoghan O’Lionaird now serves as the firm’s chief executive, and at the helm has steered the firm to a £2 billion turnover for the first time in its 127-year history, 15 per cent higher than the previous recorded year.

The construction business reported £1.17 billion turnover, up 22 per cent on the previous financial period, and secured £1.1 billion in new work, with a highest ever average project value of £48.3 million.

O’Lionaird, said: “We are in an excellent position, with profitability across all parts of our business, a solid cash balance and a positive tangible net worth.

“Our record forward order book demonstrates our customers’ confidence in our ability to deliver projects of all types and sizes.

“This confidence is hard-earned, with Wates delivering profit before tax every year for more than two decades.”

Was this interesting? Try: Former ISG director joins McLaren Construction