Turnover and profit slip at architect RSHP

RSHP posted a fall in turnover and profit last year, according to documents filed at Companies House.

The RSHP LLP accounts show the architecture giant’s revenue fell 2% in 2022 to £23.6m with pre-tax profit falling one third to £3.4m.

A regional breakdown of turnover accompanying the latest figures shows the largest decline in workload was at its UK arm, which dropped 21% to £8.8m.

Revenue from work in the Asia Pacific region fell from £5m to £3.1m, while turnover in Europe dropped £300,000 to £2.2m and income at North America slipped below £1m to £709,143.

Turnover in Australia increased from £4m to £4.4m but RSHP’s biggest growth area was in work categorised as “rest of the world”, where income increased from £252,725 in 2021 to £4.4m last year.

RSHP director Ian Birtles said work on “several” of the practice’s projects that had been put on hold because of the covid-19 pandemic had now restarted, including a mixed-use marina development in Dubai, two commercial tower developments in London and the Bayeux Tapestry Museum in France.

He said RSHP was currently projecting that 2023 turnover would see a “modest improvement” on last year and that profitability would increase, despite continued cost pressures due to inflation.

Birtles said the ongoing UK outlook was still one of uncertainty, caused by the impact of Brexit, covid-19, rising inflation and the cost-of-living crisis.

“Pressure on margins continues and we do not underestimate the challenges that we face to ensure that we retain our standing in the global marketplace,” he said.

“Notwithstanding this, the UK market has remained strong for us, and we have secured more work than we had previously projected. We expect that a number of London-based projects should start during the first half of 2024.”

Birtles added that a slowing in the Chinese construction market had been offset by other work and that the practice expected its proportion of work in the UK and the Middle East to increase this year.

Despite the declining financial figures, RSHP reported an increase in its average monthly headcount, which rose to 149 in 2022, up from 134 the previous year.