Sir Peter Trench

Sir Peter Trench CBE, TD, BSc., Hon FCIOB, Hon FRIBA was a trained economist, builder and industrialist who worked to modernise the post-war construction industry in the UK. He was awarded an OBE in 1945, a CBE in 1964 and was knighted in 1979.

He was born in London on 16 June 1918, son of Lt-Col. James Knights Trench an American-born entrepreneur and managing director of the Sandoz Chemical Company Limited, and his Scottish wife Grace Sim of Bradford. He studied at the London School of Economics, London University and St John’s College, Cambridge and served in the Queen’s Royal Regiment from 1939 to 1946. He married Mary St. Clair Morford in 1940.

Peter Trench fought Bradford Central as a Liberal in 1945 but finishing third and did not stand again.

He was Managing Director of Bovis Ltd, 1954-59; Chairman of the Construction and Housing Research Advisory Council, 1973-79 and Chairman of Y.J. Lovell Holdings plc, 1972-83. He was also a member of the Council of the CBI, president of the National House Building Council and Director of the National Federation of Building Trades Employers, 1959–64.

He died on 10 September 2006 aged 88.

[edit] Papers by Peter Trench on Designing Buildings Wiki include:

• Some impressions of management in the American construction industry 1957.
• Integration of the control of design and production 1967.
• Construction productivity 1977.
• The changing form of building worldwide 1984.