Meet the team

The Concrete Centre is staffed with a team of qualified professionals with backgrounds in concrete construction, engineering, architecture and sustainability. This team is strongly focused on the continued development of concrete and masonry through design inspiration and construction efficiency, research strategy, education and training, new product and process innovation and the achievement of best performance of concrete in practice.

	Elaine Toogood, Senior Director, Concrete, MPA Elaine leads the concrete team within the Mineral Products Association. This includes responsibility for The Concrete Centre, UK Concrete, MPA Precast, MPA Masonry, MPA Ready-Mixed Concrete and MPA Mortar. Elaine is a qualified architect with 30 years’ experience of working as a construction professional in the built environment. Elaine regularly contributes to working groups and committees related to environmental sustainability including work with DEFRA; UKGBC; RIBA; LETI; European Standards; London Climate Change Partnership; BSI and ICEC MCM. She has expertise in design for climate change resilience, carbon reduction and circular economy as well as many aspects of design and manufacture to concrete. Elaine is the current editor of Concrete Quarterly magazine.
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	Emily Halliwell, Senior Structural Engineer Emily's role includes sharing best practice for the design of concrete buildings, providing technical guidance to designers and specifiers and contributing to the development of codes and standards. Prior to joining The Concrete Centre, she worked on a wide range of challenging engineering schemes, including stations, stadia and commercial buildings. She is a chartered member of the IStructE and ICE. Emily is also a chartered environmentalist and with a focus on promoting material efficient and sustainable concrete designs.
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	Hannah Fothergill-Wilson, Architect Hannah is an architect and special advisor to The Concrete Centre. Hannah provides architecture advice and technical guidance on visual concrete and the specification and use of concrete for sustainable buildings. She provides technical lectures and workshops to UK schools of Architecture and leads the running of The Concrete Centre’s annual design and sustainability competition for students of Architecture and the built environment. Prior to joining The Concrete Centre Hannah worked on a range of projects from large commercial and cultural buildings to one off-residential extensions and refurbishments.
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	Jenny Burridge, Head of Education and Training Jenny is a chartered civil and structural engineer. Prior to joining The Concrete Centre Jenny worked for several consulting engineers including Aecom and Arup, where she designed several award winning buildings. Jenny chairs the BSI strategic committee on Engineering Design and Construction and sits on the Construction and Built Environment Sector Policy and Strategy Committee. She is on the council of Construct and the Institution of Structural Engineers.
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	Jenny Sheerin, Director, Marketing Communications Jenny has responsibility for delivering the marketing and communications strategy for The Concrete Centre. With experience derived from a wide range of marketing positions held, Jenny is passionate about delivering quality guidance for the construction industry for a variety of marketing channels.
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	Kim Hawksworth, Digital Marketing Manager Kim has over 18 years of experience working in marketing and digital communications. Within her role at The Concrete Centre, she owns the company's social media strategy, is responsible for the development and delivery of the digital marketing communications plan, and creates content for a variety of channels. Kim has a BA in Communications Management and a Professional Postgraduate Diploma in marketing communications through the CIM.
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	Marianna Micallef, Structural Engineer Marianna is a structural engineer and chartered member of the ICE. She is working within the engineering team at The Concrete Centre on Eurocode 2 guidance as these resources are revised for the Second Generation of Eurocode 2. Originally trained as an architect and civil/structural engineer, she later specialised in structural engineering. Marianna spent six years conducting research in reinforced concrete structures at Imperial College London, initially as a PhD candidate and later as a Research Associate. She also has over eight years’ experience in industry, both in London at Robert Bird Group, and in a consultancy office overseas.
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	Tony Jones, Technical Director Tony is a Structural Engineer with over 30 years of experience in design, research and investigation of concrete structures. He provides guidance on all aspects of structural concrete design including performance in fire. Tony has been involved with the production of numerous industry guides and has been involved with the development of concrete structural codes for over 20 years. He is currently the UK Head of Delegation on the European design committee which is responsible for Eurocode 2, Design of Concrete Structures, including the fire part.

The Concrete Centre, as part of the Mineral Products Association, also receives technical support from a wider team, including:

	Gareth Wake, Director, MPA Ready-Mixed Concrete Gareth's main focus at the MPA is promoting ready-mixed concrete as a sustainable and resilient construction material as well as supporting sector working groups and academia to help enable their work to be applicable to industry and standards. He the Chair of the BSI committee for Concrete, the sub-committee for Concrete Production and Testing, and convener and technical author for the British Standard for concrete, BS 8500.
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	Liam Forde, Manager - Infrastructure, Built Environment & Sustainability, MPA Ready-Mixed Concrete Liam is a chartered civil engineer and is responsible for promoting and providing guidance on the most sustainable and efficient use of ready-mixed concrete. Prior to joining the MPA, Liam worked for civil engineering contractors both onsite and as a design manager, primarily in the rail and aviation sectors. At the MPA Liam collaborates with other organisations such as CONSTRUCT and the Temporary Works Forum, acting as the voice for use of ready-mixed concrete. He is the secretariat for both the UK Concrete Social Outcome Task Group and the Basement Information Centre, and is leading the MPA’s activities for the use of concrete in offshore wind construction.
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	Dr Noushin Khosravi, Head of Sustainability Noushin is a civil engineer and has an MSc and PhD in the concrete technology field. She is a Chartered Engineer with ICT and was previously at Mott MacDonald working on Metro and Civils projects. She is an expert in concrete durability design, concrete assessment and repair, concrete construction systems, and concrete sustainable use. She is experienced in delivery of multidisciplinary design packages and complex research programs. Noushin is active in various committees including the UK concrete industry’s low carbon concrete task group, Green Construction Board Low Carbon Concrete Group (LCCG), and GCBIWG Pas 2080.
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	Dr Rachel Capon, Sustainable Programme Manager, UK Concrete Rachel is a Chartered Meteorologist, with over 18 years’ experience in the construction sector. Her expertise includes sustainability, metrics, environmental product declarations (EPDs) and international reporting of sector greenhouse gas emissions and sinks, together with climate risk, resilience, and adaptation. She leads the UK Concrete sustainability data collection programme and created the MPA sector EPDs for cement and concrete. She led a DESNZ funded consortium to model the carbon emissions sink due to carbonation of concrete to inform the UK’s international climate reporting. She is active in numerous industry committees and task groups, including the UK Net Zero Carbon Building Standard and UKGBC.