The Barry Breed Memorial Fund

With his roots in a loving, working-class family, Barry followed in his father Tony’s footsteps to train as an apprentice carpenter between the ages of 15-17, where he won ‘Apprentice of the Year’ two years in a row. Following his apprenticeship, he began his construction career 'on the tools', working with the Laing group. In 1992, he joined Holloway White Allom (HWA) as a site manager, before being promoted to Project Manager in 1998 and becoming a director of the board in 2003.

Some years later, Barry joined Darren Size in founding the eponymous SizeBreed Construction. During that period, it grew to become a £50m turnover super-prime residential construction company with a directly-employed workforce of over 140 people.

A serial entrepreneur, when Barry left SizeBreed, he went on to found a number of innovative businesses in the super-prime residential construction sector, including Decorum Partners London (offering white-glove client representation services) with Tony Gerrard, and Beau Bespoke, a new super-prime residential contractor, with Tony Gerrard and Jerome Bradley. Throughout this time, he used his incredible ‘little black book’ to help the business development efforts of some of the sector’s fastest-growing businesses.

The super-prime residential construction sector lost one of its most accomplished, personable and caring members when Barry died in early 2023. Many of us owe our professional success and the size of our businesses to his generosity of spirit and willingness to help everyone he came across to be the best that they could be.

When great people meet, great things happen...

Barry was a tremendous supporter of those ‘climbing the ranks’, just as he had done, generously giving people opportunities wherever he could and staying in touch as a seasoned professional to mentor and guide them.

Today, we celebrate his life, his career and that generosity of spirit in building a memorial endowment fund which will be invested, and its returns applied to support the Building Crafts College in nurturing, training, mentoring and supporting the "next generation of Barrys" – just as he would have continued to do.

Thank you for your generosity - by supporting the Building Crafts College we are all ensuring that Barry's legacy will live on through our next generation of craftspeople and construction entrepreneurs.

About the Legacy - Building more Barrys

In an effort to help “build more Barrys” in the sector, the purpose of the legacy is to create opportunities each year for both individual and groups of young people at the Building Crafts College, helping them to enter into the sector and open their eyes to their potential future career paths.

Through a mixture of funding, mentoring and community engagement, the legacy fund will be used to help support those who might otherwise be held back by traditional barriers to entry take their first career path steps.

The Organisation of the Memorial Fund

To maximise the charitable benefit of the incredible legacy that Barry leaves behind him, we have partnered with the Carpenters' Company (a registered charity) who will be receiving your generous donations as 'restricted funds' for the purposes of running Barry's memorial fund. They will invest the money and use its returns and capital growth to be able to enable the next generations of Barrys for years and years to come.

About the Building Crafts College

The Building Crafts College was founded in 1893 by the Carpenters’ Company as the Trades Training School.

Today, the College is constituted as an Educational Charity and is governed and financially supported by the Worshipful Company of Carpenters. Approximately 60% of income is derived from public sources, 25% in fees and 15% from charitable sources, mainly the Carpenters’ Company Charitable Trust. The College teaches a wide range of fine woodworking, stonemasonry and construction courses and apprenticeships as well as related subjects such as conservation and restoration. Crafts evening classes are also available.

Dynamic and forward-looking, the College accepts students of all ages and from all walks of life who wish to pursue excellence and outstanding craftsmanship in their chosen field. It is based in state-of-the-art facilities in Stratford, East London.

Further Information

If you would like any further information on how you or your business might be able to support Barry’s Memorial Fund on an ongoing basis, either through donations, mentoring or community engagement (be it apprenticeships, talks, work experience offers or similar enabling activities), please do get in touch with any of us directly:

Jerome Bradley (Beau Bespoke)

Tony Gerrard (Decorum Partners)

Michelle Henry (Executor)

Darragh O’Sullivan (Executor)