First published March 2022, when Lairds was shortlisted. Updated and last reviewed 11 September 2026.
In March 2022 we published a short note to say that Lairds of Troon had been named a finalist at the Scottish Veterans Awards. We are keeping that note, and adding what happened next, because the sequence says more about the practice than any single award could.
The record
- 2020. Finalist, Veteran Owned Business of the Year, Scottish Veterans Awards. Mark Laird, our founder, was also a finalist for Entrepreneur of the Year in the same programme.
- 2022. Finalist again, and then Gold, Veteran Owned Business of the Year, Scottish Veterans Awards 2022, in a category sponsored by Pathfinder International magazine. The result is on Pathfinder’s own winners page. Mark was separately a finalist for Entrepreneur of the Year at the Ex-Forces in Business Awards (Scotland) that year.
- 2023. Having won the category, Lairds sponsored it, so that the award could be given to another veteran-owned business.
- 2026. Mark was a finalist for Business Leader of the Year at the Ex-Forces in Business Awards (Scotland).
Each of those is an independently judged programme with a published shortlist and a ceremony, and each can be checked against the organiser’s own record. We publish them that way on purpose. A claim that cannot be verified is not worth the space on the page.
What veteran-owned means in practice
Lairds was founded in 1999 by Mark Laird, a veteran, and it has been a family-run practice ever since. We do not trade on that history, and we are wary of the language that sometimes goes with it. What service does leave behind is a way of working that our clients and the architects we work with tend to notice: planning before action, a written record of everything, an insistence on knowing who is responsible for what, and a habit of saying plainly when something is not right. Those are the habits that get a technology system through a building programme intact, and they are the reason the practice has moved from installation towards design.
The wider community
The Scottish Veterans Awards exist to recognise businesses and individuals from the armed forces community, and the network around them is one we value. Sponsoring the category in 2023 was our way of putting something back. If you are a veteran starting or running a business in Scotland and want a conversation about how we made the transition, we are glad to have it.
Questions we are asked
Are these awards independently judged?
Yes. Both the Scottish Veterans Awards and the Ex-Forces in Business Awards publish a shortlist, judge it, and announce the results at a ceremony. They are different organisations and we list them separately for that reason.
Where can I see the rest of the practice’s credentials?
Every qualification, certification and award we publish is listed with its issuing body on Mark Laird’s page and on the About page.
We work across Scotland, normally for the client and with the architect. If you would like to talk about a project, start a conversation.