About Us

Our history

In 1818, a small group of young engineers met in a London coffee shop and founded the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE), the world’s first professional engineering body. They had hoped that lots of engineers from different engineering backgrounds would join the institution.

However, civil engineering hadn’t really become an official profession yet, and before the 18th century most engineers were in the armed forces. After two years of struggling to attract new members, the ICE asked Thomas Telford to become its first president. His appointment in 1820 not only gave the ICE a major boost, it played a huge part in shaping who we are today.

Telford designed and built all types of infrastructure; from churches to castles, canals to harbours, tunnels to bridges. He was also given the nickname ‘the Colossus of Roads’ because his designs were used to construct all major British highways (during his lifetime he built over 1,000 miles of roads).

Using his political and social connections, Telford helped to bring in many new members, from the UK and overseas. But his most important role was getting ICE’s Royal Charter in 1828. Our charter (updated by Queen Elizabeth II in 1975), gives us our status as the leading institution for the civil engineering profession.

Since our small beginnings, the ICE has become home to many of history’s greatest engineers as past presidents and members. And more than 200 years later, we have over 95,000 members around the world.