Posted on November 3, 2010 by John Cronin
A property investment company has officially announced that it has completed the purchase of an office block in New Malden, London.
CLS Holdings plc (CLS) has purchased the multi-storey Apex Tower, located in High Street, New Malden for a total of £21.46m. CLS now has two office blocks in the town as it already owns the CI Tower (pictured) that is on the opposite side of the road, next to the railway station.
Apex Tower is predominately an office block scheme though there are both retails units and a pub on the ground floor. The building also has a four storey car park to the rear. The upper 15 floors of offices offer approximately 99,000 sq ft of floor space.
CLS report that the building is currently fully let, mainly on a long term lease to BAE Systems. The rent payable on the offices amounts to £1.748m giving an approximate rental price of £17.65 / sq ft.
Sten Mortstedt, Executive Chairman of CLS, commented: “We are pleased to conclude the purchase of Apex Tower. It continues our focus on owning cost effective offices, which generate reliable cash flow. ”
The nearby CI Tower in St Georges Square also has 15 upper floors of offices and offers approximately 81,400 sq ft of floor space. Agents Cattaneo Commercial are currently marketing empty office space on the 4th and 10th floors of the building at rental prices of £21 / sq ft.
Posted in London |
Tagged Rental Prices |
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Posted on November 2, 2010 by John Cronin
A new, speculative business park is to be opened in 2011 on an 18 acre site in Rochdale, Greater Manchester.
A newly formed 50:50 joint venture between Centric Property Group and Barnfield Construction has purchased the site from previous owners Fortis Bank in a land deal worth £2.44m that was concluded in August. The development is to be called the Crown Business Park and is to be undertaken in multiple phases.
As the empty land already had approved planning permission, construction work has already started on the first phase which will see 20,000 sq ft of office space and 30,000 sq ft of industrial space completed by next summer. Expected development costs for phase one are expected to reach £6.2m. The project is being part funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) who provided £3.2m for ground works on the 7.3 hectare brownfield site. The completion of subsequent phases will make available a total 90,000 sq ft of office space and 170,000 sq ft of industrial space.
Crown Business Park is located near to J20 of the M62, offering easy access to the national motorway network. The scheme is not the only mixed-use business park in the region however. Kingsway Business Park by J21/M62 in Rochdale is a much larger scheme, covering some 420 acres and offering 300,000 sq ft of office floor space, though much of the office space is already let.
David Malpass, Director of European Programme for the regional development agency involved commented: “Crown Business Park will provide much-needed quality buildings to the Rochdale market. It has the opportunity to attract SME companies to the local area, in particular those in the financial and business services sector, creating jobs and boosting the local economy.”
Barnfield Construction, partners in the scheme, are no strangers to the speculative office market having been involved in over 150 office developments across the UK. Property developer Tim Heatley founded Centric Property Group in 2009 after spending 8 years at office fit-out group Modus. This new joint venture aims to developed further business parks within the north west.
Rental prices and agents for the scheme are yet to be announced.
Posted in Manchester |
Tagged Business Parks, Speculative Developments |
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Posted on November 2, 2010 by Rob Powell
The Home Secretary, Theresa May MP, has announced new restrictions on large printer cartridges being brought into the UK by air.
The clampdown follows the discovery by intelligence services of Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) packed inside toner cartridges. The bombs has been sent by air freight to destinations in USA – one of them was discovered at East Midlands Airport en route to Chicago.
Ms May told the House of Commons on Monday that the explosive devices had been sent from Yemen.
She announced emergency measures in response to the toner cartridge bomb plot, including:
- Suspension of the carriage of toner cartridges larger than 500g in passengers’ hand baggage on flights departing from UK airports
- Prohibition of the carriage of these items by air cargo into, via or from the UK unless they originate from a known consignor – a regular shipper with security arrangements approved by the Department for Transport
The restrictions on printer cartridges, one of the most commonly ordered of all office supplies, came into force at midnight and will last for one month.
Other restrictions in response to the plot can be found on the Home Office website.
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Posted on November 1, 2010 by John Cronin
The large-scale Fort Dunlop building in Birmingham has received an award to recognise the successful redevelopment project.
The Birmingham Civic Society has awarded its 2010 Renaissance Award to the Fort Dunlop project in recognition of the restoration of the huge, listed building that had been neglected for over 20 years.
The iconic building has been redeveloped over several years in a joint venture between brown-field regeneration specialists Urban Splash and Advantage West Midlands, the local regional development agency (RDA).
Paul Lister, chair of the Civic Society’s planning committee, which makes the award, told the Birmingham Post: “The conversion of Fort Dunlop by Urban Splash represents a brave and imaginative transformation of this massive structure in a truly sustainable way”.
Whilst the design of the scheme has previously included many innovative energy saving measures, additional modifications have enabled the developers to further reduce the energy consumption at the scheme, giving an expected saving on fuel bills of some £200,000 pa.
A major Birmingham landmark, visible from the nearby M6 motorway, Fort Dunlop was constructed in the 1920’s and was once used as a warehouse by the Dunlop Rubber company. After being left unused for two decades the developers commenced a large-scale, mixed-use redevelopment project in 2004. Now, along with a 100 bedroom hotel and retail units the building offers over 300,000 sq ft of flexible office space. The redevelopment project, completed last year offers floor plates of approximately 33,300 sq ft on each of the six allocated office floors within the building.
The developers claim the scheme offers the biggest floor plates in the largest speculative office building outside of London. Lets are available from floor spaces of 2,000 sq ft upwards. Current rental prices are £15 / sq ft for the Grade A rated floor space. Current tenants include regional newspaper publishers, construction services, insurance companies and PR & design agencies.
Letting agents are GVA Grimley, DTZ and GBR.
Posted in West Midlands |
Tagged Listed Buildings, Renovations, Rental Prices, Speculative Developments |
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Posted on October 29, 2010 by John Cronin
The Local Government Minister Bob Neill has criticised a London council for spending money on re-fitted award-winning offices.
In response to a BBC investigation, Bob Neill has said Newham Councillors and staff were “living the ultimate Champagne socialist lifestyle on the taxpayer”. This reaction comes as the build cost of the new Newham Council office building has been revealed as totalling £18.7m. A spokesperson for the Taxpayers’ Alliance said: “This glitzy refit is the sort of thing you might expect of a five star hotel”. In their defence the council has stated that taxpayers within the borough would see annual savings of £7m a year.
The British Council for Offices organisation gave a “fit-out” award to the new office scheme at their annual awards ceremony earlier this month. The award is given for a quality fit-out that “betray no signs of opulence or financial exuberance and offers outstanding value for money”.
The new building replaces some 50 existing offices that were located in various buildings and portakabins across the East London Borough. The revamped offices are located in Newham Dockside. By adopting a shared-desk system the offices have 1,780 work spaces for 2,500 staff – a ratio of 1.4 people per desk. The building, known as Building 1000, has a total floor space of approximately 166,840 sq ft.
Architects of the scheme Sheppard Robson suggested that the offices needed a “wow factor” to make the building interior work and to generate a more collaborative work environment. More images of the office interior are available here and also at Overbury who were the main contractors for the building.
Posted in London |
Tagged Public Sector, Renovations |
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Posted on October 28, 2010 by John Cronin
Legal & General Property has announced the exchange of contracts with Mindshare for their first office let in the distinctive Central Saint Giles scheme in central London.
Mindshare, a global media company and part of the WPP group, has signed-up for some 78,000 sq ft of floor space over the 7th and 8th floors in the commercial led, mixed-use scheme. Rental prices and the duration of the lease for the deal have not been disclosed.
Central Saint Giles is a mixed-use, 12-storey development located at St Giles between Covent Garden and Soho. The development, which was completed in April and officially opened at the end of May, 2010, offers private residential accommodation, restaurants and bars and approximately 408,000 sq ft of Grade A office space. It is a joint venture owned by Legal & General Property and the Mitsubishi Estate Company. The developers claim the building offers some of the largest office floor plates (43,000 sq ft) in London’s West End.
Described by Paul Finch, chairman of CABE as “one of London’s great commercial buildings, setting the standards by which office architecture should be judged”, the Central Saint Giles scheme has received mixed public opinion due to its striking appearance. Designed by Italian architect Renzo Piano – also the designer of The Shard at London Bridge Place – the building has a colourful exterior due to the 121,000 red, green, yellow and orange ceramic tiles that adorn the walls.
The building is highly energy-efficient and has achieved a BREEAM rating of ‘Excellent’ due to the implementation of measures such as using captured rain water to flush toilets and bio-mass boilers for heating.
The developers suggest that interest in office space within the speculative scheme is strong and further lettings are expected soon.
Agents for the scheme are Cushman & Wakefield and Jones Lang LaSalle.
Posted in London |
Tagged Speculative Developments |
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Posted on October 27, 2010 by Nell Frizzell
“In this climate you need to stand out from the crowd,” snarls Britain’s favourite entrepreneur, Michael Caine sound-a-like and greying Travolta chin twin. As the thumping cellos and booming violins screech to a halt, episode four of the business buffoonery we call The Apprentice gets under way.
This time it’s Stuart who answers the early morning phone call, sheltering under a vase of flowers so enormous that it even manages to partly obscure Baggsitandbinit’s enormous rubbery face. Apparently they’ve got a hot date at the Science Museum, so it’s back in to that ubiquitous fleet of black cabs (I’m starting to suspect that S’rAlan’s sons may be called Addison and Lee).
“Science museum, so it’s probably going to be something to do with science… or museums,” muses the frighteningly astute Hollyoaks Jamie. This is a man who knows how not to shit out of his elbow, and no mistake.
“All these great inventions started off as someone’s crazy idea,” Alan tells the team. A crazy idea like a hulking great DOS computer that eats cassette tapes and craps out glowing green letters, eh Sugar? Boy were you backing the right crazy horse on that occasion.
Inspired by their sci-fi surroundings the teams are told to sell the product of the future to major retailers. Or ‘traders’ as SugarDaddy insists on calling them. Great scot! The Apprentice is finally knocked up with Dragons Den’s illegitimate lovechild and we’re all here to witness the birth. Rubber gloves at the ready; this one’s going to be messy.
According to Alanstrad, this week’s task is all a case of matching the right product to the right retailer. So, no Tampax at the Toyota garage or mirror balls at the morgue.
Surprisingly, Su Pollard stand-in Mel wants to prove herself as Synergy team leader, yet again. And so does Hollyoaks Jamie, yet again. Déjà vu? Bah oui! This time, however, the estate agent beats the hairdresser hands down. Is that a shit-storm I see brewing on the horizon?
Plum-voiced, slack jawed, vertically-haired Chris heads up Apollo. So, it’s time to pick a product or two. First off, we have the no-knife face lift, which turns out to be an infrared American football helmet designed by NASA and drawn up by Darth Vadar. Or how about an irritating alarm that goes off every time you slouch (in my childhood I called this device ‘a grandmother)? Or a £50 t-shirt that chokes your chesticles? A garden fork that moves earth like shit off a shovel? An energy-saving shower head? How about a global hypercolour babygrow? Apparently it prevents cot death.
“Would you like some free money? Urrh, yes please!” interjects Stuart with possibly the least ironic David Brent impression ever to grace the face of the earth. “At 30 degrees, am I right in thinking a baby would be dead?” he adds, just for good measure. Nice work potato face – you are now officially a twat and twonk. Everybody’s favourite mother substitute Stella tells him off, warning, “That might just lose us the Baby Glow.” Well guess what? She’s right! Apollo bag the chameleon child while Synergy are left holding the shower head.
In a quite staggering example of the stupid leading the inane, Synergy then pitch said showerhead to a shop that doesn’t sell showers and a spade to a shop that doesn’t sell garden ware. Nice work guys! Go team!
Over in the Apollo corner Chris is talking muffin tops and despite Liz’s arresting sales technique, Baby Glow is continually let down by its packaging. The scream team of Paloma, Laura and Sandeesh are getting so few offers that each one is fought over like the last cup of tea in the Sahara. The decision to give each contestant their own order book is a stroke of TV genius. It’s like clash of the morons out there.
To test the ‘sex sells’ theory to its absolute limit, the scream team hawk their pec-puckering t-shirt around Soho, resulting in a cat fight in the gutter and a demand for DV8 exclusivity. Meanwhile, Syngery’s Jamie proves that he’s also willing to talk dirty, promising that “this product will give you a new shower sensation.” He’s not selling shower accessories; he’s giving head.
Back in the boardroom there’s a nervous wait for S’rAlan to come back through those magic doors. Surely I’m not the only one to expect dry ice and Matthew Kelly to be holding a microphone every time he does this? It’s pure Stars in Your Amstrad.
Synergy (Jamie, Melissa, Stella, Joanna, Military Christopher and Stuart) put in a strong performance racking up £76,000 of sales, which would ordinarily be a winning score. However, Apollo’s Liz alone manages to sell £99,000 worth of Baby Glows. In the words of Sir Alan, “It’s a bladdy record!” and springboards the rest of the team (Chris, Liz, Paloma, Laura, Sandeesh, Maverick Alex) on to the winning spot.
So, who will take the fall for the shower-spouting Synergy? Jamie calls in Melissa Cohen and Stuart Baggs. Mel and Stu? Unless Jamie drops his trousers and shits on the conference table, The Apprentice is about to lose a comedy gold contender.
Melissa is told that “You are very annoying,” by SuperNanny Karen, while Alanstrad tells Stuart that “A lot of what comes out of your mouth is hot air. So in the name of glaciers, watch your mouth.” Good one Alan.
In the end, the SugarDaddy decides to finger Melissa. The nation recoils in horror. “Save your skin and get out of my face,” Mel growls from her outer-boardroom lair, once the humiliation is complete. “Karmically they will be retributed.” I think Sir Alan just crossed the peroxide Pollard mafia. You’d better start running Alan, you’d better run fast.
Posted in Misc |
Tagged Apprentice Blog |
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Posted on October 27, 2010 by John Cronin
The Belfast Harbour organisation has formally announced plans for a large scale development and regeneration project for the Clarendon Dock area of the city.
City Quays (pictured) is a proposal for a large-scale, £250m mixed-use development within the maritime district of Belfast and incorporates a 20 acre site. It is a commercial led scheme with over 60% of the total 2.4m square footage being allocated for speculative office floor space.
A proposed pedestrian and cycle bridge will link City Quays along with the existing Titanic Quarter and Northern Ireland Science Park (NISP) to the centre of Belfast.
NISP is also active in the Belfast office market as it owns four buildings, offering floor plates from 23,000 sq ft to 56,000 sq ft. Flexible lease arrangements are offered to prospective tenants on lets starting at 400 sq ft. Floor plate arrangements for City Quays offices have not yet been published.
Len O’Hagan, Belfast Harbour chairman, says: “City Quays is an occupier led project to provide high quality waterfront landscape for business, leisure, tourism and the arts. The aim is to help regenerate and reinvigorate the heart of historic Belfast, providing an attractive setting for potential overseas investors.”
A ‘master plan’ for the development has been created by the practice fronted by architect Sir Nicholas Grimshaw, who was heavily involved in the design of the multi-award winning Eden Project in Cornwall. Belfast Harbour claim their proposed scheme will be a “leading edge” sustainable development.
A public consultation exercise is on-going and full planning permission is yet to be granted. Furthermore, the developers have indicated that construction will only commence on the speculative development once initial tenancy agreements have been secured.
Posted in Belfast |
Tagged City Quays, Speculative Developments |
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Posted on October 27, 2010 by John Cronin
Plans have been approved to replace an old office block in Teddington with a Travelodge and a new smaller office building.
The existing six-storey office called Park House in Station Road, Teddington is to be converted into a Travelodge after local councillors granted planning permission. The adjacent building that was at one time used as a production studio but it currently empty is to be demolished and replaced with a new four-storey building that will have a ground floor restaurant with three floors of offices above.
Park House (pictured) is a 1960’s office block constructed from reinforced concrete, offering 40,000 sq ft of floor space over five of the floors and is currently home to 140 office workers. Tenants of the offices have included Barclays Bank who previously leased the building for use as a training centre. Acxiom, a data management company currently let floor space in the building. The building was bought by Longford Securities in 2003 as part of a £20m transaction involving another multi-let building in Kingston.
The office block is considered by many locals as being an ugly building. Douglas Barrell, a member of the local action group The Teddington Society told the Richmond and Twickenham Times that his group were in favour of the redevelopment plans. He said: “The building itself is very prominent and it’s not a very nice building – it’s all very run down. It will get a face-lift – it will improve it”.
The new four storey, mixed-use building will offer approximately 8,600 sq feet of office floor space over the top three floors of the building. The building will incorporate the latest energy saving design techniques and is to incorporate green roof technology that uses a Sedum vegetation blanket. A BREEAM rating of ‘Very Good’ is expected.
Architects for the project are JWA Architects. Demolition and construction work is expecting to start in early 2011 with an expected completion date of spring, 2012.
Posted in London |
Tagged Renovations, Speculative Developments |
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Posted on October 26, 2010 by John Cronin
A former airfield in North Somerset is set to become the site for a new serviced offices scheme.
North Somerset Council has approved plans for a new office scheme to be built on the old Weston Airfield site that is now branded as the Weston Gateway business park. The proposed three storey building will offer 20,000 sq ft of floor space, with a first phase offering approximately 12,000 sq ft by spring 2012.
Within the whole mixed-use redevelopment area, a total of five office blocks have been proposed. Weston Gateway will offer Grade A office floor plates from 3,000 sq ft to 390,000 sq ft. Offices will be available either to purchase outright or as leased space. The business park affords easy access to the motorway network and is adjacent to the M5 at J21.
The particular scheme, to be called The Hive, is backed by the North Somerset Enterprise Agency (NSEA) and aims to provide flexible office space on short-term leases. With a target of between 40-60 tenants the NSEA aims to lease floor space to start-up and growing businesses and create an enterprise hub backed with on-site support services. The Hive will offer on-site business training, shared office services and access to shared office equipment. The NSEA itself intends to take floor space within the building.
The offices will be built to comply with best-practice, energy efficient design. Natural lighting and ventilation will be relied upon and the building will not have air conditioning. Energy resources amounting to approximately 15% of the total consumption will be supplied from on-site sources. It is expected that the offices will achieve an ‘A’ rating Energy Performance Certificate on completion. A BREEAM pre-assessment indicated that the building is expected to achieve a ‘Very Good’ rating. Architects behind the scheme are Barton Willmore.
Commercial property agents Hartnell Taylor Cook started a marketing campaign for the scheme prior to planning permission being granted. They reported to the council that they have eleven potential office occupiers requiring between 2,000 to 30,000 sq ft of floor space with timescales for occupancy ranging from six to eighteen months.
Posted in Somerset |
Tagged Serviced Offices, Speculative Developments, Weston Gateway |
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