A weekly round up of the latest planning and property news from the central London boroughs

 

Westminster

Property Week reports that the US private equity giant Blackstone has unveiled plans for giant Berkeley Square London headquarters. The plan to establish a new European HQ at London’s Berkeley Square, has been described by Liz Truss as a “resounding vote of confidence in the UK”. They have agreed to fully lease the 10-storey prime office building, comprising 226,000 sq ft of office space. The site, close to Blackstone’s current base in Mayfair, is occupied by Lansdowne House, but is being redeveloped by developer CO-RE and architect AHMM, with construction slated to be completed by 2028. The building will accommodate over 1,800 seats as well as 14,000 sq ft of ground-floor retail space and redeveloped public areas at the south end of the square. Blackstone, whose major European investments include Mileway Logistics and Bourne Leisure, has doubled its London headcount over the past three years to around 500 people.

Property Week reports that property management estate Howard de Walden has announced two new signings with Guy’s and St Thomas’ Trust Private Care and Moorfields Private Eye Hospital. Moorfields Private Eye Hospital, previously the London Claremont Clinic, has signed a lease at 60 Wimpole Street. The hospital also forms part of the private division of Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, with the new lease set to build on the space at 50-52 New Cavendish Street. Guy’s and St Thomas’ has also expanded, taking up 4,261 sq ft of space next to Royal Brompton’s facility. The clinics, which are now part of Guy’s and St Thomas’ combine a total of 15,500 sq ft of space.

The City

Property Week reports battle stations over Liverpool Street redevelopment plans. Shard developer Sellar has defended its £1.5bn vision to redevelop Liverpool Street Station after heritage groups claimed the proposals were “oversized and insensitive” to the site’s rich history. Sellar’s plans would see the street pedestrianised, and some buildings demolished, while £450m would be put aside to alleviate congestion at the station. Chief executive James Sellar said: “Our vision to significantly upgrade Liverpool Street station will alleviate chronic overcapacity issues and future-proof it for generations, at zero cost to the tax or fare payer.” However, Historic England’s chief executive Duncan Wilson said the “oversized and insensitive development is not the answer” and the plans were “fundamentally misconceived”.

Property Week reports that London’s Selso building is to undergo sustainable refurbishment. The City of London Corporation has granted J Safra Group permission to refurbish the Selso building, in a scheme led by sustainability. The building at 95 Queen Victoria Street, EC4V comprises circa 90, 000 sq ft of office space. It will undergo the refurbishment across six floors, with J Safra Group instructing the Savills project management team to deliver the scheme. Due for completion in Q1 2024, the sustainably considerate scheme will retain the original envelope and structure in order to reduce the embodied carbon, while significantly improving operational energy performance.

Estate Gazette reports that Dominvs Group has submitted plans to build a 780-bed student housing development. They want to knock down the five-storey Friary Court office block at 65 Crutched Friars, EC3 and replace it with a 21-storey tower known as the Scriptorium. The Scriptorium will provide cultural and community space on the ground floor.

Camden

Estate Gazette reports that GlaxoSmithKline is closing in on their new London headquarters as they move from Brentford. They are nearing a deal for all of the office space at the Earnshaw on New Oxford Street, WC1. The Earnshaw measures 140,000 sq ft across nine-storeys above ground retail. The company is expected to sign a minimum 15-year lease. Rents at the development, owned by clients of Royal London Asset Management, are said to be in the region of £95 per sq ft depending on the floor.

Islington

Estate Gazette reports that Epoch Biodesign has signed a new lease at Pembroke’s 10 Finsbury Square, EC2. The company, which specialises in synthetic biology, will occupy 12,150 sq ft of workspace, known as the Green Room. It was recently redesigned to offer adaptable studio and lab space and end-of-trip facilities.

Hackney

Building Design online reports that Henley Halebrown and Stephen Taylor Architects have been granted planning permission for 189 new homes on undeveloped and underused land on the De Beauvoir Estate. The infill scheme is the first phase in redevelopment of the estate, which will be across six buildings, providing 593sq m of non-residential floorspace as well as additional green spaces and new play areas. Fifty percent of the new homes will be affordable, with 59 being social rented homes and the remaining 36 shared ownership. Hackney Council is the client for the scheme. Borough deputy mayor and cabinet member for delivery, inclusive economy and regeneration Guy Nicholson said: “Hackney is facing a real need for new homes that meet the needs of our growing community. Many families in or around the De Beauvoir Estate live in homes that don’t meet their needs”.

Southwark

Construction News reports that Mace has been appointed principal contractor for a 28-storey London Bridge office tower. The 260,000 square feet office development aims to be the most sustainable office block in London and will incorporate a large shared green roof terrace and an adjacent public park. The project is valued at £500m by data intelligence provider Glenigan. Mace was appointed to the scheme, located at St Thomas Street, by Dutch developer Edge along with Goldman Sachs Asset Management and funding partners Local Pensions Partnership Investments and the London Fund. The company has already delivered two major projects – the iconic Shard and Shard Place – in the London Bridge area.

Lambeth

Wandsworth Times reports that Lambeth councillors have approved a new Brixton hotel despite residents’ fears that their lives will be made a nightmare by misbehaving guests. The proposed five-storey hotel will have 96 bedrooms. Lambeth Council previously approved near-identical plans in 2017, but building work on the project never started and the permission for the project expired. The site is currently home to Superdrug on Brixton Road. The developer, Miraj Investments, will put aside £80,000 to help Transport for London install rental bikes near the hotel. Cllr Jessica Leigh, Labour member for Clapham East, expressed concern that the application hadn’t been properly thought through. She said: “The rigour upon which this application has been brought I’m really struggling to see how I would be happy to vote in favour.” A six-person Lambeth Council planning committee held on the 11ith October went on to pass the plans by a vote of 3-2. One member abstained.

Wandsworth

Wandsworth Times reports that Wandsworth Council’s new Labour administration will make all homes in the authority’s 1,000 homes programme available for council rent. The original scheme approved under Conservative leadership promised to build 1,000 homes on council land by 2027 across different tenures, including 442 council rent homes. The move was approved by the council’s executive on Monday (October 10) after being green-lit by the housing committee in September. But Conservative councillors raised concerns about the authority needing to borrow more cash for the programme and whether the administration is doing enough for private renters or people wanting to own their homes.

Kensington and Chelsea

Construction Enquirer reports that Ardmore has signed off the contract for a £500m residential scheme in West London catapulting the firm to the top of the contracts league for work secured in September. The £500m scheme consists of 462-flats at 100 West Cromwell Road and is for developer SevenCapital and investor MARK.

The Guardian reports that the UK’s most expensive house has gone up for sale again. The seven-storey Knightsbridge property overlooking Hyde Park has more living space than American football pitch with 45 rooms. The Guardian understands that at least five prospective buyers toured the seven-storey Knightsbridge property since it was quietly put on the market in the last few weeks. The property was sold for a record £205m in January 2020.

Hammersmith and Fulham

FulhamSW6.com reports that a new life science campus is coming to Fulham Reach. The campus, called Refinery, is being created by the redevelopment and extension of the existing office building in Manbre Wharf and the opening up of the green space in front of it to connect it to the Thames Path. Construction giant Kier has been appointed to deliver Refinery. Inside, the space will be fully redeveloped to create flexible laboratories, together with working spaces including a mix of office space, hospitality facilities and cycle facilities for 200 bicycles. Outside, the external works will create a new communal park for the public, that integrates with the Thames Path. The 121,000 sq. ft science and tech laboratory building will help to address the crippling shortage of lab space across London and will combine flexible wet and dry lab space and state-of-the-art research and development facilities, with a range of amenities suitable for science and tech SMEs to multinationals.

General

The Times reports that close to £1 billion was knocked off the value of the biggest housebuilders yesterday amid the first signs that demand for homes is falling rapidly. Barratt Developments, which builds more houses in Britain than any other developer, warned that its sales have fallen sharply in recent weeks as mortgage rates have surged. Since the beginning of September, it has been selling an average of 0.48 homes per week at its sites, a 44 per cent drop compared with this time last year and 20 per cent shy of what it was selling as recently as July and August. In a trading update on its first quarter, the FTSE-100 firm said it had launched 25 new developments – down from 27 in the same period last year – with 3,608 homes in total, down from 3,699 last year.

The Telegraph reports on how London compares to the world’s most dangerous house price bubbles right now. Toronto and Frankfurt are heading for the steepest house price crashes as soaring interest rates threaten to burst the world’s biggest housing bubbles, according to an investment bank. London house prices are not yet in bubble territory, but homes are “overvalued” UBS said, along with those in New York, San Francisco, Madrid and Singapore. Overall, London ranked sixteenth in terms of risk, out of the 25 world cities UBS analysed. Interest rates are key to driving the housing market bubbles. Low rates have allowed house prices to become detached from incomes and rents over the last ten years. Property valuations are therefore wildly out of kilter with what people can actually afford. Up until now, that gap was offset by ultra-low mortgage rates, which made borrowing exceptionally cheap. Now that interest rates are soaring, that buffer has been removed.