The Northern Quarter

[yesevil]

Sounds like quite a big re-furb of Sevendale House in the NQ:

http://menmedia.co.uk/manchestereven...velopment_boom

I believe the below is said building...

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en&...359.5,,0,-13.7

[jrb]

MEN Business Week.

[jrb]

TBD.

ONE of the flagship buildings in Manchester's Northern Quarter is set to undergo a £6m refurbishment to restore it to ts former grandeur.

Sevendale House, a Grade II-listed, six-storey building in Stevenson Square, is to be upgraded to provide quality office space if a planning application submitted to Manchester City Council is approved.

Sevendale House is owned by Philip J Davies (Holdings) plc. Director Mark Davies said that its long term plan for the building had always been to wait for several leases to expire to carry out a major investment that will restore some of its period features while providing modern office space.

A new reception area is being created on the ground floor and five upper floors are being converted into 61,500 sq ft of offices - each with floorplates of around 14,500 sq ft. Once complete, the building will have the capacity to house a further 700 office workers.

The 120,000 sq ft building dates from 1903 and occupies a prominent island site in the square. It has several retail and leisure operators on its ground and basement floor levels, including arts supplies firm Fred Aldous, the NoHo bar and the Copacabana nightclub. The landlord confirmed that it is looking to retain its current tenants whom it said would not be affected by the works.

“This is our first opportunity in twenty-five years to carry out the long awaited renaissance of this significant building which will also enhance the attractions of the Northern Quarter to office users requiring good quality space in a great location with competitive overheads," said Davies.

"The Northern Quarter’s close proximity to Piccadilly and the business/financial core of the city gives us great confidence in terms of what we can offer here to augment Manchester’s office provision to companies of all sizes.

"Whether it is the creative industries that gravitate to this area or professional service companies that need cost- effective offices centrally situated, if this consent is granted, we are on target to provide this by March 2012.”

The company, which has a number of properties within its portfolio, was established over forty years ago by chairman Philip J Davies, who continues to play an active role in the business.

Dominic Horridge, building consultancy partner at advisors OBI Property, said: “On behalf of our client, we have worked closely with both Manchester City Council and English Heritage over the past months on this important application and believe we have their support and confidence in our client’s ability and commitment to deliver this project."

He added that the firm had appointed a project team including architects Stephenson Bell, Crooks Walker Consulting and Tier Consulting to carry out the refurbishment.

Stephenson Bell partner Roger Stephenson said: “We believe this building is the embodiment of the spirit of the Northern Quarter past and present.

"Its refurbishment presents us with many challenges including the intention to reintroduce the original lightwell which Manchester City Council’s archive records show was part of its original design and planning consent.

"This will run from the first to the fourth floor of Sevendale House and ultimately provide the building with superb natural daylight to illuminate the office space we create.”

The planning application is due to be considered in early March.

[Unremarkable]

It would make a great looking boutique hotel, with some nice greenery outside and some spillage of tables onto the pavement, perfect for the NQ me thinks.

But offices is better than nothing I suppose.

Where will my favourite camera shop go though?

[flange]

Originally Posted by Unremarkable

It would make a great looking boutique hotel, with some nice greenery outside and some spillage of tables onto the pavement, perfect for the NQ me thinks.

But offices is better than nothing I suppose.

Where will my favourite camera shop go though?

The retail units are not going to be changing so, Real Camera Co and Fred Adlous etc will be staying.

The 120,000 sq ft building dates from 1903 and occupies a prominent island site in the square. It has several retail and leisure operators on its ground and basement floor levels, including arts supplies firm Fred Aldous, the NoHo bar and the Copacabana nightclub. The landlord confirmed that it is looking to retain its current tenants whom it said would not be affected by the works.

[jozblade]

I was walking around the NQ yesterday from Oldham Street area towards Piccadilly (the 'back' way) and there is so much untapped potential in that area of the city. So many great buildings around there.

Are there any plans by the council in terms of what they hope to achieve in the NQ over the coming years? Areas of Thomas Street that is largely filled with shops,restraunts and bars still has some dodgy buildings.

[nq]

Taken from the City Centre Lib Dems March newsletter,

Welcome to our latest edition of the City Centre Residents e-news. We are pleased to set out below some key issues that your local Liberal Democrat Councillors have been working on in the past month:

Stevenson Square Update

Early last year we reported on plans to redevelop and improve Stevenson Square in the Northern Quarter, which would included removing the buses and making the square more pedestrian friendly and attractive. Your city centre Councillor have received the following update from the City Centre Regeneration team:

"The TIF proposals being developed in 2007/8 would have allowed the removal of most of the buses currently using the Northern Quarter. They included the building a bus station near Salford Central Station which would be used by the Salford and other westbound services that currently terminate in Shudehill Interchange. Those services vacating Shudehill would create the capacity to allow all the services using places like Oldham Street, Lever Street and Stevenson Square to terminate in the interchange. The new bus station in Salford would also have helped remove the same Salford and westbound buses from the Greengate area in Salford and Victoria Street in Manchester, which in turn would have helped Salford and Manchester Councils bring forward, respectively, the Greengate and Cathedral Square schemes. With the failure of the TIF bid (i.e. the no vote in the referendum) the funding was lost (or more accurately, was never made available). More recently colleagues here in Transport and Highways have been working with colleagues in Salford and with the bus operators to find a way of re-routing those Salford and westbound bus services and I have been reassured that this work is progressing well.

From the outset we identified that the catalyst to the refurbishment of the square would be the delivery of the second phase of Argent's The Hive (i.e. 1 to 9 Stevenson Square and 43-45 Lever Street). The Hive Phase 2 had in its own right the potential to deliver S106 monies to help pay for works in the square and Argent had the potential to pull together a partnership with other building owners around the square. While Phase 1 of The Hive (47 - 51 Lever Street) has been completed and is gradually being occupied, Phase 2 has stalled (partly because of the economic downturn and partly because of Argent's protracted negotiations to acquire one of the buildings) and this has meant that there has been a loss of momentum in Argent's dialogue with their neighbours around the square.

In terms of scheme costs and budget, the report to Executive in June 2008 contained a scheme cost estimate of £1.6 million (which feels on the low side). There was no mention in the report of there being a budget for the scheme, although the report did say that once scheme costs were identified and private sector contributions taken into account an appropriate budget would be allocated".

[nq]

A few quick shots of the clearance for Hilton Sq Mk2(anyone know what its real name is?)








http://pa.manchester.gov.uk/online-a...=L7EL8DBC02600


Also, looks like Hilton Sq has been shortlisted for an RIBA award,
http://www.architecture.com/RegionsA...ds/Awards.aspx

[guy debord]

Good news, Hilton Square is good quality, nicely built and well located.

[macc]

Originally Posted by nq

A few quick shots of the clearance for Hilton Sq Mk2(anyone know what its real name is?)

So this is another version of the small offices near Lamarrs? These are great.

It's really good provision of reasonably sized and priced modern office space for small businesses and start ups. It's fitting it's in the NQ but the concept could be replicated in various locations, such as mediacity.

[nq]

Originally Posted by macc

So this is another version of the small offices near Lamarrs? These are great.

Yep, it's from the same developers, replicating the format/style following the success of it.

[pipkin]

I had no idea about the Hilton Sq development, what a great addition to Swan Street, in my mind an undervalued and potentially lovely addition to NQ. Lets hope something happens to the old market hall soon...

[cle]

I love those little offices around Lamarrs - always walk that was to Piccadilly. Port Street Beer House makes that area even better!

It's quite atmospheric, in a way that the central NQ around Thomas Street and Oldham Street has begun to lack, due to popularity.

[kids]

Port Street is one of my favs too

image hosted on flickr


http://www.flickr.com/photos/paullik...n/photostream/

[markydeedrop]

21 Apr 2011, 15:24

Manchester's bohemian Northern Quarter is to host a 1940s-style street party for the Royal wedding on Friday 29 April.

Edge Street and part of Oak Street will be transformed with bunting, punch and Victoria sponge in abundance.

Local cafes and businesses will set up stalls offering party food, cake, chocolate, vintage delights, arts and crafts and much more.

An eclectic fashion show will showcase the Northern Quarter's finest independent designers and outlets, with many of the garments available for sale on stalls afterwards.

The event is being organised by Edge Street Events, an events and marketing company situated in the heart of the Northern Quarter on Edge Street. The company is already known for the Manchester Food & Drink Festival.

Carole Keating is a freelance events manager who came up with the idea, pitched it to Edge Street, and is now working on the event as part of their team.

Keating said: "Since putting the word out only a month ago we've had an unbelievable response, with 2,500 fans and over 800 followers and growing every day. It looks set to be a fairly major event for the area as we're aiming to attract around 2,000 people to the event, to bring new people to the Northern Quarter as well as getting the locals together. We love a good excuse for a party in Manchester but it's also a great opportunity for businesses to engage with the NQ community- a community of movers, shakers and tastemakers."

The Northern Quarter Street Party will celebrate Manchester's cultural hub and the myriad of independent enterprises that make it one of the most exciting, dynamic and diverse neighbourhood in the UK to work and play in.

A swing dance lesson by the Manchester Lindyhop society is sure to get toes tapping, while a 40s-themed treasure hunt around the Northern Quarter will delight would-be sleuths. A busker's bandstand will feature a mix of folk bands, magicians and other entertaining eccentrics. Local artists will showcase their work in a series of live art performances; there are rumours abound of an epic sing-off between two rival barbershop choirs, while the 'Red Arrows' will be taking to the streets as you've never seen them before!

Budding cake-bakers, bunting-crafters and jam-makers are invited to enter their creations into a competition, to be judged by a very special guest. Other party plans include craft workshops, a brass band and string quartet, charity tombola, pass the parcel, black pudding hoopla and much more. As the light fades stunning visual projections will be provided by Littlestar Media and DJs including Xfm's Gareth Brooks, Murkage Cartel and the stars of the NQ's finest underground clubnights will keep the party going til 9pm.

The Northern Quarter Street Party plans to become an annual event, held every summer and growing in size, scope and ambition- now is the time to get on board with an event set to become a key fixture in Manchester's cultural calendar.

■www.facebook.com/NorthernQuarterStreetParty
■www.twitter.com/NQStreetParty
■www.northernquarterstreetparty.co.uk

http://www.placenorthwest.co.uk/news...l-wedding.html

[Manc Guy]

Originally Posted by nq

Are the drawings still online for this? How do I access them?

What happened to the planning portal map, cant seem to find it anywhere.

[nq]

Renders on the hoardings of the Swan Street development,





The developers GP Investments seem to have become Workshop Properties Ltd, being built by Pres-tech Construction.

[nq]

This looks like quite an interesting decision...recently refused application for a (retrospective?) change of use of the upper floors of 1-3 Stevenson Square, the supposed site of Hive phase two. Possibly the building Argent are struggling to acquire?

1-3 Stevenson Square Manchester M1 1DN
Change of use to D1 (education and training facility) at 1st 2nd and third floor level
094744/FU/2010/C2

Decision Doc

Reason 1, 'The proposal has the potential to be detrimental to the attractiveness of the area to future investment'

[flange]

Let’s talk Northern Quarter… the council seems to feel there are enough bars around the bottom of Thomas Street. Where does the Northern Quarter go if there are no more bars allowed in?
Flippantly, I don’t think bars are the problem. I think tea shops are the problem – as much as we love them, there are an awful lot of them.

I think Thomas Street has seen a lot of bars open and the demographic of that area has changed, but that will always happen. We have a member of staff working full time on the Northern Quarter because it’s incredibly important to Manchester’s offer and we probably don’t make enough of it. We need to make sure it doesn’t just become Carnaby Street though.

But the businesses there have to be sustainable. Tea rooms come and go.
The ones that survive and thrive have a strong identity and have a different theme to the others. You need to keep your identity and encourage the businesses to be original.

I think some parts of the Northern Quarter have gone more upmarket to the way they were three or four years ago. I think it will be interested to how it expands towards Great Ancoats Street and up towards the Sharp Project.

http://www.manchesterconfidential.co...llen-Interview

[Slow Burn]

Hoardings up around the Hilton Square site