Green Light For Leeds Student Development

Green Light For Leeds Student Development

A major new student accommodation scheme in Leeds has gained planning permission, involving the conversion of former council buildings.

McClaren Property had applied to carry out the £62 million conversion of the Leonardo Printworks, the Leonardo building and Thoresby House, which lie in the civic quarter of Leeds. These buildings and an adjacent car park site will be transformed into a 17,490 sq m development with 473 student beds, with the aim of completion in time for the 2023-24 academic year.

They are located within a few minutes’ walk of the University of Leeds, a Leeds Beckett University campus and Leeds Teaching Hospital.

With both Leonardo Printworks and Thorseby House being Grade II listed buildings, scaffolding companies in Leeds working on the project will be helping ensure the scheme maintains the existing character of these Victorian structures.

At the same time, the project will have many environmentally-friendly elements; these include the embodied carbon from retaining the existing structures, the use of photovoltaic panels and their connection to the city’s district heating system.

The use of existing buildings is in contrast with many other student developments and residential projects of recent years in Leeds, which have tended to be new builds.

Director of development at Leeds City Council Martin Farringdon said the development would have a major beneficial effect for the city centre as it recovers from the pandemic, a process he said is “already enhanced by proposals from the British Library, National Infrastructure Bank and the Bank of England, all looking to locate into our city centre.”

Regional managing director of McClaren Property Tom Gilman said: “There was a great meeting of minds on this project, especially given the complexity of the listed buildings and that it is McLaren’s first student project in Leeds.” He added that progress has been very swift, with the process from commencing the search for a development site to planning permission taking just seven months.

McClaren Property has been highly active in Leeds, with its other schemes including a build-to-rent project mentioned by Mr Gilman.

Last year, prior to the onset of the pandemic, it also gained planning permission for a 330,000 sq ft office scheme on Wellington Street in the city centre, with the 17 storeys of Grade A office space promising to be the largest of its kind in the city. At the time, the firm had promised to unveil further details at the MIPIM conference in Cannes in March 2020.

Subsequently, the pandemic has impacted on the number of people coming into the centres of major cities like Leeds, creating doubts over the level of future demand for office space as some will want to continue to work from home at least part of the time.

However, while many universities are planning to offer more online and distance learning, student property may remain a popular option as young people want to enjoy the full university of experience of living away from home as independent adults and experiencing life in a different city. This may be especially true in a large city like Leeds.

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