This Week's London Deal Sheet
A weekly compilation of Greater London and beyond's biggest leases, sales, financing deals, construction updates and personnel moves. Have news you’d like to submit? Email tim.clark@bisnow.com.
Private equity giant Blackstone and Hudson Pacific have been given the green light to build a £300M film studio facility in the UK.
Funds managed by Blackstone and Hudson Pacific will transform a 91-acre site in Hertfordshire into a state-of-the-art, 1.2M SF studio campus, creating one of the UK’s largest film and television production locations.
The project will include 21 soundstages totalling 470K SF, with 420K SF of workshop and mill space and 250K SF of stage-adjacent production office and support space as well as amenity, basecamp and backlot spaces.
The studios will create up to 4,800 jobs.
Preliminary site work is expected to start in the second half of 2022 with construction to commence in 2023 and the potential delivery of the project by the end of 2025.
DEVELOPMENT
Privately owned real estate group Topland is pressing ahead with a £165M scheme at 3-4 Bartholomew Place near the recently opened Elizabeth Line in the City of London.
Named Verdant, the scheme in Farringdon will be composed of 135K SF of high-quality, sustainable office space and will complete in 2024.
Owned by billionaire brothers Sol and Eddie Zakay, Topland Group, in conjunction with development manager Beltane, has now appointed contractor Midgard to start work on the major new development.
Cushman & Wakefield and BH2 have been appointed as leasing agents for the scheme.
FINANCE
Schroders Capital has agreed to make a £33M loan to refinance a purpose-built retail centre in St Albans.
The three-year loan facility has been agreed with real estate investor and developer Boultbee LDN Investment, which has owned The Maltings, an open shopping centre, since 2003. Boultbee were advised by Bircroft Private.
The loan includes a specific ESG-related capex programme, designed to support stakeholders’ ESG focus, while also ensuring the continued success of the asset as a central part of, and contributor to, the local community in St Albans.
The UK Senior Loan fund targets a gross return of 6.5% by directly originating loans between £15M-£100M in the UK mid-market across all real estate sectors.
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Cheyne Capital Real Estate has agreed to lend Champneys, the luxury wellness and spa group, £108M to help refinance and invest in the brand and portfolio.
The £108M loan will allow Champneys to refinance its existing loan facilities on the group portfolio and renovate its wellness resorts in Leicestershire and Cheshire.
The senior loan has been provided to Champneys Health Resorts and will also support the group’s five-year business plan. The renovations are set to take place at the Springs property in Leicestershire and Mottram Hall in Cheshire, transforming them into cutting-edge spa facilities.
Champneys has six resorts and hotels in the UK with a combined total of 538 beds and 249 treatment rooms and an average of 100,000 people visiting per annum.
Duxhill Associates arranged the transaction.
SALES
Goldman Sachs has partnered with Greycoat to buy its former City HQ for £370M. Goldman provided backing for Greycoat's purchase of 15 Newgate Street on Paternoster Square in the City of London, close to St Paul’s Cathedral.
The property was sold by Chinese firm Shimao Property. The office complex totals 303K SF of office space and was purchased by Shimao from German property management group Deka in 2015 for £270M.
Following Goldman Sachs decision to decant from the building it has undergone a refurbishment and modernisation programme. CBRE is the leading agent for the building.
LEASING
The Langham Estate has announced it has secured 70K SF of new lettings over the past three months including three new medical clinics to Randox Health and a 7K SF let of leisure space to Whistle Punks, which operates an urban axe-throwing venue.
The Langham Estate, which operates a 13.8-acre estate north of Oxford Street in the West End, said a further 80K SF is currently under offer. The estate is engaged with a number of film and TV post-production companies that have taken 27.5K SF and have a further 14K SF in advanced discussions.
PEOPLE
Pan-European investment, development and asset manager RE Capital has appointed Yuan Sun as its head of residential development.
Yuan joins RE Capital, whose UK team has focused on redeveloping heritage buildings into attractive and sustainable modern offices, from Strawberry Star Homes where she oversaw four major mixed-use regeneration projects with a combined gross development value of over £700M.
At RE Capital, Yuan will lead the pan-European company’s entrance to the UK BTR and BTS residential and mixed-use markets. Yuan will also support RE Capital’s Lisbon team, which has a growing portfolio of residential property in the Portuguese capital including the LX Living and AAA23 luxury living developments, as well as sit on the firm’s pan-European executive team.
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Knight Frank has expanded its ESG Consulting team with the appointment of Joe Warren as associate.
With expertise in regulatory compliance, carbon reporting, feasibility studies and sustainability asset appraisals, Warren will work closely with Knight Frank’s Jonathan Hale and the firm’s ESG Consultancy team, as well as its project & building consultancy team, led by Charles Ingram Evans, to advise clients on managing and reducing the carbon output of development and refurbishment projects.
Joining from MITIE, where he spent seven years specialising in technical energy solutions, Warren developed additional technical experience in roles at David Maher & Associates and Coffey Construction, as well as through a master's of engineering from University College Dublin.
