This Week's London Deal Sheet
The Deal Sheet is 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 mark.faithfull@bisnow.com.
UK REIT Landsec has completed a deal worth more than £400M to divest its portfolio of 21 hotel assets to Ares Management.
The properties comprise 3,766 rooms and are managed under the Novotel and Ibis brands, leased to AccorInvest until 2091 with a break clause every 12 years. The next break is not expected until around 2030.
The portfolio's flagship assets include the Novotel London West in Hammersmith and the Novotel London Tower Bridge. Other hotels in the portfolio include Ibis London Heathrow, Novotel Leeds Centre, Ibis Manchester Portland Street and Novotel Glasgow Centre.
Ares is understood to be partnering with AccorInvest to carry out the deal, which had a preemption option regarding the proposed sale of the portfolio. Accor sold the portfolio to Landsec in 2007 for £711M. That deal included an additional nine hotels.
DEALS
KKR and European hospitality partner Amante Capital have acquired the Park Grand London Kensington Hotel from Bartek Holdings.
The transaction is the first acquisition by KKR and Amante Capital since the launch of its vertically integrated hotel platform in 2022, and Amante Capital said in a statement that it will continue to focus on sourcing and acquiring hotel opportunities across Europe.
The 132-bedroom hotel is set to undergo extensive refurbishment to be repositioned as a boutique lifestyle hotel operated by Amante Capital under Marriott International’s Tribute Portfolio brand. Colliers advised KKR and Amante on the acquisition.
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Urban industrial investor and developer Bloom and TPG Angelo Gordon have acquired multilet industrial estate Poplar Business Park in east London for £21.5M.
The property was purchased from Workspace and comprises about 76K SF of industrial and business space across 29 units ranging in size from 652 SF to 11K SF. There are 19 tenants, including Colt Technology Services, NTL National Networks and Tower Hamlet Homes, and the weighted average unexpired lease term is 2.1 years to break and 4.4 years to expiration.
Although the 2.4-acre site has planning consent for commercial space and 222 homes, Bloom and TPG Angelo Gordon said in a statement they intend Poplar Business Park to remain an industrial estate and plan refurbishments to improve the property's energy performance certificate ratings to A.
This acquisition is the seventh in London since the formation of Bloom’s joint venture with TPG.
FOR SALE
The Cavalry Barracks, a former Ministry of Defence location and urban brownfield site in Hounslow, has been brought to market by CBRE’s residential land team on behalf of Kroll.
At just under 37 acres, it is one of the largest brownfield sites in west London and has hybrid planning permission for 1,525 residential units, 35% of which will be affordable, plus social rent and shared ownership units.
Fifty-six buildings occupy the site, with the extant consent retaining 23 of the buildings, including 14 Grade II-listed and nine locally listed.
Hutchinson & Partners and CBRE have designed two new feasibility studies, which include a lower-rise apartment-led and housing-led scheme for 1,234 units and 808 units, respectively. CBRE is seeking offers on both for the freehold interest.
LEASING
Cushman & Wakefield has exchanged contracts on new offices at Derwent London's 25 Baker Street development. Baker Street will replace Portman Square as Cushman & Wakefield’s West End office starting in September 2025.
The new offices include a shared rooftop terrace and sky room and, once complete, will be a net-zero carbon building targeting BREEAM Outstanding, LEED Gold and an EPC rating of A. The building will also be connected to a new public courtyard with cafés and restaurants.
“We spent considerable time reviewing potential locations and believe this building — at the forefront of sustainable development anywhere in the world — offers the best fit for our organisation and culture,” Cushman & Wakefield Head of UK and Ireland George Roberts said in a statement. “Our goal is to create a flexible and inclusive environment which reflects our brand and values and is a showcase for our clients, underpinned by technology and sustainability.”
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AXA IM Alts has announced that Gordon Ramsay Restaurants will open what will be the UK’s highest building-top bar and restaurant at 22 Bishopsgate in London, according to the company.
Gordon Ramsay Restaurants has taken a 20-year lease on levels 58M, 59, 60 and 61, directly above Horizon 22, the recently opened public viewing gallery.
The 24K SF will be used for Lucky Cat by Gordon Ramsay, an Asian-inspired restaurant. This new leisure offering represents another step for 22 Bishopsgate, having already opened Europe’s highest free public viewing gallery on level 58 and London’s first climbing window in the 25th-floor gym.
DEVELOPMENT
Longfellow Real Estate Partners has signed a fixed-price contract with construction company Wates to reposition its CamLIFE campus.
Construction on the 42-acre parkland CamLIFE campus is set to begin in Cambridge immediately, consisting of fitted lab space, amenities and green space. Delivery of the lab space will begin in mid-2025, with the Cam 3 building coming online first and Cam 1 and 2 following.
“This initial phase will be the foundation of what we hope will be a more extensive, broader vision for the campus,” Longfellow Real Estate UK Lead and Development Director Tom French said in a statement.
PEOPLE
Real estate credit and special situations investment manager Zenzic Capital has made two new appointments to its London office. Richard Clouston has been appointed as vice president of development finance and joins Zenzic from the Bank of New Zealand.
Edward Barnes joins Zenzic as a credit analyst from Westpac Banking Corporation in Melbourne, Australia.
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M7 Real Estate and Oxford Properties Group have announced the appointments of industry veterans Sylvain Fortier and Melinda Knatchbull as independent nonexecutive directors to the M7 board of directors.
Fortier, the new chair, was chief investment and innovation officer of Ivanhoé Cambridge, while Knatchbull has more than 25 years of financial and operational experience in real estate investment management. She is the chief financial officer at Sellar.
