Business News The Griffin Report


Jon Griffin, Chamberlink’s award-winning columnist, talks to Mark Lee, chief executive of Calthorpe Estates, and other members of his team. Mr Lee talks about the transformation which Edgbaston has undergone in the past 25 years, and how momentum is being kept up with the ambitious Edgbaston Village project.


Edgbaston is in the throes of its biggest rebirth in 300 years of ground- breaking history – with a major new phase of development around the corner. A three-pronged programme of rejuvenation – comprising the Edgbaston


Medical Quarter, the area’s burgeoning Village centre and the replacement of tired 70s and 80s office blocks – is putting the UK’s largest urban estate firmly on the map. The firm behind the project, landowners Calthorpe Estates, has unveiled


its vision for its 1,600 acre estate as the clock ticks towards its own 300th birthday celebrations next summer. Chief executive Mark Lee offered Chamberlink a fascinating insight into


the future of Edgbaston Village, including the £300 million New Garden Square project, a new private hospital, extra retailers and a new skyline with the redevelopment of stale office block sites. The next phase of the Edgbaston rebirth comes as


Head of marketing Nicki Gibberson said: “It is a completely different feel to the city centre – we also have the green open spaces.” Next up in Calthorpe Estates’ sights are a number of old office blocks


dating back to the 1970s and 80s which promise to further increase the speed of development across Edgbaston. “The renovation of commercial office stock is the next phase. We have


already been through a process with Historic England to identify which blocks are immune from listing. There are six blocks we could demolish tomorrow if we chose. “There is the old Five Ways Tower, the Chamber of Commerce building,


the HSBC office next to the Binding Site – a whole number of buildings of that size and scale that will need redeveloping. “We would talk to anybody. If HSBC want to come


the area awaits crucial new transport links with the extension of the Midland Metro tram system within five years, bringing the area within five minutes’ travel of the city centre. Mark Lee said: “Edgbaston has got so much to offer, it has undergone


‘Edgbaston has got so much to offer, it has undergone the biggest rebirth in its history’


the biggest rebirth in its history – it is very much mixed-use, that is the modern thinking and that thinking is evolving all the time. “If you go back 25 years it was very tired but there has been a change of


outlook for the whole area. It has taken a long time to turn around but the area has had a completely new lease of life.” Mark identified three key areas of redevelopment which had helped


transform Edgbaston - the Medical Quarter around Pebble Mill and now home to over 550 medical companies, the growth of the Village centre and the planned replacement of old office blocks. The 27-acre Pebble Mill site has already attracted the Birmingham Dental


Hospital and School of Dentistry, a Bupa Care Home and a new Circle Health Private Hospital, bringing industry and academia together. Meanwhile, the development of Edgbaston Village has gone from


strength to strength, with a wide range of new bars and restaurants in the last few years, from Michelin-starred Simpsons to the Edgbaston boutique hotel and cocktail lounge, the High Field gastro pub, and the recent launch of the Physician pub-restaurant in Harborne Road becoming the latest part of the jigsaw. “It has all come together in the last five years, most of it within the last


two years. People are now talking about ‘let’s go out at the weekend, where shall we go? Right, let’s go to Edgbaston Village.”


here we will talk to them, if the Government wants a Government office here, we will speak to them. You can put good size buildings up here – it is a positive signal for people to come to work in this area.” As part of its £300 million New Garden Square project


– which will see Edgbaston House, a 1970s vacant office block demolished – new apartments, commercial units


and an array of leisure facilities will be built around a garden square on land between the Plough and Harrow pub and Five Ways island. “The consultation process is now underway – it will be three years before


all the buildings will be ready for occupation.” Meanwhile, The Village in Edgbaston aims to create a new urban village


around Greenfield Crescent which will include new boutique shops, restaurants and residential accommodation. “We are creating retail units around the centre of the village – we have five out of 11 signed up or in the first stage of legals. “I am very pleased with what we


have been able to achieve – there is more momentum than ever in Edgbaston.”


Mark Lee: Change of outlook for Edgbaston 14 CHAMBERLINK December 2016/January 2017


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