Urban Splash sells Ducie House to TCS
Town Centre Securities (TCS), has extended its property portfolio with the acquisition of Ducie House, a 33,000 sq ft office building with 63-space car park, for £9m.
Contracts have now been exchanged between TCS, the leading Leeds based property investment and car park operator, and Urban Splash, the award-winning regeneration company and former owner of Ducie House who converted the building from a petticoat factory into loft-style workspaces two-decades ago.
The deal will be TCS’s fifth in the area as it continues its commitment to the regeneration of the adjacent site at Piccadilly Basin. TCS has a mixture of retail, commercial and residential developments in the area, including Urban Exchange, Carver’s Warehouse and Burlington House, with a focus on further developing the south-eastern side of Great Ancoats Street as a link to the city centre.
Situated on the fringe of Manchester’s Northern Quarter, Ducie House is a brick-built contemporary development which provides highly flexible work solutions for companies’ needs - large and small, short-term and long-term. As it stands, there are 64 office and studio spaces ranging in sizes from 82 to 3,900 sq ft. In the past 20 years, these spaces have been home to a range of exciting and iconic Manchester names like 808 State and Simply Red, as well as ANS, UK Fast, Ask Developments and Ear to the Ground.
Currently there are approximately 50 tenants based in the building, with a number of unique units available to let. The majority of units are let on an all-inclusive flexible lease basis producing an annual income of £675,000.
Richard Lewis, property director at TCS, said: “We’re delighted to have acquired Ducie House, the building will be a valuable addition to our existing assets within The Basin and the surrounding area. It has been great to continue working with Urban Splash, following our recent joint venture of the former Brownsfield Mill (now AVRO) with the company. Urban Splash has owned and operated Ducie House for many years and we hope to mirror the same success they’ve had.
“Ducie House will allow us to have greater control of what we see as a key strategic site, directly opposite our next planned residential development, Eider House. The building will offer additional flexibility alongside our existing office site, Carvers Warehouse, as we will have the ability to present our existing tenants more office options in the future. We certainly see room for potential refurbishment as well as development of the car park.”
Nathan Cornish of Urban Splash added, “Ducie House is a true Urban Splash success story – a classic example of us spotting an up and coming area of Manchester and investing in its future; Piccadilly Basin is a hive of activity and home to our Avro scheme which we acquired from TCS last year.
“We bought Ducie in 1991 to save it being demolished; we then refurbished it with the help of architects Simpson Haugh, and quickly fully let the spaces to iconic Manchester brands and start-ups. We are delighted to see it enter its next phase and are pleased to pass it onto the very good hands of TCS as part of the wider redevelopment of this exciting area of the city centre.”
Positioned just off Great Ancoats Street, Ducie House has excellent links to Manchester’s motorway network, and is just two minutes walk from Piccadilly Station, the city’s busiest mainline and Metrolink station.
