Full screen in a popup

Aerial view of the proposed project, visible in the bottom middle of the image

View of the Cambridge Circus proposals

DSDHA plans to renovate and extend a major office building in the heart of the West End have resurfaced six years after original plans received planning approval.

The practice has refined the design of the 12-storey 125 Shaftesbury Avenue project to align with post-pandemic working practices and submitted a new planning application.

It comes a year after the central London site was bought from previous owner Almacantar for Luxembourg client VREF Shaftesbury Avenue, a joint venture between developers Edge and Mitsubishi Estate.

Much of the same project team was retained, including the DSDHA design team, although MEP engineer Long & Partners and elevator consultant D2E were both replaced by Sweco.

Other firms still part of the team include cost consultant Gardiner & Theobald, civil and structural engineer AKT II, ​​planning consultant Gerald Eve, daylight consultant GIA and transport consultant Waterman .

The wedge-shaped site occupies most of a corner building between Soho and Seven Dials and is currently occupied by a vacant brick office block built in 1982 above the ground floor.

The original Almacantar project was submitted in 2016 and approved by Westminster council in 2018, but was never launched and consent has now expired.

This would have required an “extensive renovation” and extension of the building as well as the reinstatement of historic Little Compton Street, a pedestrian route through the site linking Old Compton Street to New Compton Street.

The DSDHA said it had “assessed the previous planning permission and concluded that changes are necessary to bring the proposals in line with the latest sustainability standards and meet the needs of a modern office occupier”.

“Since initial approval in 2018, the context around the building has evolved, the way people work and interact with commercial spaces has changed, and the way the world views carbon has changed for the better,” it says. the firm in planning documents.

The revised plan sought to build on previous proposals with “significantly enhanced sustainability ambitions”, including a reduction in the volume of demolition required and greater use of low-carbon materials.

The changes include the addition of a new light-filled atrium, widening the previously narrow pedestrian route of Little Compton Street and retaining existing floor slabs to reduce embodied carbon emissions.

A draft construction management plan developed by Waterman as part of the new application proposes clearance and demolition works commencing on site in August next year with construction completing in summer 2028 .

Almacantar had initially considered building a 30-story tower on the site, but opted for a renovation of the existing building after concluding that a high-rise project would have been “inappropriate” for the area.

The developer wanted to complete the project by December 2018, in time for the then-planned opening of the Elizabeth line at Tottenham Court Road, which finally opened more than three years in late 2022.