Elliot Group plans boutique hotel after acquiring Beetham Plaza

Developer Elliot Group has acquired the long leasehold of Liverpool’s Beetham Plaza, with plans in place to bring forward a new hotel whilst relocating the existing ‘bucket fountain’ installation.

The mixed-use Beetham Plaza was completed in the 1990s and includes 42 luxury apartments, the restaurants Etsu and Silk Road, 4,500 sq ft of offices, and an underground cark park. The project was designed by Brock Carmichael.

Elliot Group has acquired the site for an undisclosed sum and will bring forward a hotel on the site, to be operated by Liverpool-based Epic, which also recently opened an Elliot-developed hotel on Seel Street. The hotel is also set to include a ground-floor restaurant and café space.

Under the emerging plans for the site, the developer is proposing to relocate the existing bucket fountain, a hydraulic installation by Richard Huws.

The site of the fountain will be taken up by the £10m new-build hotel element, designed by Falconer Chester Hall, and Elliot is proposing to meet the full costs of the fountain’s relocation.

Elliot Lawless of Elliot Group said the developer would welcome public views as to where the fountain could be moved to.

“It’s a great piece of engineering but it’s hidden in this part of the business district and deserves a more visible location so that more people can enjoy it,” he said.

“Just as our beloved Super Lamb Banana had to find a new home, so it’s time for the buckets to go on a short journey.  The question is, to where?  We’re talking to the council about their own aspirations for the fountain but would very much welcome the public’s view.”

Under the plans, the existing 42 luxury apartments, restaurants, and office space will remain unchanged. The developer is currently in discussions with the council about extending the opening hours of the underground car park.

Elliot Group was represented by Hill Dickinson, while Beetham Plaza’s vendor was represented by Excello Law.

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Don’t like that at all…..it is a nice little public space, and any new build will cast it into shadow.
The bucket waterfall is fine where it is.

By JA

Also any new build will cast the existing restaurants into shadow. It is nice just to stumble across the bucket fountain. Not everything has to be obvious and in your face. Leave it alone!

By JA

“I like it”, the little square is underused and the fountain needs to be seen in a more visible space, how about on the strand somewhere and illuminated at night?

By Gerry Pacemaker

Some people just want to ruin anything decent in the city. They need to finish some of the hoarded up eye soars scattering the city centre.

By Mikes mate

How long before someone paints “pay your lads Elliot “ on it

By Trent

Methinks someone has a real agenda on here criticising everything Elliot does, is it jealousy or just a snobby attiude? I am sure if I am right that person will be back on because they just can’t leave it alone, they seem obsessed with him. Personally I think he doing alright and good to see him creating investment and employment in the city. I have no connection with him, but I am sad to hear of disapproval of him on other forums too!

By Tarzan

The square is NEVER, EVER used…bring it on.

By Jojo

Isn’t there a plaque on the side commemorating the slave trade? Is that what the sculptures all about?

By Hugo Drax

@Hugo Drax Fear not, old chap: Liverpool has a rather excellent (and rather large) museum at the Albert Dock commemorating the city’s role in slave trading. But if you’re asking us to beat ourselves up for what our ancestors did more than 200 years ago, forget it.

Interesting to note, of course, that the area was previously known as the Goree Piazza and that stretch of the dock road is called Goree – named after the slave trading post off the coast of Senegal by the same name. I suspect it was so named, however, to mark its profitable contribution to the city’s growth…

By Sceptical

@Trent that was issues with Forrest as the contractor which as we all now know why, not Elliot

By L17

I think it’s ok. The square is elevated and only relates to the immediate buildings. Looks good retaining a smaller dining square and with the ground level recess at the new Epic hotel.

By Roscoe

I agree with Tarzan

cant we all just get along ?

By cheetah the chimp

Really not a good idea…

By Anonymous

Give him one thing, he’s not a nimby. Instead of looking out at the buckets and the square he’ll now be looking out at the back of the hotel. Good luck to the fella, he certainly gives it a go.

By Verum

words like Boutique should be forever banned from Liverpool, a rugged port with strong industrial heritage. Translated into Scouse it would be ‘booty’ and I suggest that is what it deserves

By C Morton

Turns out the bucket fountain has nothing to do with slavery at all – although it still has a dark past stained with civic triumphalism…

It was actually commissioned by Merseyside Civic Society to commemorate the completion of the Tryweryn scheme, which saw a remote Welsh valley flooded to satisfy Liverpool’s need for water. Families and businesses displaced; historic buildings lost; the dead dug up and re-interred. But Liverpool had political and economic clout so that was alright.

Interestingly, it was never a ‘sound sculpture’, either – and the current site was the fourth choice location and secured by chance when the London-based developer needed something to animate the square behind his swanky new office scheme. It’s all on the Civic Society’s web site, for them wot’s interested.

By Sceptical

I would like to make suggestion with regards to re-siting the iconic ‘buckets waterfall’ currently at Beetham Plaza. Can you provide me with a contact name and email address please. I remember this area with very fond memories. Think it’s very good of Elliot to suggest paying to re-site it, some builders would have just bulldozed it and carried on with their construction.

By Jeanne Morgan

If it was meant to commemorate Tryweryn then we really must think carefully about where this fountain goes! We could use this an opportunity to make amends with the people of North Wales who still feel sorely about the drowning of this village. It has left a lasting scar on our relations with the Welsh to whom we owe so much for their contribution to our city. How about the grounds of a restored Welsh church in Princes Road, or in the area once known as Little Wales in the Vauxhall Road area.

By Roscoe

There is no agenda as Tarzan implies just serious questions about the multi million investments of Elliott Group and yet the same company has advised its investors in Queensland place of its one year default of paying assured rentals on their investments for their student units . Something does not add up here despite all these hyped up reports on the group .

By Fiz

I wouldn’t touch it with a barge pole, I’ve just dealt with this company and had a nightmare

By Steven pasha

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