Opening day for The Spine
The £35m building in Liverpool’s Paddington Village, billed as one of the world’s healthiest workplaces, brings 160,000 sq ft to the city’s Knowledge Quarter.
The distinctive 14-storey building offers the highest office space in the city, standing at the eastern gateway to KQ Liverpool. Morgan Sindall delivered the building for Liverpool City Council, with AHR as the architect.
The Spine has been designed according to the scientific and medical research principles established in the international WELL Standard to achieve WELL Platinum status. The Spine features double-height spaces at the ground, 10th and 12th floors
Incoming mayor Joanne Anderson and metro mayor Steve Rotheram will be at the buildingtoday to meet Dr Andrew Goddard, president of the Royal College of Physicians, which will have its northern base at the building.
As well as RCP, which has taken seven floors within The Spine, Clatterbridge Cancer Centre has taken a floor, with the council currently in negotiations to complete the occupancy of the building.
When complete, the 30-acre Paddington Village, which received £12m from the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority towards a £20m infrastructure programme, will feature several other buildings, some of which are already occupied.
The University of Liverpool’s International College and The Rutherford Cancer Centre North West opened in 2020 and a new hotel by Novotel is scheduled to open in April 2022.
Plans for further developments on Paddington are also being progressed, with designs for Hemisphere, a 150,000 sq ft health, life sciences and tech focused building, soon to be revealed by Liverpool Science Park owner Sciontec Developments.
Morgan Sindall is lined up to deliver a 90,000 sq ft office building on plot five within the KQ masterplan.
Other members of The Spine’s delivery team are Arup as multidisciplinary engineer, CBRE as lead consultant for RCP, Overbury as RCP’s fit-out contractor, CBRE and Knight Frank as letting agents and KQ Liverpool on strategic support and marketing.
City mayor Joanne Anderson, elected earlier this month, said: “The Spine is simply stunning and very much reflects the Liverpool we all want to see develop in the 21st century.
“Its unique design and distinctive look also symbolises the ambitions we have for Paddington Village – to create an innovation district to rival any in the UK and Europe.
“I’m delighted the RCP will be calling this their northern home. They are joining a fantastic roster of world class institutions and am sure will help attract others to join them.
Steve Rotheram, freshly voted in for a second term as metro mayor, added: “It’s brilliant to see the investment we’ve made in the Knowledge Quarter really starting to take shape.
“The Spine is a building that really encapsulates a lot of my vision for the region: harnessing the expertise of our world-class universities, attracting nationwide jobs and housing it all in one of the cleanest, greenest buildings in Europe.
“As mayor, it’s exactly the sort of thing I am working to deliver on a region-wide level. We’re already seeing the difference those investments are having.”
Morgan Sindall Construction’s area director Rihard Potts said: “It has been an absolute privilege for Morgan Sindall Construction to help deliver this sensational building and to be part of the wider Paddington Village development.
“I’d like to offer my congratulations to the Council, the whole project team and to warmly welcome RCP to Liverpool.”
A welcome addition to the LCR and looking forward to more to come 😉
By Liverpolitis
Unfortunately, this comes on the heels of the city losing several high profile office occupants. Given the shortage of space in the city you’d think this would do well, but the situation is a right mess.
The city’s office market is now commanding £28 a square foot for space that frankly doesn’t merit the outlay, purely due to the fact that there is little on offer. The limited size and offer means that larger occupiers not only automatically look elsewhere, but get better value/offer while they are at it. Often deciding that any Liverpool workers they want to keep can commute or work at home.
Meanwhile, the further diminished business density that’s occurred since they majority of the city’s office stock was turned into apartments (or building sites), means that the city is on no one’s must-be-here list.
Council and government share the blame for this situation. If it can’t be resolved (requiring massive state intervention not seen outside of Manchester) then there will be very large problems ahead not just for Liverpool but the wider region, and probably nationally.
By Jeff
Impressive and quality offices for today`s needs, and more to come on this site, not sure why they can`t boldly complement this with a tram system that starts at Paddington and transports people onwards to Lime Street station , and then extends to the downtown business area and planned new offices at Pall Mall.
By Anonymous
This is all positive news for the city
By Anonymous
Totally agree Jeff. You just don’t give planning permission to convert 1960s office blocks into resi in the business district. OK to do so in outlying areas that can’t attract any interest, but once those office block footprints in the business district have been turned into resi it is very difficult to get hold of them again. Joanne Anderson (our new leader….ahem!) should be halting this practice urgently. That said, does she even know Place North West exists!!
By Old Hall Street
The Mayor will do well to big this up because Liverpool needs premier office space like a dying man needs water. You only have to look at the recent Big Nine report from Avison Young shown recently on PNW to see that.
By Aigburther
@jeff do you mean it’s over priced? I have been told by companies looking to locate from outside liverpool and who did not locate here are: not enough quality candidates with the right skills, confused messages from the council, slow bandwidth (when Liverpool council was offered an exchange using existing lines council tried to charge without understanding the huge potential) price was never an issue for locating to Liverpool it’s so cheap here even if more invested in premium spaces this would necessarily drive the economy in the right way. It needs to compete on its services and innovate them otherwise it will be a constant low wage service economy because there will be no incentive to improve
By Jay
Fabulous
By Allan
Great development, well done Liverpool.
By Derek
Great news for Liverpool. Another iconic building. Still has the most untapped potential of any UK city!
By Geoff