Urban & Civic asks for designs as Renaissance inches forward
A design competition for the Renaissance hotel site on Manchester’s Deansgate is underway. Developer Urban & Civic, which acquired the site in December 2014, expects to shortlist architects soon, a spokesman said.
The 1-9-acre site currently houses a 203-bedroom hotel,, along with 26,700 sq ft of offices and 399 car parking spaces. Marriott has a management agreement that runs to the end of 2019 for the hotel.
On acquiring the site – which, like U&C’s other Manchester interest, the former Origin site, is a former West Properties project – the developer said it intended to start a phased development in either 2017 or 2018.
In December, the firm said that it had revised its plans for the Origin site at Princess Street and Whitworth Street. It intends to submit a planning application in the next two months for this scheme.
Thank god, this building is a bad stain on Deansgate! It negatively impacts the whole area even with the fantastic buildings, shops and restaurants that are around there.
By Tofu
Can we just ‘delete’ the building and turn the site into a Riverside Park? #wishfulthinking
By Bystander
I hope any scheme brought forward will allow public access to the river side, as has been done on the Salford side of the river and at the bottom of Spinningfields.
The facade at street level of the current building is terrible, dealing with this would be a massive improvement and link nicely to the works on Greengate.
By Bradford
Agree with Bystander
By Elephant
About time! We expect great things for this important site.Was there ever a more awful view of this vile,ugly monster ruining the cathedral?
By Schwyz
I have a feeling that a lot of developments of Manchester won’t go ahead. Recessions are predicted to happen in ten year cycles and next year will mark a decade since the global catastrophe of 2008. Thoughts anyone? Anything to assuage my pessimism?
By AWS
••••all it needs is a re-clad or a few tins of masonry paint. The exterior gets dirtier as every year passes. Some similar white exterior buildings in the City Centre get painted regularly, like the one opposite the new office development No.1 New Bailey (near Salford Central train station). The Renaissance Hotel is a 4 star establishment, part of the Marriott worldwide brand, in a prime City centre location & the building looks filthy, as does the Premier Inn North Tower nearby. Regular external painting of these & other similar 1950-70’s buildings should be included in all Management contracts.
By Anthony Fallon
Needs proper landmark architecture this one. Brilliant site I’d have thought, and with river frontage someone should be able to do something pretty special. The sooner the better.
By Andy