Property briefs: New £14.5m Bolton academy completes; and more
CONTRACTOR Kier and architect Sheppard Robson have completed work on the new £14.5m Essa Academy school in Bolton.
The Academy is an 89,000 sq ft, 900-place school for 11-16 year-olds. It has been created to provide a business-like, calming environment for pupils offering teaching using the latest technology products – students receive their own iPod touch which is used in teaching programmes, for instance.
The building also contains an International Business and Enterprise Centre (IBEC) – an interactive facility and official Apple Learning Centre placed in a glazed section above the building’s entrance and interspersed with brightly-coloured aluminium fins, so that the activities and events inside can be seen on the approach to the building.
Academy principal Showkat Badat said: “This fantastic building has improved well-being, increased community pride and fostered a happy, calm and business-like atmosphere.
“This is a building that takes innovation rhetoric into delivered reality.”
Rupert Goddard, design director at Sheppard Robson, said: “It has been great to be involved in such an exciting new project and to see the team’s visions turned into reality.
“We have been fortunate to have had an enormously enthusiastic and committed team from Essa, who have inputted into the design from the very start.
Gary Wintersgill, managing director of Kier Construction (Northern) said: “The school team have been a delight to work with and very proactive throughout, which has enabled us to deliver a school fit for the 21st Century.”
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ORBIT Developments has let 2,912 sq ft of business unit space to US machine tool manufacturer, Climax Portable Machine Tools.
The firm has taken the space at Orbit’s Lyme Green Retail & Business Park in Macclesfield, where it will launch its first UK sales, rental and service office.
The US company provides portable machine tools, valve lapping & grinding and welding products to contractors and engineers.
The 40-acre Lyme Green retail & business park contains a mix of offices, retail sites and car shpowrooms. Tenants include Next, Mercedes-Benz and Pets at Home.
Paul Codling, surveyor at Orbit Developments, said: “We are delighted that Climax Portable Machine Tools chose to open their first ever UK office at Lyme Green Retail & Business Park. The park offers modern, practical business units in a desirable location on the fringe of the affluent town of Macclesfield.”
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THE 120,000 sq ft Haslemere Industrial Estate in Wigan is now fully let after four occupants signed up for over 38,000 sq ft of space within three months.
Canon Tri-laminates started the flurry of recent deals, by taking 20,000 sq ft on a nine-year lease, shortly followed by Pall Mall Carpets, which took 4,000 sq ft on a five-year lease.
Unit B6 was let to Seddon Foods and Units B9 and D10 (totalling over 14,000 sq ft) were taken by Continental Foods – each on a 10-year lease.
Paul Nolan, director at Nolan Redshaw, said: “Most of the tenants have relocated from older accommodation, so the newly-refurbished space at Haslemere has been well received.
“The recent lettings indicate that smaller, well presented industrial stocks in good locations are beginning to move.”
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KNIGHT Frank has disposed of 18,209 sq ft of self-contained industrial space in Salford on behalf of flooring contractor Newards.
The firm is moving to a new production and distribution facility on Trafford Park, so Knight Frank has let its detaxched unit on Broughton Road East to a mobile phone accessories wholesaler. The unit is close to J2 of the M602 Motorway and the A57.
David Nuttall of Knight Frank said: “Self-contained properties on secure sites are always of interest to purchasers. Longer term, the property also offers the flexibility to subdivide, which was an added attraction for the purchaser, as well as its close proximity to the city centre and easy links to the motorway network.”
