February 10, 2021
Fiera Real Estate and Packaged Living are pleased to announce that plans have been approved for 352 build-to-rent (“BTR”) homes and a new public square in Piccadilly East, Manchester.
‘The Castings’ development will comprise of 1, 2, 3 bedroom apartments alongside three attractive roof gardens, a residents’ lounge and entertaining suites all opening onto the new square and public realm.
The development is the next exciting part of the now established Piccadilly East area, which includes the highly successful Crusader Works by Capital & Centric, and the award winning Jenga-style Leonardo Hotel.
‘The Castings’ has been designed to meet the pressing need for new homes within Manchester City Centre and will help to enhance the quality of life for the growing population in the area. It will also support new jobs and provide vital investment at an important time.
As with all Packaged Living schemes, environmental and social values are at the heart of the design. The development will use sustainable materials to reduce embodied carbon and focus on residents’ wellbeing through social amenity spaces, a gym and bike repair ‘.
Manchester is the second largest city in the UK and is the fastest growing British economy outside London. The site is easily accessible being located only 5 minutes’ walk from Piccadilly station, which sees over 27 million people movements in an average year, and is set to be the front door to the new HS2 station.
The one acre site on Heyrod Street was purchased in January 2020 through the Fiera Real Estate Opportunity Fund V UK (“FREOF V UK”), the latest fund in Fiera Real Estate’s programmatic venture series with CBRE Global Investment Partners (“CBRE GIP”). FREOF V UK is targeting £250m of value add and opportunistic real estate transactions in the UK.
The development has been designed by a leading build to rent consultant team including Arcadis, Crookes Walker and Curtins. The architects, award winning BTR specialists CallisonRTKL (CRTKL), drove the project’s strong resident experience and brought to bear learnings from their vast, multi-sector portfolio on The Castings.
Mark Woodrow, Joint Managing Director of Packaged Living commented: “The Castings is the next exciting BTR scheme in Packaged Living pipeline, which is now delivering over approximately 3,000 homes in the multi-family sector across the UK. The scheme represents a fantastic opportunity to create next generation homes developed by an experienced team, at a time where vital investment is needed into our city centres”.