HJB Investments’ plans to redevelop a former nightclub at 80 Broad Street in Birmingham into a 42-storey build-to-rent tower have been recommended for refusal.
The France-based investor filed planned to redevelop the Grade II listed former Royal Orthopaedic Hospital, which most recently operated as Zara’s Bar, Grill and Club before closing in 2020.
HJB proposed demolishing the post-war unlisted extensions to the rear and sides of the building, while retaining the original fabric of the Grade II listed structures.
Plans filed in March would have delivered 300 BTR homes plus residents amenities, a 12,000 sq ft flexible community facility and 300 cycle parking spaces. In addition, a 6,000 sq ft viewing platform named GlassWorks, featuring a café/exhibition area, would have been created above the historic structures.
Birmingham City Council planning officers have recommended the council refuse the plans, saying integrating a retained historic building into its base results in an incongruous fusion of new and old fabric that is ad hoc and bears no reflection of proportions, connections, materials, detailing or relationship between architectural components.
The officers’ report said: “The existing building bears an awkward relationship between its entire external envelope and the cantilevered form of the tower that extends over it.”
It added that the proposed development, by virtue of the inconsistent architectural elements failing to link the body of the tower with the base and crown, made for a “poor architectural concept that comprises of a number of disjointed design elements that are unrelated and draw on a range of differing materials”.
Birmingham City Council will discuss the scheme at a planning meeting next week.
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