Derwent to start building work next year on Oxford Street scheme after replacing lead architect

London developer Derwent is moving ahead with the redevelopment of a listed corner block on Oxford Street after replacing Hopkins with DSDHA as the scheme’s architect.

The firm said in a trading update this morning that it was finalising the design of the 150,000 sq ft Holden House scheme and would start construction in the middle of next year.

Derwent submitted an initial planning application for the corner of Oxford Street and Rathbone Place in 2017 proposing an eight-storey retail-led scheme under plans designed by Hopkins.

This was approved by Westminster council later that year despite opposition from Historic England due to the addition of two storeys to the roof of the grade II-listed Holden House, which was previously known as Evelyn House. 

Derwent then appointed DSDHA last year to draw up revised plans increasing the scheme’s amount of office space and its sustainability credentials along with changes to internal layouts and the removal of two of the scheme’s four basement levels.

The firm said its purpose for repositioning the scheme was responding to the “changing needs of retail and office tenants” and reduction of embodied carbon by reducing the extent of basement excavation.

The revisions were approved in September last year with a second amendment to the building’s facades signed off by Westminster in December.

Derwent said the Holden House site was one of three major schemes in the West End which constituted the next phase of its pipeline.

The other schemes are AHMM’s 240,000 sq ft redevelopment of an entire city block in Marylebone, 50 Baker Street, and a 108,000 sq ft refurbishment of Greencoat and Gordon House in Victoria.

The firm said its capital expenditure in the first three quarters of this was £145m, including its work on the three West End schemes. It added that its longer term pipeline extends to 1.1m sq ft from 2027.

Derwent added that it expects its 25 Baker Street scheme being built by Laing O’Rourke to complete next year along with its Network building job being carried out by Kier.

Derwent and Hopkins and have been contacted for comment.