BDP working as landscape architect on city-centre regeneration vision
Plans by Howells to replace a historic Brutalist music venue in central Derby with a £100m mixed-use scheme are set to be approved this week.
The 1970s Assembly Rooms building, which has been vacant for more than a decade, would be redeveloped as a multi-purpose events building, a four-star hotel and an office block under plans due to be put before councillors on Thursday.
An outline application for the Derby Market Place Regeneration, which has been designed for Vinci UK Developments and Ion Developments, has been recommended for approval by the council’s planning officers.
The Assembly Rooms has existed in various forms since 1714 but the present building was constructed in 1977 and designed by Casson, Conder & Partners, the practice co-founded by modernist architect Hugh Casson.
Casson was the director of architecture for the 1951 Festival of Britain and one of the architects behind the Royal College of Art’s grade II-listed Darwin Building, which is set to undergo a refurbishment designed by Witherford Watson Mann and Clementine Blakemore Architects.
The Assembly Rooms was once a major music venue in Derby, hosting performances by artists including The Smiths, The Clash, Oasis, Elton John, Ozzy Osborne, Iron Maiden, Manic Street Preachers and The Specials.
It has stood empty since a 2014 fire in the adjacent multi-storey carpark damaged its ventilation system, and was placed on the Twentieth Century Society’s heritage at risk list in 2021.
Planning officers said the redevelopment of the 2ha site is seeking to repair the social, environmental and economic impacts of the site’s long vacancy, which had caused “inactivity and lack of animation” in the city’s historic core.
It is bounded on all sides by historic buildings including the grade I-listed Derby Cathedral to the north, the medieval Iron Gate street to the west, the grade II-listed Guildhall to the south and the grade II-listed Magistrates court to the east.
Under Howells’ plans for the site, the Assembly Building and the multi-storey carpark would be demolished and replaced by a five-storey events venue called Derby Made, a six-storey office block called Derby Works and an eight-storey hotel containing 160 rooms.
The scheme would also create a new pedestrian route from Market Place to Full Street towards Cathedral Green and extensive new public realm on Market Place around an existing grade II-listed war memorial.
Historic England warned that the scheme would cause the loss of some views of the cathedral but has not objected to the application.
The heritage body said the site presents an “exceptional opportunity for heritage-led redevelopment”, and praised a series of design amendments made during the planning process including a 2.5m height reduction of the proposed hotel building.
Planning officers concluded that the “significant” public benefits of the scheme including restoring an underused part of the city centre and providing new high quality workspace would outweigh the less than substantial harm to surrounding heritage assets.
The project team includes BDP as landscape architect, Turley on planning, WSP on transport and heritage, Cundall on MEP, CCE on civils and GIA on daylight.
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