55 Colmore Row

Contractor experience

CWM Project

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The project involved the restoration of a building one of Birmingham’s most iconic addresses – 55 Colmore Row. The team had to carefully work around the building’s Grade II-listed Victorian terrace, whilst adding three additional floors that take in the spectacular views of St Philip’s Cathedral, delivering 160,000 square foot of flexible and contemporary Grade A office space.

The Morgan Sindall Construction team worked closely with building conservation officers throughout the process to ensure that the work done to bring the building up to 21st Century, Grade A office standards was still sympathetic to the Grade II-listed building.

The 19th Century banking hall was a particular area that was carefully considered. As part of 55 Colmore Row’s upgrade a state-of-the-art building management system was installed, which included a seven-storey glass scenic, buttonless lifts built to NASA tolerances, as well as people and car identification systems that learn user movements within the space, reducing waiting times and making the buildings systems much more efficient. All of this was installed without impacting the banking hall, with regular quality checks completed periodically to monitor not only the progress of the work but also impact to the existing space.

Whilst the existing structure was retained, 20% additional floor space was created with three new floors added to the roof to create a six-storey building as well as reconfiguring internal layouts to better accommodate open plan and flexible working spaces. This not only created office space, but space for two restaurants at street level, which benefited from views from a stunning full height glazed façade.