Plans for £160m new Smithfield Quarter given the green-light
PLANS to turn part of Smithfield market into a new public quarter with offices, shops and restaurants, was given the all clear yesterday.
The City of London Corporation voted in favour of Henderson Global Investors’ £160m mixed-use scheme called the Smithfield Quarter, despite campaigns against altering the 150 year-old site.
The McAslan + Partners-proposed development will see the 150-year-old General Market – which has lain derelict for over twenty years – and the adjacent Fish Market and Red House cold store will be turned into restaurants and shops, and 230,000 sq ft of new office space.
Geoff Harris, director of property development at Henderson, said: “Horace Jones’ Smithfield was a City landmark in the 1800s and the Henderson plans approved today will help restore it to the destination that it once was.”
He said it would retain as “as much of the Victorian fabric as is possible”, with much of the outside structure kept.
The scheme needs approval from Boris Johnson before construction can start in 2015.