ARTISAN Real Estate has announced plans to strengthen its position in Scotland with the announcement of a new management team.
The developer is pressing ahead with its £140 million investment plan focusing on low carbon city centre residential redevelopment across Edinburgh and Glasgow.
Experienced property professional David Westwater will join Artisan this month as Scottish regional manager, following 40 years of industry experience including at Frasers Property UK, Interserve plc and most recently, as development director at Robertson Property.
He will be tasked with helping to take forward Artisan’s plans to progress low carbon housing development with mixed-use regeneration across city centre brownfield sites.
Artisan is also currently recruiting a Scottish commercial and technical manager.
The business revealed it has witnessed a ‘significant expansion’ of its housebuilding operation in Scotland during the past 12-months. The developer will shortly begin construction on Rowanbank Gardens, a residential development delivering 126 apartments in the Corstorphine area of Edinburgh. Artisan’s first residential development in Scotland, the 180-apartment Canonmills Garden overlooking the Water of Leith to the north of Edinburgh city centre, has now sold 85% of all available properties as it approaches completion later this year.
Clive Wilding, Artisan’s UK property director, said, “These are exciting times for Artisan Real Estate in Scotland, and the strengthening of our team reflects the significant progress we have made during the last 12 months, despite the very obvious challenges faced during lockdown. Our current focus is developing prime brownfield sites across city centres in Edinburgh and Glasgow, delivering low carbon, multi-tenure housing with no fossil fuel, linked to high quality external spaces and integrated with a range of green transport options.
“We are delivering niche urban developments in the most exciting parts of the city centre, creating a high-value premium product for a wide range of homebuyers. And we have a very exciting residential pipeline and are actively identifying and securing new opportunities across Scotland’s major city centre areas – a process which will be hugely boosted by our expanded dedicated residential and commercial Scottish operation.”
Artisan added that it is also consolidating its position as an urban regeneration specialist with a number of mixed-use commercial redevelopment projects across Scotland. Construction work on the £80 million transformation of the Custom House building in Glasgow continues with a 294-bed Clayton Hotel and a 162-bedroom Adagio Apart-Hotel tipped to create a vibrant riverside quarter when it opens in 2022. Artisan’s £250 million New Waverley development at the heart of Edinburgh’s Old Town was completed in 2020.
Jaco Jansen, Artisan’s CEO, added, “Artisan has an amazing opportunity in Scotland to set a new benchmark for high quality urban regeneration in sensitive city-centre environments – whether it be commercial, residential or mixed-use. This supports our other regional businesses, each with a similar focus in Bristol and Leeds. Our track record in Scotland has given us a strong understanding of the importance of high quality placemaking, which is at the heart of all Artisan’s developments. We are an ambitious and hungry company with an increasing appetite for bespoke developments in the best city centre areas. We are looking forward to expanding our footprint across Scotland and the rest of the UK.”
