Beetham Tower, Manchester
Encyclopedia
Beetham Tower is a landmark 47-storey residential skyscraper
in Manchester city centre
, England. Completed in 2006, it is named after the developers, Beetham Organization
, was designed by Ian Simpson, and built by Carillion.
At a height of 168 metres (551.2 ft), it is the tallest skyscraper in Manchester overtaking the CIS Solar Tower
. In addition, the Beetham Tower is the tallest building in the United Kingdom outside of London, and overall the eighth-tallest building in the UK. The skyscraper is visible from 10 English counties
on a clear day and is the tallest residential building in the country.
It consists of a Hilton Hotel up to level 23 and apartments from level 25 up to the triplex penthouse
on level 47. There are also 2 basement levels, which contain car parking for the residents of the apartments. The tower lies on Deansgate
and has two postal addresses, with the apartments falling under 301 Deansgate and the hotel under 303 Deansgate. Widely referred to as Beetham Tower, it is also known colloquially as the Hilton Tower owing to the corporate logos placed on the 24th storey, on each side of the building.
at the junction with Great Bridgewater Street and Liverpool Road, it has 47 floors and is 168.87 metres (554 ft) in height, making it the tallest building in the UK outside London, the UK's 8th tallest building and the tallest residential development in Europe. It is the tallest building in Manchester, having overtaken the CIS Tower
. In comparison, the UK's tallest building, One Canada Square
, is 235 metres (771 ft) tall. When the Shard London Bridge
is complete it will stand at 310 meters over taking One Canada Square
making the Beetham Tower the 9th tallest building in the United Kingdom
.
The tower contains a four-star 279 bedroom Hilton Hotel for the first 22 floors. The 23rd floor is deeper than those below by 4m, and has two glass windows in the floor, offering views down to the ground from the skybar Cloud 23, which is the only skybar in Manchester. The floor also has a bar and lounge, both operated by Hilton. From the 25th to 47th floors, the tower is occupied by residential apartments.
As part of the project, a 12-storey office block is due to be constructed adjacent to the tower, with 6,506 square metres of floor space. The hotel also has a 4-storey annex, containing a swimming pool, ballroom, conference rooms and coffee shop.
The architect, Ian Simpson, bought and resides in the top floor penthouse, which is the highest living space in Britain
. It cost him £3 million. The residence occupies the top two storeys of the building and features a semi-indoors garden containing 21 four-metre high olive, lemon and oak trees, shipped from Italy, and placed before the roof was built.
The tower offers views of the set of Coronation Street
, and on a clear day it is also possible to see Liverpool
, the mountains of Snowdonia
, the Pennines
mountain range, the Peak District
, Liverpool Cathedral
, Blackpool Tower
, much of the Cheshire Plain, the Lovell Telescope
at Jodrell Bank Observatory, City of Manchester Stadium
, MEN Arena, Old Trafford
, The Lowry
and Blackpool Pleasure Beach.
The Beetham Hilton Tower was built entirely using post-tensioned flat slab concrete construction and was the first building in the UK to use the Doka SKE 100 automatic climbing system and trapezoidal windshield.
The tower had its official "topping-out" ceremony on 26 April 2006. Local wind conditions dictated that the building's height had to be reduced by a little more than 2 metres (6.6 ft) from its originally planned height of 171 metres (561 ft). The hotel opened and received its first guests on 9 October 2006, and the first apartment residents moved in during 2007.
The building cost £150 million to construct.
with producers having to create extra background noise as the tower is close to the show's set.
On 11 September 2008 a piece of glass had a fault and cracked; the street below was cordoned off for several hours until the matter was resolved.
There were reports the project was commercially suffering due to the UK's 2008 housing market slowdown. One newspaper report stated that (as of September 2008) 55 of 219 apartments were waiting to be let and a further 30 were unsold.
At September 2010, the Manchester rental market has improved considerably and only 2 apartments of the total 219 in the building are unoccupied as they await interior fit-out.
During the early hours of 29 January 2009 a fire broke out on the 31st floor. A partial evacuation of the complex took place and the fire was brought under control within one hour. Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service are yet to produce a final investigation report into the cause of the blaze, which left one apartment uninhabitable.
On 14 February 2011 the company that operated the Hilton Hotel, Beetham Hotels Manchester Ltd, went into administration. Later in the year, the hotel was sold to Cypriot businessman Loucas Louca.
Skyscraper
A skyscraper is a tall, continuously habitable building of many stories, often designed for office and commercial use. There is no official definition or height above which a building may be classified as a skyscraper...
in Manchester city centre
Manchester City Centre
Manchester city centre is the central business district of Manchester, England. It lies within the Manchester Inner Ring Road, next to the River Irwell...
, England. Completed in 2006, it is named after the developers, Beetham Organization
Beetham Organization
The Beetham Organisation is a privately owned property development and investment company based in Liverpool, UK. It was founded by Hugh Frost as Oastdren Investments in 1985. Its primary focus is city centre real estate, specialising in hotel, residential and office projects...
, was designed by Ian Simpson, and built by Carillion.
At a height of 168 metres (551.2 ft), it is the tallest skyscraper in Manchester overtaking the CIS Solar Tower
CIS Tower
The Co-operative Insurance Tower, or CIS Tower, is an office tower building on Miller Street in Manchester, England. It was completed in 1962 and rises to 387 feet in height. The Grade II listed building, which houses Co-operative Financial Services, a part of The Co-operative Group, is...
. In addition, the Beetham Tower is the tallest building in the United Kingdom outside of London, and overall the eighth-tallest building in the UK. The skyscraper is visible from 10 English counties
Counties of England
Counties of England are areas used for the purposes of administrative, geographical and political demarcation. For administrative purposes, England outside Greater London and the Isles of Scilly is divided into 83 counties. The counties may consist of a single district or be divided into several...
on a clear day and is the tallest residential building in the country.
It consists of a Hilton Hotel up to level 23 and apartments from level 25 up to the triplex penthouse
Penthouse apartment
A penthouse apartment or penthouse is an apartment that is on one of the highest floors of an apartment building. Penthouses are typically differentiated from other apartments by luxury features.-History:...
on level 47. There are also 2 basement levels, which contain car parking for the residents of the apartments. The tower lies on Deansgate
Deansgate
Deansgate is a main road through the city centre of Manchester, England. It runs roughly north–south in a near straight route through the western part of the city centre and is the longest road in the city centre at over one mile long....
and has two postal addresses, with the apartments falling under 301 Deansgate and the hotel under 303 Deansgate. Widely referred to as Beetham Tower, it is also known colloquially as the Hilton Tower owing to the corporate logos placed on the 24th storey, on each side of the building.
Description
Located along DeansgateDeansgate
Deansgate is a main road through the city centre of Manchester, England. It runs roughly north–south in a near straight route through the western part of the city centre and is the longest road in the city centre at over one mile long....
at the junction with Great Bridgewater Street and Liverpool Road, it has 47 floors and is 168.87 metres (554 ft) in height, making it the tallest building in the UK outside London, the UK's 8th tallest building and the tallest residential development in Europe. It is the tallest building in Manchester, having overtaken the CIS Tower
CIS Tower
The Co-operative Insurance Tower, or CIS Tower, is an office tower building on Miller Street in Manchester, England. It was completed in 1962 and rises to 387 feet in height. The Grade II listed building, which houses Co-operative Financial Services, a part of The Co-operative Group, is...
. In comparison, the UK's tallest building, One Canada Square
One Canada Square
One Canada Square is a skyscraper in Canary Wharf in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is the tallest completed building in the United Kingdom since 1991, standing at above ground level and containing 50 storeys...
, is 235 metres (771 ft) tall. When the Shard London Bridge
Shard London Bridge
Shard London Bridge is a skyscraper under construction in Southwark, London. When completed in May 2012, it will be the tallest building in the European Union and the 45th-tallest building in the world, standing tall...
is complete it will stand at 310 meters over taking One Canada Square
One Canada Square
One Canada Square is a skyscraper in Canary Wharf in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is the tallest completed building in the United Kingdom since 1991, standing at above ground level and containing 50 storeys...
making the Beetham Tower the 9th tallest building in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
.
The tower contains a four-star 279 bedroom Hilton Hotel for the first 22 floors. The 23rd floor is deeper than those below by 4m, and has two glass windows in the floor, offering views down to the ground from the skybar Cloud 23, which is the only skybar in Manchester. The floor also has a bar and lounge, both operated by Hilton. From the 25th to 47th floors, the tower is occupied by residential apartments.
As part of the project, a 12-storey office block is due to be constructed adjacent to the tower, with 6,506 square metres of floor space. The hotel also has a 4-storey annex, containing a swimming pool, ballroom, conference rooms and coffee shop.
The architect, Ian Simpson, bought and resides in the top floor penthouse, which is the highest living space in Britain
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
. It cost him £3 million. The residence occupies the top two storeys of the building and features a semi-indoors garden containing 21 four-metre high olive, lemon and oak trees, shipped from Italy, and placed before the roof was built.
The tower offers views of the set of Coronation Street
Coronation Street
Coronation Street is a British soap opera set in Weatherfield, a fictional town in Greater Manchester based on Salford. Created by Tony Warren, Coronation Street was first broadcast on 9 December 1960...
, and on a clear day it is also possible to see Liverpool
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
, the mountains of Snowdonia
Snowdonia
Snowdonia is a region in north Wales and a national park of in area. It was the first to be designated of the three National Parks in Wales, in 1951.-Name and extent:...
, the Pennines
Pennines
The Pennines are a low-rising mountain range, separating the North West of England from Yorkshire and the North East.Often described as the "backbone of England", they form a more-or-less continuous range stretching from the Peak District in Derbyshire, around the northern and eastern edges of...
mountain range, the Peak District
Peak District
The Peak District is an upland area in central and northern England, lying mainly in northern Derbyshire, but also covering parts of Cheshire, Greater Manchester, Staffordshire, and South and West Yorkshire....
, Liverpool Cathedral
Liverpool Cathedral
Liverpool Cathedral is the Church of England cathedral of the Diocese of Liverpool, built on St James's Mount in Liverpool and is the seat of the Bishop of Liverpool. Its official name is the Cathedral Church of Christ in Liverpool but it is dedicated to Christ and the Blessed Virgin...
, Blackpool Tower
Blackpool Tower
Blackpool Tower Eye is a tourist attraction in Blackpool, Lancashire in England which was opened to the public on 14 May 1894. . Inspired by the Eiffel Tower in Paris, it rises to 518 feet & 9 inches . The tower is a member of the World Federation of Great Towers...
, much of the Cheshire Plain, the Lovell Telescope
Lovell Telescope
The Lovell Telescope is a radio telescope at Jodrell Bank Observatory, near Goostrey, Cheshire in the north-west of England. When it was constructed in 1955, the telescope was the largest steerable dish radio telescope in the world at 76.2 m in diameter;it is now the third largest, after the...
at Jodrell Bank Observatory, City of Manchester Stadium
City of Manchester Stadium
The City of Manchester Stadium in Manchester, England – also known as the Etihad Stadium for sponsorship purposes– is the home ground of...
, MEN Arena, Old Trafford
Old Trafford
Old Trafford commonly refers to two sporting arenas:* Old Trafford, home of Manchester United F.C.* Old Trafford Cricket Ground, home of Lancashire County Cricket ClubOld Trafford can also refer to:...
, The Lowry
The Lowry
The Lowry is a theatre and gallery complex situated on Pier 8 at Salford Quays, in Salford, Greater Manchester, England. It is named after the early-20th century painter, L. S. Lowry, known for his paintings of industrial scenes in North West England...
and Blackpool Pleasure Beach.
Construction
The site was originally occupied by a redundant section of railway viaduct. Planning permission for the development was given in October 2003, at which point 206 of the 219 apartments had already been sold, as well as 4 of the 16 penthouses. The viaduct was demolished in March 2004, and the twin cores of the building were above ground level at the end of August 2004. One of the two cores reached a height of 125 m at the end of July 2005, at which point the building became the tallest UK skyscraper outside of London.The Beetham Hilton Tower was built entirely using post-tensioned flat slab concrete construction and was the first building in the UK to use the Doka SKE 100 automatic climbing system and trapezoidal windshield.
The tower had its official "topping-out" ceremony on 26 April 2006. Local wind conditions dictated that the building's height had to be reduced by a little more than 2 metres (6.6 ft) from its originally planned height of 171 metres (561 ft). The hotel opened and received its first guests on 9 October 2006, and the first apartment residents moved in during 2007.
The building cost £150 million to construct.
Issues
During the installation of the glass and steel "blade" architectural feature on the roof, a strange noise problem emerged. People reported that the building "whistles" (more like an intermittent hum) in windy weather. The sound is close to standard musical C (approximately 262 Hertz); some say it is like a "UFO landing" in sci-fi films. The noise affected the production of local soap opera, Coronation StreetCoronation Street
Coronation Street is a British soap opera set in Weatherfield, a fictional town in Greater Manchester based on Salford. Created by Tony Warren, Coronation Street was first broadcast on 9 December 1960...
with producers having to create extra background noise as the tower is close to the show's set.
On 11 September 2008 a piece of glass had a fault and cracked; the street below was cordoned off for several hours until the matter was resolved.
There were reports the project was commercially suffering due to the UK's 2008 housing market slowdown. One newspaper report stated that (as of September 2008) 55 of 219 apartments were waiting to be let and a further 30 were unsold.
At September 2010, the Manchester rental market has improved considerably and only 2 apartments of the total 219 in the building are unoccupied as they await interior fit-out.
During the early hours of 29 January 2009 a fire broke out on the 31st floor. A partial evacuation of the complex took place and the fire was brought under control within one hour. Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service are yet to produce a final investigation report into the cause of the blaze, which left one apartment uninhabitable.
On 14 February 2011 the company that operated the Hilton Hotel, Beetham Hotels Manchester Ltd, went into administration. Later in the year, the hotel was sold to Cypriot businessman Loucas Louca.
See also
- No. 1 DeansgateNo. 1 DeansgateNo. 1 Deansgate is the name and location of a medium-rise apartment building in central Manchester, England. It is the tallest all-steel residential building in the United Kingdom and one of the most expensive addresses in Manchester...
, another glass residential building on the same road, also designed by Ian Simpson - Piccadilly Tower, a similar hotel/residential skyscraper proposed in Manchester