Boutique luxury hotel within Bristol’s historic Guildhall
This project came to Nash Partnership in mid-2020. Covid had gripped the country and the implementation of a consent for a large hotel conversion set within the old lawcourts the Grade I listed Bank of England building had stalled on viability. The developer for the site, Trevor Osborne Group, approached us to help them de-risk the scheme by splitting the development into a smaller boutique hotel set wholly within the Guildhall and then separately look at a residential conversion and commercial use for the remainder of the site. The key to this was that a new operator, Gotham Hotels, had identified this as an ideal building to expand their brand and operation into the South West. Our challenge was to negotiate the complex planning and listed building consent history for the site to help the team re-design the front of house and bedroom layouts to align with the distinctive and fresh approach of the Gotham brand.
The Gotham hotel brand had first gained recognition through their projects in Manchester and Glasgow. Both had involved prominent, high profile city centre listed buildings. Both projects exemplified the exceptional Gotham design ethos, focused on exceptional design, celebrating the character and drama of heritage buildings encompassed within an elegant hotel environment. So, the Guildhall in Bristol represented an ideal project for the Gotham Group to step into. They were particularly keen to look for local knowledge to help them realise the potential of this prominent Bristol heritage asset.
The collaboration with the client and their interior designers, squid.inc, helped us shape a much more efficient layout for the boutique operation whilst still maintaining heritage fabric integrity. The final scheme managed to deliver 80 keys wholly contained within the Guildhall and still present characterful f&b spaces within the original law court rooms and vaulted basements. The consented scheme is now on site and looks set to become another excellent additional to the Gotham portfolio.
Image credit: Alamy