One of Mayfair’s worst eyesores, the Audley Square multi-storey car park, is set to be redeveloped as luxury flats and a hotel.
A Middle Eastern investor has submitted an application to Westminster council to redevelop the 1960s car park, built on a 0.4-acre former bomb site at 5 South Audley Street, W1.
The site which also includes a lamp post famously used by a Russian spy ring for storing coded messages during the Cold War, and is next to the office where the first James Bond film was developed already has planning consent for a 92-bed hotel and 293 parking spaces, which Westminster council itself obtained before it sold the site, in 2003.
However, the new application attempts to scale back the hotel element of the scheme to only 48 rooms, omits the public car park and replaces it with luxury flats.
The scheme’s architect Assael said it was “unlikely” to require any affordable housing, although Westminster has recently lowered its threshold.
CBRE Hamptons is advising.
References: EGi News 13/02/06
