OakNorth and ASK Partners, a specialist property lender, have provided a £30.8m co-loan to London-based Vabel, to acquire 114-150 Queensway and 97-113 Inverness Terrace.
The post-war 1950s building occupies a prominent corner position “on the southern end of the site, bookended between Porchester Gardens and Inverness Terrace.”
The site currently has planning consent “for an office-led mixed-used development, comprising of 87,284 sq ft of offices, 30,021 sq ft of residential, and 22,809 sq ft of retail space.”
While this latest acquisition already has “a consent in place, Vabel will look to bring forward new proposals that will positively contribute to the continued improvement of Queensway, and that will deliver a mixed-use building of the highest quality, with sustainable design and architecture for one of London’s most prestigious prime central streets.”
Founded in 2009 by Daniel Baliti and Jeremy Spencer, Vabel set out to “do things differently with a vision to revolutionize the quality of new build homes and how they’re conceptualised, designed and built.”
Today, the business has a team of approximately 40 people – “including in-house architects, interior designers, project managers and construction managers – all of whom work under one roof, collaborating within an innovative and powerful operating model.”
In addition to Vabel’s uniquely integrated process, it is also “sets itself apart through building homes with renewable technologies, such as: LED lights which save up to 90% energy compared to a traditional bulb, aerated taps to reduce water flow and cut water usage, heat recovery ventilation systems to circulate fresh filtered air, solar panels to generate renewable energy, and thermally efficient glazing, zonal underfloor heating, and air source heat pumps to control room and water temperatures more efficiently.”
Its development in Blackheath will “be its first to have a ground source heat pump system, enabling the building to extract heat from the ground and use it to heat the underfloor heating systems and water.”
Where possible, the team aim to “retain existing building fabric and recycle building materials such as bricks.”
They also use lime mortar, which “has a much longer lifespan than cement and absorbs CO2 from the atmosphere during its curing process.”
Jeremy Spencer and Daniel Baliti, co-founders of Vabel, commented:
“We recently worked with the OakNorth team on securing funding for our other Queensway project, so were confident they were the right funding partner for us. Coupled with ASK Partners, which is equally entrepreneurial and commercially-minded, we have backing from two incredibly strong partners, which will be essential as we seek to enhance the existing planning consent. We are proud to further our involvement in Queensway’s exciting regeneration.”
Deepesh Thakrar, Senior Director of Debt Finance at OakNorth, continued:
“Vabel is exactly the kind of business we want to work with – an incredibly strong management team with a proven track record spanning 15 years, ambitious growth plans as evidenced by the fact that they’re working on two of their largest projects to date simultaneously, and a considerate construction approach which takes the environment into account. We were delighted they once again chose to work with us and that we could partner with ASK to help Vabel bring much-needed new homes and high quality retail to Queensway.”
