Mayor’s office sold in £1.7bn Kuwaiti deal
KUWAITI firm St Martins Group has paid around £1.7bn to buy the More London complex next to Tower Bridge, which includes Boris Johnson’s headquarters City Hall.
The sale, one of the largest ever UK commercial property deals, is due to be formally completed next month.
The 10-year old development on the south bank of the Thames in Southwark, designed by Foster & Partners, includes City Hall as well as a sunken amphitheatre called The Scoop, and offices let to tenants including EY, PwC, Norton Rose and Terra Firma Capital.
The current owners – London Bridge Holdings, a Bahamas-based company led by Armenian businessman Dikran Izmirlian – had originally explored refinancing of the 13-acre estate.
However it decided to sell after an attractive bid from St Martins, the UK-based property investment vehicle of the Kuwaiti government.
“This transaction underscores the success of London Bridge Holdings in transforming a blighted, brown field site into a vibrant and vital global business centre,” the firm said yesterday.
“It is an important symbol of London’s position as an international business centre with morning, lunchtime and early evening footfall traffic at levels comparable to Bond Street,” it continued. St Martins already owns swathes of property in London includings the nearby Hays Galleria and 60 Threadneedle in the City, which it acquired from Hammerson two years ago for around £176m.