Size

70,000 sq ft

Location

Warwick

Activity

Property & Coworking

A vacant 70,000 sq ft campus in Warwick may have looked like its best days were behind it. Landlord, FI Real Estate, had other ideas.

It commissioned Office Principles North as part of a collaborative project designed to completely reimagine the building.

The result is The Woods, a flagship CAT A two-storey office space, where 70% of the building was let before the project was even completed.

FIREM is one of the UK’s most established names in commercial property and asset management, and has managed more than 15 million sq ft of commercial and industrial real estate.

Founded by Tim Knowles, it has 40 years’ experience of providing workspace, asset and property management and creating development opportunities for its diverse investment portfolio, which includes industrial, office, retail and residential sectors.

The Woods is based at the former IBM campus on Opus 40 Business Park on the outskirts of Warwick and boasts illustrious neighbours like Royal Mail and Volvo.

FIREM wanted to transform the site into a CAT A development, providing employees with a fresh and invigorating place to work and a great opportunity for any business to upgrade their HQ to an illustrious location.

To realise that ambition, it needed a bespoke fit out of outstanding quality. And to make the task even more challenging, Office Principles North was also contracted to deliver two parallel CAT B fit outs in the same building.

The project would need to be delivered across a huge site during one of the hottest British summers on record, with up to 160 workers present throughout - a huge commitment from the supply chain.

Office Principles North and FIREM have worked collaboratively to develop an exceptional two-storey office space befitting of the site’s renowned status.

The Woods has been designed with employee wellbeing at its heart and boasts landscaped outdoor green space, EV charging points, state-of-the-art lighting and climate cooling, collaborative working areas, coworking places and a high-end reception and bistro cafe.

Design and materials have been inspired by nature to emphasise the wellbeing focus and reflect the building’s rebrand to The Woods.

Catering to the changing needs of West Midlands businesses across the healthcare, medical and creative industries, the revamped development offers a range of floor sizes for freelancers and small companies to larger organisations seeking satellite office space.

In tandem with its delivery of the full landlord refurbishment, Office Principles North has successfully completed a pair of CAT B fit outs at The Woods.

They include a new 23,293 sq ft state-of-the-art development facility for medical equipment manufacturer, Quanta Dialysis Technologies (Quant DT), which comprises clinical and non-clinical areas, static safe environments and thermally controlled rooms.

A second activity-based space of 9,505 sq ft has been completed on behalf of Europe's leading diagnostic and molecular imaging services provider, Alliance Medical.

Delivery of a combined CAT A and CAT B fit out has enabled both businesses to exit their previous tenancy agreements on time and take residence in an exciting new space, shaped to their respective specifications.

It has also achieved significant environmental benefits, vastly reducing the level of waste typically associated with the delivery of new configurations following landlord works.

We’re proud to have extended our successful working relationship with FIREM in the delivery of this exciting new workplace destination. The Woods is a sustainably focused refurbishment, with a range of amenities that will cater for the changing needs of businesses in the region. Our team has worked at considerable speed to deliver the CAT A development alongside the bespoke design and fit out of two fantastic workplace environments for new occupiers of the building, who have chosen The Woods to continue their business growth.

Tina Batham, Joint Managing Director of Office Principles North

1493 064

The completion of this major refurb at The Woods elevates our UK-wide office portfolio and also sees the building reclaim its rightful place at the heart of the West Midlands business community. With a strategic focus on wellbeing and welfare, the reimagined space introduces a new office concept to Warwick and will offer businesses and their employees a fresh and invigorating place to work. We’re drawing major interest from businesses in the region and beyond and are very pleased to have already welcomed two major players from the health and pharmaceutical sector to the building. We wish Alliance Healthcare and Quanta Dialysis Technologies and their teams a very successful future here at The Woods.

Tim Knowles, Managing Director of FI Real Estate Management