Court will be turned into 15-storey hotel where most rooms don’t have windows
By Robert Firth, Local Democracy Reporter
A former court will be turned into a 15-storey hotel where most of the rooms don’t have windows.
Southwark council approved plans to convert Camberwell Green Magistrates’ Court into a 150-bed hotel and 134 homes at a planning meeting on Wednesday (April 2).
The building, which has been empty since 2020, will have seven-storeys added to it as part of the conversions. A café, co-working space and recording studio will be created in the former court as part of the project.
Victoria Lewis, a Southwark planning officer, said the proposed hotel’s 90 windowless rooms would include high levels of soundproofing and filtered air.
Only 35.1 per cent of the planned homes will be classed as ‘affordable’, despite policy generally requiring at least 50 per cent of homes to fit this definition on land previously in public use.
According to Southwark council planning documents, a viability test carried out by consultants Cluttons found the site could only support 35.1 per cent ‘affordable’ housing.
Of the ‘affordable’ homes, 24 will be available at social rents, while the other 12 will be ‘intermediate’, which is usually up to 80 per cent of local market rates. Ms Lewis said that the proposed hotel was ‘driving value’ in the scheme and any reductions in the size of the hotel would result in less ‘affordable’ housing.
Zedwell, which has hotels in a number of locations in London, including Tottenham Court Road, Greenwich and Piccadilly, will operate the planned hotel.
Rooms are expected to start at £71 per night in the first year of the hotel’s operation, increasing to £90 per night after a few years.
Cllr Livingstone, Cllr Emily Tester, Cllr Michael Situ and Cllr Jon Hartley voted to approve the hotel conversion. Cllr Kath Whittam abstained.
Pictured top: CGI of how the hotel and homes at Camberwell Green, South London could look (Picture: Southwark council planning documents)
