End in sight for landmark Brighton building

9:58am Friday 25th January 2013 in News

The American Express building in Edward Street, before the new headquarters were built in John Street, Brighton The American Express building in Edward Street, before the new headquarters were built in John Street, Brighton

A landmark building that houses one of the county’s biggest employers will be demolished in three years.

American Express is moving its 3,000 staff into its new £140 million European headquarters in John Street, Brighton.

As part of the agreement, Brighton and Hove City Council has confirmed the company’s current offices – the iconic “wedding cake” in Edward Street – must be demolished by 2016.

Local authority bosses said this will provide space for offices, homes and commercial premises.

A design brief is being drawn up to identify potential uses for the site.

Within the revised City Plan, which will guide development of Brighton and Hove until 2030, the local authority believes the plot could accommodate 20,000 sq m of offices and 65 homes.

This has been reduced from an original estimate of 30,000 sq m and 165 homes.

The City Plan will be debated by all councillors at a meeting on Thursday, January 31 in Hove Town Hall.

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Comments(18)

inadaptado says...
10:56am Fri 25 Jan 13

What's with this obsession for new office space, when there's so many empty ones right now? If the vacant offices are not affordable or practical enough, shouldn't we take care of THAT problem first?

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kerryfee says...
11:23am Fri 25 Jan 13

Knocking it down isn't very Green is it. Why can't the existing structure be utilised?

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Nick Brighton says...
11:29am Fri 25 Jan 13

kerryfee wrote:
Knocking it down isn't very Green is it. Why can't the existing structure be utilised?
Very good point. I heard that it can't be refurbished as offices, due to the constraints of modern IT equipment (though I'm not sure what), but the building would provide some excellent homes.

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bug eye says...
11:40am Fri 25 Jan 13

new businesses do not want the old dilapidated office space available, to attract new and big business and there ore jobs we need quality office space close to amenities. hopefully any housing will be iconic and of quality and not like any of the vile flats going up in that area barratt styly.

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getThisCoalitionOut says...
12:28pm Fri 25 Jan 13

It's an ideal location for a very much needed car park - wouldn't that be a better idea for this area?

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Wiggsy says...
12:33pm Fri 25 Jan 13

If they retained the facade of the building, could this not accommodate a much needed leisure centre?

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brightonline says...
12:50pm Fri 25 Jan 13

Having had worked in that office for almost 20 years, I feel that I can provide an answer on this. The building is well past it's sell-by date - it may look OK from the outside but it has been altered so many times inside. It has vaults that are no longer used as Amex outsourced it's Travellers Cheques distribution, it has had so much diamond drilling done through the concrete floors that the internal steelwork has been compromised, there are hints of asbestos in certain areas and the remaining raised computer/data centre areas are also old that they cannot be easily upgraded. The new offices are also configured so that Amex can lease off whole floors if they ever decide to downsize, change their business model, etc - there is also a new fit for purpose datacentre that will consolidate all their computing requrements in one space.

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george smith says...
1:02pm Fri 25 Jan 13

That's sad it is a fun looking building

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peterww2000 says...
1:04pm Fri 25 Jan 13

Why does the Argus have to describe every item they write about as "iconic"?
On what possible basis is the ugly, 1970s concrete monstrosity that is the Amex building iconic? On Wednesay, they called the West Pier iconic? On Monday it was Saltdean Lido. Earlier this month it was the Komedia. Where will this disease stop? Can Argus reporters just accept that everywhere and everything in Brighton is iconic and try to think of an interesting, non-cliched word instead?
And why can't people who comment on this site EVER realise the difference between "it's" and "its"? It's really not hard.

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roughsea says...
1:20pm Fri 25 Jan 13

Recycle this recycle that, save the planet. What a waste of time when councils and others care less and want to tear down buildings without a thought for the worlds limited resources.

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leobrighton says...
1:31pm Fri 25 Jan 13

Glad to see it go but surely they can manage more than 65 homes there. It would be much better if they could demolish the hideous job centre next door too.

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peterww2000 says...
1:31pm Fri 25 Jan 13

roughsea wrote:
Recycle this recycle that, save the planet. What a waste of time when councils and others care less and want to tear down buildings without a thought for the worlds limited resources.
Why is it a waste of time? Just because some people couldn't care less about the consequence of their actions doesn't mean that there's no point in trying to reduce our environmental footprint. In fact it makes it more essential, both in terms of the example we set, and reducing pollution etc.

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Hoarder12345444 says...
5:00pm Fri 25 Jan 13

kerryfee wrote:
Knocking it down isn't very Green is it. Why can't the existing structure be utilised?
It has Asbestos.

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nocando says...
6:18pm Fri 25 Jan 13

peterww2000 wrote:
Why does the Argus have to describe every item they write about as "iconic"?
On what possible basis is the ugly, 1970s concrete monstrosity that is the Amex building iconic? On Wednesay, they called the West Pier iconic? On Monday it was Saltdean Lido. Earlier this month it was the Komedia. Where will this disease stop? Can Argus reporters just accept that everywhere and everything in Brighton is iconic and try to think of an interesting, non-cliched word instead?
And why can't people who comment on this site EVER realise the difference between "it's" and "its"? It's really not hard.
Because people get muddled up between it is and the possesive. Errant apostrophes are more annoying than missing ones.
This sentence is missing its apostrophe but its a case of remembering which one.

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wippasnapper says...
10:08am Sat 26 Jan 13

bug eye wrote:
new businesses do not want the old dilapidated office space available, to attract new and big business and there ore jobs we need quality office space close to amenities. hopefully any housing will be iconic and of quality and not like any of the vile flats going up in that area barratt styly.
Are now you have made a good point there, the council has just confirmed planning perdition for the old co-op building witch is to be turned into student accommodation so why not turn this iconic “wedding Cake” into affordable homes I mean if you can turn an old co-op store into accommodation why not a “Wedding Cake” makes sense to me.

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wippasnapper says...
10:17am Sat 26 Jan 13

bug eye wrote:
new businesses do not want the old dilapidated office space available, to attract new and big business and there ore jobs we need quality office space close to amenities. hopefully any housing will be iconic and of quality and not like any of the vile flats going up in that area barratt styly.
New Businesses so basically what your saying is we need more empty office buildings to attract more businesses but isn’t there anoth of new empty offices around B&H for new Businesses to choose from or do you enjoy seeing empty new offices standing empty for a long time so you can deem them OLD OFFICES.

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wippasnapper says...
10:38am Sat 26 Jan 13

roughsea wrote:
Recycle this recycle that, save the planet. What a waste of time when councils and others care less and want to tear down buildings without a thought for the worlds limited resources.
And you thought GREEN meant the green party was green Conchos sorry they are as green as the type you smoke they are though greedy selfish back-stabbing twofaced tree hugging activists that say one thing but do the total opposite like all the big plans they have for reducing carbon dioxide in B&H that’s why the Lewes Rd will soon be chocked in carbon dioxide duo to them reducing the traffic down to one lain in both directions.

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wippasnapper says...
10:43am Sat 26 Jan 13

They believe the plot could accommodate 20,000 sq m of offices and only 65 homes, do we really need anymore offices why not more affordable homes with parking facilities so the tenants dote clog up the already clogged streets around the eara, you’d think this council would be taking this opportunity to build more affordable homes as Brighton & Hove need more and as they have plans to do this anyway.
The mind boggles with disbelief at what this green run council deems as possible offices space as there is so much offices space available and EMPTY but more homes would bring in more needed cash into this city maybe the greens have been smoking to much green to work that one out.

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