Major plans to build eleven and six-storey offices on and by Bermondsey Street have been approved.
Aviva Investor’s scheme will see the demolition of an old office building and extensions built on the Vinegar Yard Warehouse and the warehouse at 40 Bermondsey Street.
The extension to the historic Vinegar Yard Warehouse will be six storeys high while the new Bermondsey Street extension will be eleven-storeys.
Local businesses had railed against the plans, branding them “outrageous” because they modified warehouses of local heritage significance.
A Southwark Council planning officer admitted there would be some harm to the conservation area, which was however “outweighed by the benefits of the scheme”.
He said the buildings would create 915 new “high quality” jobs, be highly sustainable, and provide ten per cent affordable workspace.
A previous application was deferred in 2020 following local concerns over the height and design of buildings.
Revised plans were subsequently drawn up by John Robertson Architects (JRA) and Studio RHE, which reduced the Vinegar Yard Warehouse extension to 26.188m from 40.8m.
The new plans also mean retaining rather than demolishing the warehouse at 40 Bermondsey Street.
A council officer said: “The revised scheme is a significant improvement adopting a more sensitive approach to the Vinegar Yard Warehouse as a non-designated heritage asset.
He added that the warehouse extension was “high quality” and the Vinegar Yard Warehouse would now be restored having “fallen into a very poor state of repair”.
Including the 2020 application, the plans have received hundreds of objections including one from Shiva, a local business run by Stompie the Tank owner Russell Gray.
Shiva’s objection letter describes the extension to the Vinegar Yard Warehouse as an “invasive modification” driven by “greed”.
The letter said: “The council should be insisting on the most rigorous preservation of heritage assets that is viable.”
“It should not be allowing destruction and disfigurement in order to offer developers abnormal profits,” it added.
Speaking at the meeting, Russell Gray said the plans were “complete nonsense” and that developers should treat Vinegar Yard “with the respect it deserves”.
But Nick Staddon of Aviva Investors said “our design seeks to balance jobs, heritage and public realm”.
He added that the use of masonry instead of glass bricks on the Bermondsey Street building was “in sympathy with the prevailing character” of the area.
Councillors voted unanimously in favour of the scheme on Monday, April 24.