A £45 million revamp of a famous Edinburgh close has won top prize at a prestigious awards ceremony for the UK's best building developments.
The regeneration scheme for Advocate's Close - which saw the street off the Royal Mile turned into a hotel, apartments, bars and restaurants - was crowned with the top accolade at the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) Awards 2015.
RICS named the new Advocate’s Close quarter as the national Project of the Year at the final at the Dorchester Hotel in London.
The RICS Awards celebrate the most inspirational initiatives and developments in land, property, construction and the environment from across the UK.
Broadcast journalist Sian Williams hosted the event which was attended by 400 guests from across the construction and built environment industries.
Advocate’s Close occupies an historical site within the heart of the Old Town.
The development which was delivered by Thomas & Adamson surveyors and Morgan McDonnell Architecture Ltd for the Chris Stewart Group, created a vibrant new quarter in a "previously run down and unloved part of the city".
The team was said to have sympathetically breathed a new lease of life into the World Heritage site close.
David Tuffin, chairman of the RICS judging panel, said: "Careful conservation, coupled with sensitive interventions and a clever use of new material and finishes, has produced an imaginative mixed use scheme, including a new hotel, 50 serviced apartments with views over the city, offices, restaurants, cafés and bars combining to produce a commercially sustainable and elegant addition to the Old Town.
"An exceptional regeneration, Advocate’s Close is a very worthy winner of the 2015 RICS Awards Project of the Year.”
Awards were also presented in the categories of building conservation, community benefit, design through innovation, regeneration and infrastructure.
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