HFF Real Estate Limited (HFF) has announced the €126.7m (£108m) bilateral acquisition and refurbishment financing of 127 Kensington High Street, a marquee 127,000ft² mixed-use project in London. Currently, a neglected 1970s monolithic brutalist structure will be fully transformed into one of the premier office and retail assets in the area. Included in the acquisition is the adjacent retail arcade, which serves as the entrance to the High Street Kensington underground station. The project is ideally situated between Holland Park and Kensington Gardens and enjoys close proximity to Equinox, Whole Foods Market and other key local amenities. The HFF debt placement team representing the borrower was led by managing director Claudio Sgobba and director Andrew Hornblower.
“It is always a gratifying result to bring together a new borrower-lender relationship,” Sgobba said. “We are confident that AshbyCapital and the lender are an outstanding fit and will have a longstanding go-forward partnership. It was a pleasure working alongside Charles Lawrence, AshbyCapital’s investment director, to close an attractively priced and flexibly structured facility that is ideally suited for their business plan.”
“There is excellent synergy between all parties involved, and we are very pleased with the outcome,” Hornblower added. “It was a competitive lender selection process with flexibility, pricing and surety of execution, all playing a role in the ultimate decision. We very much look forward to watching AshbyCapital lengthen their already impressive London track record of creating special, generational assets.”
“Prime freehold development opportunities are increasingly rare in central London and we are delighted at the prospect of delivering best-in-class office and retail space to Kensington,” Lawrence said. “This financing validates our enthusiasm for this unique project and frees up further capital for us to deploy as we look onwards to the next opportunities.”
