SRA to move in beneath Marco Pierre White at The Cube
The SRA will be moving to The Cube, a striking new office building in Birmingham city centre, this summer, the regulator has announced.
The SRA will be moving to The Cube, a striking new office building in Birmingham city centre, this summer, the regulator has announced.
Around 700 staff Law Society and SRA staff currently split between Redditch and Leamington Spa will find themselves working beneath a glass rooftop restaurant run by Marco Pierre White.
The MPW Steakhouse Bar and Grill, which has just opened, offers 'affordable luxury' with 'exquisite food, refreshing cocktails and stunning views of the city', according to its website.
Ken Shuttleworth, the Birmingham-born architect behind 'the gherkin', the City's Swiss Re building, intended The Cube to suggest a jewellery box and link with Birmingham's jewellery-making heritage.
However the recession took its toll, and the project went into administration early in 2010. PwC was appointed and the building was completed that summer. The Highways Agency now occupies 50 per cent of its office space.
Antony Townsend, chief executive of the SRA, said the regulator would occupy all of the remaining large office floors in the building.
'The Cube offers us excellent facilities in the heart of Birmingham city centre to consolidate our position as the principal regulator of legal services, and to attract high-quality staff from a diverse population,' he said.
Des Hudson, chief executive of the Law Society, said The Cube offered a 'better, greener and more centrally located working environment, topped with first-class transport links.'
He went on: 'Consolidating our four current Midlands buildings and all our Midlands-based staff together in one building will reduce our costs, make us more effective and more efficient and support the provision of high quality services for our members.'
The Cube's website comments: 'Situated in the thriving Westside district of the city centre, neighbouring The Mailbox, the intricate glowing tessellations blanket the exterior façade, to be admired from afar.
'Inside this fascinating 'jewelry box', a rich mix of slick residential apartments, exclusive retail, extensive office space, boutique hotel, private spa, a hi-tech automatic car park and the city's first roof-top restaurant reside.'
Situated in the thriving Westside district of the city