18 January 2013

Hat trick of Deals for British Land at St Stephen's

British Land is pleased to announce a hat trick of deals at its 565,000 sq ft St Stephen's Shopping Centre in Hull. 

Due to kick its heels at St Stephen's is footwear retailer Schuh taking 4,400 sq ft, whilst Theo Paphistis' lingerie offer, Boux Avenue, has moved into a 2,490 sq ft unit. In addition, jeweller Hugh Rice has expanded at the centre taking a new lease on two combined units providing the retailer with 6,450 sq ft.  All three retailers have taken 10 year leases.

Claire Barber, Head of Shopping Centre Asset Management for British Land, said: "St Stephen's has continued to go from strength to strength since opening and these new lettings are testament to the attraction of the centre to both retailers and shoppers alike. We remain committed to working with our retailers to ensure we provide the right space to help them grow whilst maintaining a diverse and exciting offer for consumers.

Smith Young and Lunson Mitchenall represented British Land. Stephen Kane & Co acted for Hugh Rice, Briant Champion Long acted for Boux Avenue and Schuh represented itself.

St Stephen's has transformed Hull's retail and leisure provision and propelled it into the UK's top 20 retail centres. Retailers include Cult, Lipsy, Next, TK Maxx, Topshop and Zara.

Enquiries:

Emma Hammond, FTI Consulting 020 7269 9347
Jackie Whitaker, Retail PR Manager, British Land 020 7467 3449

Notes to Editors

About British Land
British Land is one of Europe's largest Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) with total assets, owned or managed, of £16.3 billion (British Land share £10.4 billion), as valued at 30 September 2012. Through our property and finance expertise we attract experienced partners to create properties and environments which are home to over 1,000 different organisations and visited by over 300 million people each year. Our property portfolio is focused on prime retail locations and Central London offices which attract high quality occupiers committed to long leases. Our occupancy rate of 97.3% and average lease length to first break of 11.1 years are among the highest of the major UK REITs.

Retail assets account for 60% of our portfolio with around 28 million sq ft of retail space across 82 retail parks, 92 superstores, 13 shopping centres and 9 department stores. The retail portfolio is modern, flexible and adaptable to a wide range of formats and our active asset management delivers space which is attractive and meets the needs of both retailers and consumers. 80% of our retail parks have open A1 consent.

London offices, located in the City and West End, comprise 35% of the portfolio (which will rise to an estimated 40% on completion of current developments). Our 7 million sq ft of high quality offices includes Broadgate, the premier City office campus (50% share) and Regent's Place in the West End. Over the last 2 years, we have committed £1.2 billion to create Central London's largest committed office development programme which will deliver 2.3 million sq ft of high quality space by 2014, including a 700,000 sq ft building at 5 Broadgate, the 610,000 sq ft Leadenhall Building in London's insurance district and a 500,000 sq ft mixed office and residential scheme at Regent's Place in the West End.

Managing our environmental, economic and social impacts is central to the way we do business and deliver value for our shareholders. We assess the issues that matter most to us and our stakeholders on an on-going basis and, where appropriate, adjust our strategic focus to reflect this. We focus on managing our buildings efficiently, supporting communities, developing sustainable buildings and engaging our staff. For each of these priorities we are targeting our efforts and resources at initiatives where we can achieve the biggest impacts.

Further details can be found on the British Land website at www.britishland.com.

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