The once-overlooked city centre area is becoming a hub for businesses. Alistair Houghton reports

FOR years, as it lay mostly idle, the idea that Liverpool’s Baltic Triangle could be a “cutting-edge destination” seemed a pipe dream.

But today, even amid recession, there are more and more signs that the area is about to enjoy a new lease of life.

The Baltic Triangle has been earmarked by regeneration officials as a new creative industries hub for Liverpool.

Organisations such as Elevator Studios and the A Foundation have already set up home there, while new company Baltic Creative is working to develop more workspaces for digital and creative entrepreneurs.

But development in the Baltic Triangle area, which stretches from Wapping to Parliament Street, Park Road and St James Street, is about more than just creative industries.

Liverpool-based developer LAG Pritchard has been developing parts of the Baltic Triangle, building the Hampton by Hilton hotel and 190 apartments. In May, the Daily Post revealed Pritchard was planning another development, including 100 more apartments, a 95-bedroom care home, a second hotel, and a new youth hostel.

Another proposal to build an 11-storey apartment block in Bridgewater Street was approved by Liverpool planners last month.

The scheme, designed by Make Architecture, would see a brick warehouse demolished and replaced with a new building including 98 apartments, commercial and office space.

Meanwhile, building work is well under way on the £5m Women’s International Centre for Economic Development (WICED), which will open in December. Pavements are being relaid along Jamaica Street and other main roads through the district as part of a city council-led package of public realm improvements.

And, behind the scenes, work is under way that could lead to the redevelopment of other areas, including the former Beers timber yard.

Barry McGorry, development manager at Liverpool Vision with responsibility for the Baltic Triangle, is proud of the changes that are under way.

“I’ve been working on this area for five years now, but it’s only in the past couple of years that we’ve started to realise that our efforts are coming to fruition,” he said.

“We need to get more publicity, so people know about the Baltic Triangle.

“We need to start singing about it from the rooftops.

“We need to start feeling proud of ourselves – not just Liverpool City Council or Liverpool Vision, but the people who live and work here. They should be proud of themselves.”

Businesses in the district have also pulled together to launch new website www.baltictriangle.co.uk

The website calls the Baltic Triangle “creative, industrious and pioneering”. It describes the area as “once the city's well-worn workshop, now a cutting-edge destination where pioneering creatives work and play.” Creative organisations that already call the Triangle their home include the A Foundation and the New Picket, while Elevator Studios houses other firms such as design studio Milky Tea.

Newly-formed company Baltic Creative is creating five buildings off Jamaica Street – known as the “crinkly sheds” – into units for small and growing firms. The £5.2m investment plan is funded by the Northwest Development Agency and the European Regional Development Fund.

One thing everyone working in the area is keen to stress is just how close it is to the city centre. Buildings such as the Contemporary Urban Centre and Elevator Studios are separated from Liverpool One by industrial units and empty land, meaning they seem a world away from the city, but they are only a short walk away.

Mr McGorry said: “A lot of people don’t know where this area is. People don’t understand that it’s part of the city centre – the city centre stops at Parliament Street. It’s an area that links to Liverpool One, the Ropewalks, and the waterfront – powerhouse areas not just for the city, but for the region.”

McGorry is also working with Merseytravel to improve public transport links between the triangle and the rest of the city centre.

Two of the biggest developments in the building in recent years were Elevator Studios and Novas’s Contemporary Urban Centre (CUC).

The CUC originally opened in 2008 and is now, under a new management team led by interim chief executive Susie Parsons, promoting itself more widely as a venue for events.

It boasts venues ranging from conference suites and galleries to its atmospheric brick cellars.

Next door to Novas is another massive warehouse conversion that has, without any fanfare, become another Baltic creative hub.

Paul and Tim Speed turned a Victorian brick warehouse into Elevator Studios, a “magnet for commercial companies, arts collectives and musicians”.

The building, facing Parliament Street, includes six floors of space and is home to bands, design agencies, web designers and other creative professionals – as well as Leaf cafe and Giant bike shop, facing Parliament Street.

The remaining quarter of the building is being turned into more workspace and should be open shortly.

Tim Speed says he wants the building to have its own “Elevator biosphere” – for creative firms to be able to find everything they need in one place, without leaving the Baltic Triangle.

He said: “In terms of the creative industries, we have a very interesting and eclectic mix ranging from people doing dancing classes to the Giant bike shop and Leaf.

“There’s a real mix of musicians, artists and designers – which I think is what Liverpool Vision have in mind for this area.

“There’s a lot of cross-pollination here. Integral to that is the cafe as networking space.

“There have been a lot of chance meetings in that space. Photographer Alex Hurst has done some work for Microzine, for example, while Smiling Wolf has built the website for Leaf cafe.”

For Mr Speed, the whole area is full of potential.

“The area is absolutely ripe for redevelopment,” he said. “Look at its proximity to Liverpool One.

“The fact that the city council has found money for public realm improvements is significant. It shows their commitment to the area.

“This is probably the last city centre location that is yet to be fully realised. People are now putting together a framework that will guarantee the future of this area as a creative hub.”

The WICED centre aims to encourage women to set up and grow their own businesses. The centre, which is now being built on the corner of St James Street and Norfolk Street, will house an international research centre and a range of support services. It will also house space for 70 “incubation” units for new and growing businesses.

Maggie O’Carroll, executive director of WICED and Train 2000, said: “It is crucial that society harnesses women's enterprise and we must encourage women to start up and grow their own businesses.”

And once the area gets busy with firms and with residents shuttling to and from their flats, then the service sector will also benefit.

For Tom Stanley, owner of The Orchard restaurant and cider tavern, in Blundell Street, that boom can’t come soon enough.

The venue has built up a solid clientele of regulars and is starting to get busier after a quiet start.

“The more people and the more exposure we get, the better,” said Stanley – who believes land in the Baltic Triangle will be in demand from developers as the property market begins to grow again.

“The Baltic Triangle is one of the last undeveloped areas close to the city centre,” he said.

“ If you want to do something, the Baltic Triangle is one of the last spaces left to do it.

“We have a lot of space here. We’re probably the only restaurant in the city centre with a car park outside.

“For the same rent elsewhere, we could only get a much smaller restaurant.”