Melbourne Developer’s Brisbane Skyscraper Gets Green Light

A private Melbourne-based developer has received planning approval to build an energy-efficient A-Grade office tower above a 150-year-old synagogue at 25 Mary Street in Brisbane’s CBD.

The developer will knock down a hall owned by the Brisbane Hebrew Congregation, as well as its own commercial spaces, to create a 2700sq m site and build a 200-metre-high tower. 

The Urban Developer reported in January that the developer had been in talks with the congregation for more than a year before finalising the deal.

The new building, designed by BVN, will have 46-storeys of ventilated floor plates, a level dedicated to wellness and landscaped terraces as well as a ground plane with new facilities for the congregation and an activated cross-block link.

It will also be topped with a distinctive building crown, dubbed “the lantern”, with two penthouse apartments on levels 44 and 45.

The state-heritage-listed synagogue will not be changed aside from minor alterations to make room for the pedestrian accessway linking Mary and Margaret streets.

It will, however, gain a new secondary hall, cafe, kosher kitchen and indoor children’s recreation space. The upper floors of the building will be used for tenant event spaces while the top two levels will accommodate a luxury penthouse.

The tower will sit above three basement levels for 224 vehicles and 416 bicycles and will also provide a new public realm and retail opportunities.

Other features include sustainability initiatives throughout the building to meet green-building guidelines set by the council with a target for a six-star Green Star rating.

▲ The proposed tower would face Mary Street and back onto the Brisbane Synagogue on Margaret Street.

The development is being overseen by Mary Street Holdings Unit Trust and Bellevue Terrace Properties Unit Trust, which is headed up by John Kaias of JJK Properties.

Kaias is the director of the family-owned Abcor Proprietary Limited, a Melbourne based engineering company which has had a run of developments in Brisbane.

The commercial tower is the developer’s second project in Brisbane, the other is a boutique apartment development at 25 Harcourt Street in New Farm that will see two early 1960s apartment blocks demolished and replaced by five apartments.

The Mary Street tower will add more than 42,000sq m of commercial floor space, in “mixed mode” workspaces of up to 180sq m, to Brisbane’s stock.

Brisbane’s office sector has continued to strengthen in recent years with figures from the Property Council of Australia revealing the city is second only to Adelaide in occupancy rates.

Sublease availability in Brisbane has reduced dramatically since the start of the year as corporates holding space have switched to expansion mode.

The big problem facing Brisbane’s office market is a lack of supply coming into the market between 2022 and 2024.

According to Knight Frank, only 205 North Quay, a fully leased 43,700sq m tower being developed by Cbus Property and Neilson Properties, and the first stage of Waterfront Precinct, a 70,000sq m skyscraper being delivered by Dexus, are due for completion in that time.

The 25 Mary Street project joins a long list of approved office towers that are yet to break ground, including Chater Hall’s 55,000sq m development 309 North Quay, Mirvac’s 66,000sq m project at 200 Turbot Street and ISPT’s 42,000sq m proposal at 150 Elizabeth Street.

Also in the street, QIC has plans for a 38,000sq m tower at 62 Mary Street, while at 133 Mary Street, ARA Private Funds has approved plans for a 12,000sq m commercial block.

Mooted developments currently being considered include GPT’s 27,000sq m tower at 141 Eagle Street, a 20,000sq m tower at 2 Alice Street and two potential towers above Cross River Rail stations at Roma Street and Albert Street.