Shelbourne set to walk away from €364.5m deal for Lloyd’s building

SHELBOURNE Developments may walk away from the €364.5 million property deal to buy the Lloyd’s insurance building in London.

Designed by Richard Rogers, the City landmark has concrete cancer. The deal was with Deka, the German investment group, according to a story in the British based Insurance Times magazine.

Shelbourne Developments is controlled by Garrett Kelleher and has significant property interests including France. According to Simon Barowcliffe, executive director CB Richard Ellis, the property company advising Deka, the potential breakdown in the deal is directly linked to the cancer concerns in the concrete structure of the building.

Commenting last night, a spokesman for Shelbourne said the issues involved the state of the building.

Due diligence issues concerning the state of the building exist that have to be resolved, he said.

Reports yesterday that Shelbourne has financial issues over the deal is simply untrue, he said. Shelbourne is likely to issue a full statement later today, he said.

Shelbourne Developments is involved in several major schemes in Dublin city centre, including the conversion of the former Virgin Megastore on Aston Quay into a number of high end apartments. Crunch Fitness and the Musgrave Group have already been confirmed as tenants for the retail element of the scheme.

The firm is also building the Moore Street Plaza in the north inner city. Jury’s Inn is to operate the hotel being built on the site while Lidl will be the anchor tenant. Treasury Holdings, via its subsidiary Keelgrove Limited, had objected to that scheme.

Earlier in 2003 the company got the go-ahead for a €100 million mixed-use scheme in Tallaght on a site it bought for €16.5 million. Up to 389 apartments, shops, a leisure centre and a restaurant were designated for the site.

The Lloyd’s building was completed in 1986 having been designed in the late 1980s by Rodgers.

This design directly followed his involvement in the collaboration with Renzo Piano on the controversial Pompidou Centre in Paris.

In London, the building was eye-cathching for its sweeping design and Rodgers beat off stiff competition that included Norman Foster and IM Pei.