Statement showroom on St John Square for Nowy Styl

Warwick Bookman & Associates identified and secured a premium off-market building on excellent terms to meet Nowy Styl’s aspirations and timings.

About the Client

Nowy Styl is headquartered in Poland and offers comprehensive furniture solutions for office buildings, conference centres, cinemas and stadiums. They wished to complement their 30+ European showrooms with a statement presence in London.

Our recent client Konig + Neurath recommended Warwick Bookman & Associates.

The Project

Their previous building was due for redevelopment, so Nowy Styl needed to find somewhere new; fortunately, we were approached in good time to get them relocated if all went smoothly.

Challenges

Plenty of showroom options were identified, although these were narrowed down dramatically by the desire for a statement building, ideally without paying a statement price!

While exploring other options, we were approached with an off-market proposition at 58 St John Square EC1 (with a dual frontage to 90-94 Clerkenwell Road) previously a recruitment agency. This space was in solicitor’s hands to another showroom operator, who had been dragging their feet for several months. The agent handling the transaction knew that we are very active within the furniture world, so got in touch to see if we knew of anyone who might move on this quickly. 

With a 19m frontage onto one of the prime streets of London’s ‘furniture village’, it perfectly met Nowy Styl’s brief. 

There were 2.5 years left on the previous occupier’s lease, meaning 2 separate transactions had to be agreed. An assignment of the existing lease and a new least with the building owner, starting at the end of the existing lease.

Of course, despite this complexity, we needed to move quickly to secure the showroom.

How WB&A Secured the Space

The transfer of the previous lease was relatively simple, with a ‘cashback payment’ (reverse premium) to be paid to our client and other terms remaining the same. 

For the remainder of the 10 year occupancy, we agreed a lease with a downward or upward rent review on Day 1. In our opinion, this will reduce the rent paid by our client going forward.

While this sounds reasonable, the key point is that it allows for the rent to go down during the occupation. Rent reviews are almost always upward only, in favour of the landlord, so this clause has the potential to massively benefit Nowy Styl.

The timing of the transaction allowed Nowy Styl to launch their new statement showroom, which will also be used to showcase their brand Kusch+Co at Clerkenwell Design Week 2022.

October 2021

Warwick – many thanks for your superb support through the process.

Bartosz Karasinski
Sales Director UK & Ireland | Extended Board Member