Dual hotel project to revitalise Melbourne's Bourke Street Mall
A $200 million hotel development that could help revitalise Melbourne’s struggling Bourke Street mall shopping precinct has finally kicked off construction after being delayed for a number of years.
Comprising two hotels with 450 rooms sitting on top of a three-level shopping mall, the Buchan-designed 11-storey project known as Melbourne Walk will replace the former Walk Arcade.
Most of this 1980s arcade, apart from some historic Bourke Street facades, has been demolished to make way for the new development.
Due originally to open in 2022, the 180-room Hotel Indigo and 270-room Holiday Inn are now only expected to be completed by builder Hickory in April 2024.
The project – the first new development on Bourke Street Mall in decades – is being undertaken by Singaporean owner Hua Sin Tay’s Steadfast Capital. Approval for the development was granted in 2019.
Melbourne’s premier shopping strip – the equivalent of Sydney’s Pitt Street Mall – and home to flagship David Jones and Myer department stores, Bourke Street Mall has suffered from the closure of numerous retailers with vacancies emerging on the strip during the pandemic.
But the opening of two new hotels, a rooftop bar and a new retail offering alongside the redevelopment of the neighbouring David Jones menswear store by Newmark Capital into a new retail and office hub could help spark a revival of Bourke Street Mall, which has some of the most expensive retail rents in the country.
“We look forward to rejuvenating a precinct that enjoys pride of place in theheart of Melbourne’s famed Bourke Street Mall,” said Eugene Teo from Shorea Capital, which is acting as the development advisor to Steadfast Capital.
The 3600 sq m site running from Bourke Street to Little Collins will – once completed – form part of a shopper’s paradise starting at the entrance to Degraves Street Laneway opposite Flinders Street Station and running all the way to Emporium Melbourne on Lonsdale Street.
A main retail arcade will run through the new development connecting Bourke Street to Little Collins, meeting in the middle with another arcade running perpendicular through to Union Lane and The Causeway, the two laneways on either side of the building. These laneways will be activated with shopfronts.
The Steadfast Capital project adds yet more future supply to Melbourne’s swelling hotel pipeline, which exceeds more than 5000 rooms and is the largest in the country.
Other hotels in development in the Victorian capital include a 277-room 1 Hotel on the Northbank of the Yarra, which is due to open in 2024 and a 500-room Shangri-La due to open in the Melbourne CBD next year.
Also in the pipeline is a 210-room Four Seasons hotel which will form part of the city’s tallest project, Sth Bank by Beulah International.
The original Walk Arcade opened in 1980 following the refurbishment of the lower part of several old buildings that connect Bourke Street to Little Collins.
