Renold’s Corner is a high quality, sensitively designed mixed-used space for working and living that we are proposing to build at a key location at the junction of Kingsway and Lane End Road in Burnage. This is an important and prominent site. That’s why we are consulting you before any planning application is submitted.

Your feedback is important and will be carefully considered by our team ahead of the planning application being submitted to Manchester City Council. There will then be a further opportunity to comment on the final proposals through the Council’s own formal consultation process. Have your say before by 16th June 2025 by filling in the form at the foot of this page.

Jump to: Context / The Project / Have Your Say

Context

Burnage is a community with a proud history and a strong identity. The “village” developed as a centre for weaving, but in the 19th century the growth and expansion of Manchester radically changed the area, providing it with a new identity and its most distinctive landmarks.

For generations, Burnage was almost synonymous with Renold’s Chain Factory, a vast and striking industrial building that provided employment for local people and was a visible emblem of identity and belonging. The Hans Renold’s Social Union embodied the company’s philanthropic ethos,  providing and encouraging a wide range of leisure activities for employees and their families.

In the same spirit, Burnage Garden Village was founded on a new ideal for urban life; a self contained community that brought nature and greenspace back into the heart of modern city living.

Burnage was a pioneering place, and these progressive ideas and values are part of its history, and also part of its modern day identity and physical character. In designing and developing this key site, known locally as Renold’s Corner, we have been influenced not only by Burnage’s architectural heritage, but by the ideals that inspired that heritage.

This development is unique to its location and rooted in an understanding of what defines and differentiates places. That’s why we are starting a conversation with our neighbours and the wider community. You are the people who will live with this development. It will be part of your community for years to come. So let us know what you think, and help us get it right before we submit a planning application.

The project

The site is a prominent corner at the junction of Lane End Road and Kingsway in Burnage. What could be an attractive gateway is currently an underwhelming and characterless site comprising a local pharmacy and a poorly maintained open space. We are proposing a mixed-use development of 32 apartments with a roof garden, two new retail units with car and cycle parking facilities for residents

We believe that this location, at an important intersection linking Kingsway with Burnage’s main retail area, calls for a higher density development – a landmark building of scale and character.

Our approach to the design and development of this site has been driven by three key principles:

With Renold’s Corner we have set out to design a building that is appropriate and unique to its location. The development has been designed to ensure that it respects and enhances the area’s character and identity, taking into account the site’s location, history and community.

The scale and massing reflect the need for a strong, prominent focal point at a busy urban intersection We have been inspired by the industrial history of the area. Our design references the red brick factory buildings that once defined and characterised this part of Burnage, whilst also embracing contemporary features and materials including the rippled metal cladding on the Fog Lane facade.

As well as referencing the area’s architectural heritage, we have also looked at our immediate environment for design inspiration. We have echoed the horizontal brick patterns of St Nicholas church on Kingsway – one of the area’s most strikingly original buildings. And we have also echoed the curved facade of the church, and the high street buildings opposite, to accentuate the corner’s gateway aspect  By working closely with Manchester City Council’s heritage and urban design team, we have set out to create a respectful development that blends heritage and modern design elements to celebrate and enrich Burnage’s distinctive sense of place.

The sequence of primary intersections on Kingsway were devised as commercial and social hubs serving neighbouring residential communities. Changing patterns of retail and lifestyle have left many of these areas bereft and neglected, and in urgent need of investment and re-imagining.

We envisage a vibrant dynamic space that fuses much-needed residential  accommodation and two new retail configured to offer quality fit-for-purpose space for businesses and services that will fulfill community need and provide employment for local people.

There is a chronic shortage of good quality new housing in Britain today, and that is also true of this part of Manchester. Our proposal envisages 21 one-bedroom apartments and 11 two-bedroom apartments, many exceeding NDSS standards for size, layout, and accessibility, while providing comfortable and well-designed contemporary living spaces for future residents. The site’s proximity and easy accessibility to Manchester City Centre, along with its more generous and more affordable accommodation make this an attractive destination for key workers and young professionals.

It’s a solution that is in tune with local and national planning policy, especially given the site’s excellent transport connectivity close to both bus and rail infrastructure. The Lane End junction is the gateway to the major retail centre on the former Renold’s Factory site, and a high density landmark building reinforces the area’s role as a recognisable local centre. The scale, prominence and mixed-use character of the development can serve as a catalyst for further investment on adjacent and nearby sites, and therefore will help stimulate future regeneration.

We will work with Manchester City Council and your local Councillors to identify other ways in which this investment will benefit local people including the provision of apprenticeships and jobs during the construction phase.

Renold’s Corner’s proximity to bus routes and a rail station make this a highly sustainable location and therefore appropriate for higher density and mixed-use development. Manchester’s Core Strategy explicitly advocates high density sustainable land-use on sites where access to public transport minimises the need for and use of private cars.

The scheme provides the minimum required number of parking spaces, but also provides cycle storage for every apartment and electric vehicle charging points to further promote greener travel options.

In addition to referencing the area’s former industrial heritage, we have also taken inspiration from the pioneering Burnage Garden Village by bringing nature into the heart of the development. We will create a shared garden on the roof of the building as a convivial and relaxing space for residents. The proposed roof garden is more than an amenity for residents; with appropriate native planting and management, it will also contribute to our achievement of biodiversity net gain.

We want to deliver the optimum achievable impact on ecology and biodiversity.  To mitigate the loss of two trees on site, we are proposing a new line of trees on the Kingsway frontage of the development.  We will also be creating a new nature habitat off-site to ensure the development delivers a net benefit to bio-diversity. If possible, we want to deliver this as close as possible to the site, and  we will work with local Councillors and local nature conservation groups to explore options that will  achieve this objective.

What happens next?

Please fill in your answers to the questions below and provide any other comments. We will carefully consider all your responses and comments and then make final revisions and refinements to the plans before submitting a formal planning application in the coming months.

When planning is submitted, you will have another chance to comment when consulted by Manchester City Council. They will consider all consultation responses before a final decision on whether or not to grant planning permission will be taken by Councillors at their Planning Committee Meeting later this year.