Stuart Lyell's previous meeting overruns a little. He has been looking at banners. 'We need to dress Spinningfields,' he says. 'We need to make it a place.' As development director of Allied London, Lyell is responsible for banners - and design competitions, detailed lease negotiations and building out the loha site in Manchester. Since taking on Spinningfields in early 2001 - 'When it was just an A3 masterplan' - he has delivered buildings designed by Sheppard Robson, Foster+Partners, RHWL and Gensler, among others, and let most of them. Sandwiched between banners and the inevitable attendance at Mipim was a lunch date with the Queen. She came to see what Lyell describes, with an apology for the pun, as 'our crowning glory' - the Civil Justice Centre, designed by Denton Corker Marshall. Not every commercial development is rewarded with a royal visit, but then, few can boast such an extraordinary building. Before Allied London arrived, the Spinningfields district was fairly run-down and impenetrable despite being very close to the the centre of Manchester. BDP's masterplan suggested opening up the site. It is now marketed as a business district with an emphasis on the legal sector, thanks to the courts, and on banking, thanks to early tenant Royal Bank of Scotland which took two buildings.
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