Mactaggart Family & Partners and development manager Longstock Capital have signed the Automobile Association for a new headquarters at the Plant development, a reworking of one of the best-known buildings in Basingstoke.
The car insurance, recovery and repair group is taking 41,000 square feet on a 15-year lease. It will take occupation after the summer when the redevelopment is completed.
Plant, previously called Mountbatten House, will comprise 150,000 square feet of BREEAM outstanding office space.
The building is being marketed by Savills and Hollis Hockley. Avison Young advised the AA.
In September 2022, Longstock Capital, the real estate company formed by investment chiefs from WeWork and Squarestone Growth, in collaboration with Mactaggart Family and Partners, secured a series of agreements including a £33 million development loan to unlock redevelopment of the building. It is known locally as the Hanging Gardens of Basingstoke because of the series of roof gardens designed by landscape garden designer James Russell.
It is located in Basing View, the town’s central business district, and is a Grade II-listed office building, previously known as Gateway House. It was developed by Arup Associates between 1974 and 1976 for paper manufacturer Wiggins Teape as a five storey, 154,200-square-foot building.
William Laxton, chief executive of Mactaggart Family and Partners said: “We look forward to welcoming The AA to their new home after the building completes in the summer. We have had healthy interest from the occupier market, which we expect to intensify as the building continues to take shape over the coming months. As a business of such high standing and significance in the UK, the AA taking a 15-year lease proves that businesses are happy to commit for the right assets, assets that genuinely satisfy the needs of employees and stakeholders in terms of environmental credentials, design quality, and occupier experience.”
Jakob Pfaudler, chief executive of The AA, said; “This move aligns with our ambition to modernise the AA and supports our vision and environmental ambitions.
“This move will be somewhat bittersweet for us, marking the end of 50 years at our historic home of Fanum House, dating back to the late Queen opening the building in 1973. But at the same time it represents a key moment in transforming The AA into a fresh, flexible and modern company.”
The Automobile Association and Basingstoke Deane Council appointed JLL and Avison Young to sell its historic home in Basingstoke at the beginning of last year.
Fanum House sits on a prominent 3.2-hectare site in the town and has 225,000 square feet of offices. Basingstoke council owns the freehold and AA the long leasehold.
The AA announced in December 2022 that it would be leaving the 47-year-old building as it no longer met its needs for a modern work environment, months after launching a requirement for options for better space.
CoStar News revealed in February that year that the AA was on the hunt for a headquarters building in the South East and was selling its buildings in Cheadle and Newcastle as part of a major overhaul of its real estate by its new private equity owners. In 2021, a consortium led by Tower Brook Capital Partners and Warburg Pincus completed the acquisition of the AA.
In the South East, the AA had relaunched a search for a circa 40,000 to 60,000-square-foot headquarters it had dropped in 2017. The AA retained Avison Young to review options along the M3 and A3 corridor. It said in December 2022 the search had narrowed to Basingstoke.
In September 2017, the group decided to stay put at Fanum House on the Basing View campus despite launching a requirement 12 months before that. The AA’s volte-face followed the replacement of the group’s executive chairman, who had been driving the relocation. Executive chairman Bob Mackenzie was “removed” by the board with immediate effect because of a “personal conduct-related matter”.
The Automobile Association was founded in 1905, to help motorists avoid police speed traps in response to the Motor Car Act 1903 which introduced new penalties for breaking the speed limit and for reckless driving.