Former Glasgow hotel could be converted into 147 'luxury' student flats with cinema and roof garden

New images show how 147 student flats with a gym, cinema room and roof gardens could replace a Finnieston hotel.

Plans have now been submitted to Glasgow city council for the conversion of the former Lorne Hotel site on Sauchiehall Street.

The applicants, PL Glasgow Ltd, a joint venture between The Parklane Group and Brydell Partners, want to deliver an IconInc development. They have requested permission to use the old hotel as student accommodation and as short-stay properties in non-term time.

If approved, the 102-bed hotel, which is made up of two buildings, an A-listed tenement on the corner of Sauchiehall Street and Kelvingrove Street and a 1960s building on the corner of Sauchiehall Street and Derby Street, would be turned into 147 ‘luxury’ studios.

According to the plans, early investigations have highlighted the existing facade of the 1960s building “consists of a mixture of combustible insulation and rain screen cladding”. It will be replaced with an “industry standard non-combustible facade”.

They added: “The vision is to sympathetically re-purpose a vacant hotel into luxury student accommodation and to refurbish, repair and regenerate a significant heritage asset on the western edge of Sauchiehall Street, as well as seizing an opportunity to visually improve and better embed the building into the local urban fabric, whilst also drastically improving its thermal performance.”

The student accommodation would include a new courtyard, two roof gardens, a gym, cinema room, events kitchen and study lounge. It would be a car-free development but 147 cycle parking spaces are set to be provided.

The plans stated: “The Grade A listed building will undergo some internal alterations to the rear of the building along with window upgrades and fabric repairs. The 1960s building element will undergo a far more comprehensive refurbishment, with significant works proposed to the existing facade to provide an industry standard non-combustible facade.”

They added the facade will be replaced with “modern, compliant and non-combustible cladding”.

Continuing, the plans read: “This also presents an opportunity to improve the Sauchiehall Street and Derby Street elevations and create a more aesthetically sympathetic envelope that gives a better setting to the A-listed building and wider street locale.”

The development would also include an extension to the rear and a “set back rooftop extension to Derby Street”.