A London office landlord and developer, with its headquarters at 25 Savile Row, known for design-led buildings in areas such as Fitzrovia, Old Street, Clerkenwell and Shoreditch.
Derwent London is a property company that specialises in offices in central London. It describes itself as the largest central London office-focused real estate investment trust (REIT) and is based at 25 Savile Row in Mayfair. Its approach is design-led: it looks for well-connected sites with hidden potential and builds or reworks spaces with generous volume, high ceilings and lots of daylight. It often keeps the industrial character of old buildings, from Victorian warehouses to late twentieth-century offices, and uses materials such as stone, brick, steel and timber.
The company's own history page says it began in 1984, when stepbrothers John Burns and Simon Silver created Derwent Valley Holdings from a shell company that had once owned a small railway in Yorkshire. Its first refurbishment project was in Islington in 1987. It bought a disused tea warehouse in Shoreditch in 2001 and in 2007 merged with London Merchant Securities, roughly doubling in size. It became a REIT that year. Milestone buildings include the Angel Building (2010), White Collar Factory (2017), Brunel Building (2019), 80 Charlotte Street (2020) and The Featherstone Building (2022). Its history page says it aims to be a net zero carbon business by 2030.
All of Derwent London's work is in London. Its portfolio is grouped by neighbourhood, which the company calls villages: Clerkenwell, Fitzrovia, Holborn, Islington, Marylebone and Baker Street, Mayfair, North of Oxford Street, Old Street, Paddington, Shoreditch, Soho and Covent Garden, Victoria and Whitechapel. Named buildings include the Tea Building in Shoreditch, the Buckley Building in Clerkenwell, 40 Chancery Lane, Soho Place and 25 Savile Row itself. Wikipedia says Fitzrovia is the largest cluster, with about 1,000,000 square feet across more than 30 sites. The company has also begun work at 25 Baker Street.
Its history page puts its success down to vision, imagination and a great team, and says business sense and careful cash management help it get through market ups and downs. A brochure from 2017 describes a strong interest in architecture and design: it names architects such as AHMM, Piercy&Company, Bennetts Associates, Fletcher Priest and Squire & Partners, and artists whose work is shown in its buildings. It also says the company supports local communities through giving and through staff time and expertise. These are the company's own claims.
The jobs at a company like this mix property and design. There are asset managers who look after tenants and buildings, development and project managers who deliver new buildings with architects and builders, leasing and marketing teams, finance and legal staff, and sustainability specialists. If you like drawing, architecture, art, maths, business or the environment, this is a sector where those interests turn into real buildings you can walk into. Check the company's website for current vacancies.
Website: www.derwentlondon.com
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