An imposing listed building in the town centre of Colchester is to be turned into homes.

Developers Mersea Homes want to turn the grade II listed Eaglegate building in East Hill into ten new homes. They also want to put up a new building in the adjacent car park to take five more apartments.

It follows the Eaglegate building's unsuccessful spell on the lettings market as offices.

The building was formerly a brewery, with the site being used from the mid 1800s to the 1950s by the Stopes family, Osborne's, Colchester Brewing Company, Daniell's, Charringtons, then Ind Coope.

Architect firm Stanley Bragg has been drafted in to design the apartment lay out.

For the existing building the firm wants to create one one-bedroom apartment, eight two-bedroom flats and one three-bedroom apartment.

In the new building, the architects plan to build five two-bedroom apartments.

The building is both listed and in one of the town's conservation areas. It dates back to 1828 and has about 7,000 sq ft of space.

In the planning support statement, a spokesman for Stanley Bragg said: "The design aspiration of the scheme is to give a quality conversion to enhance the distictive identity of Eaglegate."

The plans have been lodged with Colchester Council and will be looked over by council planners before a decision is made on the scheme by the planning committee.

Published Monday, June 2, 2003

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