More hotels and office buildings in Łódź

11 January 2019
During the last quarter of the century, major changes have taken place in Łódź, on both the economic and the urban level. Therefore, the agglomeration has become one of the most important business markets in the country, which increases its office resources faster than the other regional cities.
 
Bartłomiej Zagrodnik, partner at Walter Herz, admits that the structural revitalization carried out in the city, as well as the uniqueness of Łódź’s architecture and access to multiple well-located plots for new commercial projects are a major advantage for the investors. - The dynamic development of the agglomeration is also influenced by competitive personnel costs and rental rates for offices - adds the expert.
 
Offices in Łódź are catching up with Katowice and Poznań
 
The largest public investment in Europe is carried out in Łódź, the New Center of Łódź (NCŁ) is under construction. The plan includes the reconstruction and revitalization of a 100-hectare area in the city center, in the vicinity of the modernized Łódź Fabryczna railway station. - Industrial buildings that are located in this area, after revitalization will perform commercial and public-cultural functions. Thanks to this unique project on the European scale, Łódź will become one of the most attractive Polish cities, offering the most modern retail, office and residential space, as well as interesting entertainment and cultural facilities - informs Bartłomiej Zagrodnik.
 
- Łódź is becoming more and more attractive, in terms of both living and working. An unquestionable advantage of the agglomeration is its location and wide access to well-educated staff. Łódź is after all an academic center with 20 universities. This is a city with tradition that has undergone a huge change. Every year, there are more and more investors who see huge potential in the Łódź market. They want to associate their business with Łódź, thanks to, among others, the fact that a lot of modern office space has been built in the city recently. The revitalization changes the image of Łódź. What will be the future of our "Promised Land"? Well, I hope that all visions and plans included in the Integrated Development Strategy for Łódź 2020+ will be implemented - summarizes Przemysław Andrzejak, CEO of Łódź Regional Development Agency
 
The agglomeration of Łódź ranks sixth in Poland in terms of available office space, but thanks to the intense development of this segment, it has a chance of becoming the fourth market in our country in the near future. Over the last three years, the office market in Łódź has been growing three times faster than before. According to Walter Herz, the total amount of modern office space in Łódź, is approaching 500 thousand sq m, similarly to Katowice and Poznań.
What is characteristic of the city are, first of all, original historic red brick buildings located in post-industrial areas, such as Teal Office, Sepia Office and Textorial Park. Also several new office buildings are noteworthy, including Centrum Biurowe Fabryczna, Brama Miasta in NCŁ, and the nearby Manufaktura - Ogrodowa Office Park, Hi Piotrkowska and P22 at Piotrkowska Street.
 
Large projects under construction
 
The Central Axis of Łódź, the largest office area in the city that gathers such buildings as: Red Tower, Symetris Business Park and Łódź 1. Many investments are currently under construction in this area, including the famous Monopolis carried out in the former vodka factory. Investors together with the city are renewing the historical areas of Łódź and are building the new districts. The biggest international real estate development companies such as Ghelamco Poland, Skanska Property Poland, HB Reavis and Echo Investment are investing in Łódź.
Ghelamco’s investment, which is on the most expensive plot in New Center of Łódź, located on more than two hectares of land with planned nine buildings, sparks particular interest. The first stage of the project, which already has a building permit, will include a hotel with 166 rooms, an office building with 18 thousand sq m of space and an apartment building with 70 apartments. Between the buildings there will be retail passages with gastronomic function. Skanska’s Brama Miasta is also noteworthy. It is to become a new showcase of Łódź, welcoming travelers leaving the modern, underground Łódź Fabryczna railway station.
Also, Łódź’s Księżny Młyn is under renovation in cooperation with private investors. It is a city within the city. This post-industrial district was created by the nineteenth-century factory-builder Karol Scheibler, with textile factories, warehouses as well as factory housing for workers, shops, school and the owner's palace. Today, Księży Młyn becomes a green, intimate district in which the artistic life of the city is being born.
 
A record number of offices entering the market
 
In 2017, according to Walter Herz, a record number of 74 thousand sq m of modern office space entered the Łódź market . The largest completed office buildings were Przystanek mBank (24.7 thousand sq m) and Nowa Fabryczna (19.4 thousand sq m), located in the New Center of Łódź.
Over 100 thousand sq m of office space is under construction in Łódź. Most of the buildings are emerging in the area of ​​the Central Axis of Łódź. The recently completed Ogrodowa Office Łódź with over 28 thousand sq m of space is the largest office building completed in 2018. Such office projects as Brama Miasta Łódź B1& B2 (25.3 thousand sq m), Hi Piotrkowska 155 (18.3 thousand sq m), Imagine A&B (13.8 thousand sq m), Monopolis M1, and Teal & Sepia are currently under construction.
In addition, JJ Invest is planning the construction of Centrum Biurowe Fabryczna (28 thousand sq m), Ghelamco is planning investments at Piłsudskiego Street (23 thousand sq m), whereas Echo Investment is to implement a project at Kilińskiego Street  (14 thousand sq m). HB Reavis (30 thousnad sq m) and Ghelamco (43 thousand sq m) are also preparing to carry out their investments in the NCŁ.
 
Over thirty hotels with 3 thousand rooms
 
The main tenant of office space in the city is the sector of modern business services, which in 2017 generated 80 per cent demand for Łódź’s offices. New players are opening service centers, whereas companies already present here are developing their activities. According to ABSL, at the end of the first quarter of 2018, BPO/SSC sector in Łódź employed 20.5 thousand people in 76 service centers. That is 5.4 thousand more than a year earlier.
According to Walter Herz’s latest report on the hotel market, hotel resources in Łódź include 33 categorized hotels with over 3200 rooms. There are 6 four-star hotels in the city that offer 1.1 thousand rooms, including the Holiday Inn, Ambasador Centrum, Novotel and Double Tree by Hilton. The stylish Andel's hotel located in the former Izrael Poznański’s spinning mill stands out in this group. 
The city also has 16 hotels in the three-star standard. Hotel Focus, located in the historic building of the former Cotton Goods Factory of Juliusz Kindermann and Tobacco hotel, situated in the restored buildings of the former cigarette factory deserve special attention.
Łódź hotel market is one of the fastest growing in Poland. By the end of 2019, the number of hotel rooms in the city, compared to the resources from the end of 2016, will increase by over 40 per cent. 
 
More information in the latest Walter Herz report - Hotel market in Łódź
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