Breaking News: Leas Pavillion Developer Goes Under
Updated @017:27 23/04/24
It has been brought to our attention via a variety of sources that the company responsible for the development and build out of the Leas Pavillion, in Folkestone, will not be able to finish the development due to financial issues.
According to the sources, the company had until Friday 19th April 2024 to come up with the money to continue the development, but were unable to secure finance to allow the project to continue.
This leaves the building in an unfinished state. A blot on the landscape.
We know that other developers looked at this site prior to it being taken on by Olivier Georges Jacques Daelemans (pictured), and they couldn’t get the numbers to work.
The Financial Viability Assessment concluded that the Listed Leas Pavilion, was unviable and could not deliver a 30% provision of Affordable Housing. The Total costs for the project according to the FVA was £40,751,973, with a profit of £2,439,289. This makes for a 6% profit when the normal profit margin is 20%.
NB: We have asked Mr Olivier Daelemans if he would provide evidence/proof he has enough finances to finish the Leas Pavillion development. If sufficient evidence/proof is provided we will apologies and take down the post.
We will update this story as more information becomes available
The Shepway Vox Team
Journalism for the People NOT the Powerful
Completely untrue. The crane is being serviced today, and the Pavilion structural frame will be rebuilt by the end of June, so that they can continue building upwards from beginning of July.
What a mess, if only in had been left as it was, would have made the best Wetherspoon in the country.
Untrue. Crane is being serviced today for work to continue.
What happened here was that there was a nicely designed and appropriately sized building that got planning permission but the extensive demands of the Friends of the Pavilion who lobbied the council endlessly, expecting the developer to somehow stump up £4 million to renovate an old tea room made the project unviable. That is the fundamental reason why it never got of the ground.
In the end the council under pressure from these local do-gooders and B list celebrities issued a repairs notice but refused to discuss any details with the then developers, thinking that somehow-this would magically fix the problem.
In the end Gustavia came along promising everything wold be fine, but ultimately the inescapable fact remained: that the tea room was a catastrophic money-pit. The irony is that the the Friends and the council conspired together to prevent the previous owners from finding a solution and this has ultimately resulted in the complete destruction of the pavilion right under their noses, only the terracotta bricks have been saved.
Even if the whole monstrous building is finally constructed, the original tea rooms are no more, leaving a faux replacement – a modern concrete box and brick facade.
This is what you get by being greedy and uncompromising. The local activists have only themselves to blame.
I witnessed the dismantling of the Tower Crane from the Lease Pavilion site yesterday, is this a portent of things to come. No heavy lifting of materials can now take place on this site.