When the flagship facility of the Women’s Organisation opened in the Baltic Triangle in 2011, the building only had a collection of ageing warehouses for company.
None of the new developments that now surround it had been built, explains the organisation’s CEO Maggie O’Carroll, meaning the terrace near the top of the structure offered a sweeping view of the city, gradually sloping down towards the river. Eleven years later, the terrace still offers a good view in some directions, but its new neighbours have filled the backdrop in others.
For Maggie, the change was an expected one, but there is the hint of a bitter-sweet tone when considering the area’s rapid growth and unarguable progress. “I don't mind being boxed in,” Maggie tells the ECHO, “the problem is what we're boxed in with.”
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Ultimately the terrace doesn’t matter in terms of what the Women’s Organisation does in supporting hundreds of businesses and entrepreneurs, and Maggie and the team aren’t in the Baltic to protect a panoramic view of the city from growing private residential developments along Norfolk and Jamaica Street. Some social housing is also being built by Torus on Park Lane.
“We wanted the building to sit as an international centre within an area of regeneration so that we would be a key catalyst,” Maggie says. But the changing perspective around the organisation speaks of a wider recent trend in the area, as its desirability has rocketed.
“It's an extraordinary success,” says Maggie, of the Baltic’s journey from post industrial landscape less than two decades ago, “you just think, if you could have just had a little bit better governance it would have been so much better.”
Building the Baltic dream
The vision for the Baltic Triangle started to gather pace towards the end of the 2000s, with Baltic Creative CIC and The Baltic Triangle Area CIC playing leading roles in shaping its ethos and ambition. The former has gone on to be one of largest landlords in the area, leasing space to a wide range of people working across creative and tech sectors.
Across the Baltic many music venues sprung up in repurposed warehouses and helped define its image as the city’s slick, up and coming district. Independent businesses, studios and a raft of artists could all be found within a stone’s throw of one another.
As a clear success story, development interest followed. The skyline of the area is now very different to 10 years ago, with Baltic’s first ‘tower’ recently completed by developers Legacie.
Other new developments frame the view along Jamaica Street. Constellations, a mixed used venue, made way for developments on the corner of Parliament Street while club 24 Kitchen Street had previously been in dispute with developers over acceptable decibel levels, after a residential development was effectively built on top of the venue.
Noise issues aside, new businesses are still moving into the area. But there’s clearly a feeling that a form of intervention is required to ensure the Baltic dream is preserved and isn’t paved over with a type of cladding few envisioned at those crucial meetings over a decade ago.
In December Liverpool City Council approved the adoption of a Supplementary Planning Document for the Baltic Triangle. It will in essence provide guidelines with the aim of “delivering a distinctive place within the city whilst retaining the unique and industrial character of the area to harness the digital and creative economy.”
The document adds that it will aim to “deliver an independent community with space for communities and businesses to grow in a sustainable and harmonious way.” Speaking about the document, Cllr Sarah Doyle, cabinet member for development, told the ECHO: “For me the supplementary planning framework and any policies should be about protecting what is there - enhancing what is there and making a balance.”
‘The Baltic needs managing’
The word balance is one that crops up a lot when discussing the Baltic. The introduction of the framework doesn't necessarily suggest the area is losing its footing, but it can be seen as a form of intervention to ensure that what comes next happens with an element of control from those it will be happening to.
Baltic Creative has been at the centre of the Baltic’s rise. It still retains a large stake in the area, amid the change that has taken place in the last 12 years.
While the organisation has been there from the start, its current CEO, Lynn Haime, is a relative newcomer. Lynn has been in the role for the last two months, so in many ways speaks with a fresh perspective - although she did play a key role in reshaping Ropewalks, only a handful of streets away, in her time working for regeneration company Urban Splash.
“The Baltic is still creative, still has personality,” Lynn tells the ECHO when asked about its journey now that it has moved beyond the decade mark. She adds that the spaces the organisation offers are 100% let.
“It’s testimony to Baltic Creative that it has stood the test of time,” Lynn adds. Similar to Maggie O’Carroll, she notes how “the landscape of the area has changed dramatically” since the starting out, initially “standing alone” with many of the “gaps” since filled with more residential builds and commercial space.
“It’s the sign of a good regeneration project when those types of businesses start moving into an area,” says Lynn, but notes the importance of people singing from the same hymn sheet to ensure a visual aesthetic isn’t tarnished - one that has its industrial past at the forefront.
She adds: “In the Baltic Triangle, there is still so much to get at. [It] needs the right plan.”
While rents have increased and the makeup has changed, those who built their success in the Baltic aren’t looking to jump ship. Carl Wong started his Living Lens company with nothing more than two hot desks inside Baltic Creative back in 2014.
He was renting out the largest office space by 2017. Offices were then opened in London, New York and Toronto before the company was sold in 2020.
He agrees that the Baltic has been a real success story, one that offered a springboard for his own career. He’s now fronting ‘Baltic Ventures', an accelerator to help people get funding and scale up.
Carl does admit the conditions may not be the same as they were eight years ago, in terms of affordability to launch in the area. But he believes the down payment would still pay off.
Carl told the ECHO: “The change is a condition of the success. The Baltic Triangle is not a walled garden, so it would be great to see [similar areas] spread out across the city. All power to it.
“But I do think [the Baltic] needs managing. Baltic Creative has done a lot to fight for that space."
Jonathan Clark, an investor who invests and advises early-stage tech companies, is currently working on research looking into tech and economic development in the Baltic. For him, the gentrification cycle is a “normal one” and one that has started to take hold of the Baltic.
But he believes that this cycle shouldn’t mean the death of an idea. His view is that it can move and spring up in other parts of the city region, those more in deep regeneration and new economic development.
“That’s normal, it’s fine," he said of how the Baltic has changed with its growing desirability, noting the sheer scale of Silicon Valley and how the whole of the Liverpool City Region could be something of its own success story with a few dynamic shifts in its narrative.
The Baltic is still worth fighting for, in Carl’s view. He said: “It’s a fragile and natural landscape. Shoreditch had the same. An area reaches critical mass, so it needs a defensive plan, or risks being overrun.”
‘Business is growing’
Simon Holt has owned the Baltic Fleet since 1997. The Grade II listed pub is found on Wapping towards the city centre point of the Baltic Triangle.
Simon told the ECHO that the significant change he has witnessed over the past 25 years has worked in his favour. Before the Baltic’s regeneration, the pub stood essentially alone. Now it is flanked by hotels, while luxury flats tower over it from Wapping and Hurst Street. Simon credits these developments with providing his pub with an influx of customers from right on his doorstep.
He said: “The community that has been built up around me - the flats and development - have helped tremendously. I think they were actually open in 2018 - if I remember rightly.
“Since then, things have been great. We’ve had great support from all the people in the flats around here.”
The 19th century pub “stands out like a sore thumb” on its side of dock road, according to Simon. It is one of few remnants of Liverpool’s maritime heritage in a stretch now populated by new-build accommodation blocks.
Despite that, Simon does not feel a threat from developments around him. He is in a relatively rare position as the pub’s listed status means it can enjoy the benefit of increased customers living in close proximity without worrying about the prospect of being knocked through to create more accommodation.
He said: “From my point of view, it’s brilliant and I’m sure you can see why. For my pub, this was all industrial land and though I was well supported by the people there, that was just small business during lunch.
“Then there was the promise of it being redeveloped, so all the way through the 2000s and 2010s, it was a bit like a building site. Then there was the recession, the developers went bust, it was just like a building site.
“I’m sure a lot of people remember the lift shaft coming out of the ground nearby and being surrounded by harris fencing through those barren years. But now it’s great - business is growing, I’m planning a refurbishment.
“Because we’re a listed building - and that’s the purpose of being listed - there is less of a feeling of threat than there might be.”
Deeper into the triangle, tucked away on Watkinson Street, is wine bar and restaurant Manifest. It opened on Watkinson Street last March and was soon included in the Michelin guide.
Paul said the Baltic felt like the natural home for his venue. He told the ECHO: “We came here, saw the building - it was an absolute shell when we took it on but it had loads of character. It gave us a blank canvas, and as soon as we walked out with the agent, I said to my wife, that’s the one - we’ve got to go for it.
“It just felt right - the Baltic is full of young professionals and creatives, the type of people we hoped would use a natural wine bar and want some decent food.”
Despite the area “feeling right” for Manifest, Paul does not think the Baltic has progressed at the rate people might have expected since its regeneration process began.
He said: “I think the development and progression has been a lot slower than what people expected, but I think it can still get there. There are a lot of empty units here. Hopefully more people will take a punt on the units.
“The rent is still a bit cheaper than the city centre. I’d like to say that we’ve proved that if you take a punt, you can make a go of it.
Next chapter
Among the issues mentioned by people working around Jamaica Street is footfall. The road is very quiet as the ECHO visits on a Thursday lunchtime, with many hospitality venues not yet open and little else to draw people in.
Increasing the reasons for people to visit the area during the day is an important next step, according to Paul.
He said: “I think 90% of our trade is bookings. We do get some walk-ins, but it’s not what we base the business on and we wouldn’t have done very well if we did.
“I think the more people that are around, the more things will pop up. If they get in gear with the train station, that will really open it up. It will make it a lot easier.”
Some workmen walk between the various sites around the road while 92 Degrees coffee shop plays host to people working at laptops. A woman tells the ECHO she thinks Jamaica Street is in need of a Greggs-equivalent and more bars to bring more people in.
As venues tend to be found close to the triangle’s perimeter, ensuring the Baltic’s various offerings tie together and create a fuller experience is on the agenda for Liverpool Independents BID. The new organisation will cover Ropewalks, Chinatown and the Baltic, with Baltic Triangle Area CIC chair Fiona Shaw overseeing the work of the group across the district.
Other representatives will manage the other areas within the BID group. It has been set up so each independent business can “self determine” and decide what is best for areas they understand most. Plans are still taking shape for how the Independent BID will impact the area.
Whether this brings in a more diverse makeup remains to be seen. But it is one of many signs that the Baltic Triangle is morphing as its original idea and ethos grows older roots.
In the view of Maggie O’Carroll, the journey hasn’t been perfect, but it has produced some remarkable results along the way. It’s likely to be a similar outlook for the future.
“There have been huge mistakes made in relation to this area,” Maggie says, “but in spite of all that [there has been the creation] of a very dynamic area that is of national and international significance.”
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