This is the first artist impression of Cardiff Sixth Form College’s (CSFC) proposed new campus. The project, which is seeking planning permission, would turn the Victorian-built and listed Cory’s and Merchant Place buildings on Bute Street in Cardiff Bay into a new teaching and learning facility.
CSFC, which currently operates from a smaller site on Newport Road close to the city centre, would also invest in a new student accommodation development nearby at a current vacate land site behind the Wales Millennium Centre at Pierhead Street.
The project, which would have a development cost of tens of millions of pounds, would see CSFC - part of Dukes Education Group and whose majority of students are attracted from overseas - increasing its student numbers by around 200 to 600. The college teaches both GCSE and A-level subjects. With boarding annual fees are around £50,000.
The two buildings, currently owned by Cardiff Council, have been vacant for 20 years. Subject to planning consent CSFC would acquire the buildings from the council and the land site from Global Mutual whose agents are Knight Frank. The accommodation scheme would provide around 400 student bedrooms.
Planning consultants DWD are expected to submit a planning application to Cardiff Council this summer with a determination by year end.
It said of the learning campus element of the project it said: “The proposals comprise the sensitive conversion and restoration of the grade II listed buildings and a new seven story building to the rear within the existing courtyard. This site will house the majority of the educational facilities and teaching space for up to 600 pupils."
The five-storey grade two listed buildings were designed by Bruton and Williams, with Merchant Place built in 1881 and Cory’s Buildings constructed eight years later for Cory Brothers & Co - whose business interests included chandlery, brokerage, colliery and wagon ownership and coal exporting.
The buildings were bought by Cardiff Council in January 2021 in a bid to protect the city’s architectural heritage, and marketed the following month. Knight Frank marketed the two buildings for the council.
A pre-planning consultation exercise has been launched.
