Orchard Piper Teams with Corsair for $400m Toorak Project

Plans for a prime site in Melbourne’s blue-ribbon Toorak have advanced with the developer announcing a partner for the project.

Orchard Piper acquired the Mercedes-Benz dealership at 7-11A and 17-19 Carters Avenue, next to Toorak Village, in May of this year and revealed plans for a luxury $400-million mixed-use precinct.

The developer will partner with Corsair Investment Management for the project, which it said would “add $550-million worth of residential, commercial and retail development in Melbourne’s most premium suburb”.

The private developer, led by directors Luke McKie and Rick Gronow, picked up the site from Karl Hagen and the family of his late business partner, John Worrell—whose father purchased the 3600sq m holding in 1932.

At the time of the sale, McKie told The Urban Developer its existing relationship with the Hagen family and vision for the site had helped the developer better 14 rival offers from local, interstate and international parties and secure it on a two-year settlement.

McKie said that the partnership between Orchard Piper and Corsair would bring “unrivalled commercial strength further adding to the regeneration of Toorak Village as a thriving high street, bolstered by the Buxton family’s six generations of property history”.

“Corsair align and support our design-led approach to architectural development,” he said.

“They bring a rare level of expertise and knowledge together with 100-plus years of multi-generational experience represented by the Melbourne based, Buxton family name.”

Adding to Orchard Piper’s portfolio, now in excess of $1.1 billion, with $200-million worth of projects previously completed in Stonnington alone, the development will comprise a high-end, architecturally significant residential development complemented by hospitality, retail and strata commercial, suited to local owner-occupiers.

The project will offer residents full concierge services and amenities, including a pool and gymnasium.

“We have again appointed highly regarded and world renowned, Kerry Hill Architects to design the precinct, which will arguably become the most high-end building for Melbourne’s most affluent suburb,” McKie said. 

“Landholdings of this scale and proximity to the village are rare. We will take our time designing this project to ensure we achieve an architectural response befitting of the significance of this opportunity.” 

The developer intends to file plans with the Stonnington council towards the middle of next year, when the Mercedes Benz dealership lease expires.

▲ The Mercedes Benz dealership currently occupying the Toorak site.

Orchard Piper has been progressively building a significant stake in Toorak Village’s revitalisation with 10 individual titles acquired since 2019, bringing the developer’s land holdings in the village to more than 5000 square metres.

Nearby, Vicland $300-million office building at 489-505 Toorak Road is progressing on the site it paid $80 million for in 2019.

The eight-level Toorak office building, known as St Germain, features more than 10,000sq m of office space and 3500sq m of retail space on the lower levels.

Toorak remains Melbourne’s priciest suburb with Corelogic’s Best of the Best 2022 report revealing 138 houses were sold in Toorak during the year, with an average property value of $4,955,630.

Three of the top five most expensive house sales in Melbourne were in Toorak.

It has been a busy year for Orchard Piper. Earlier this month it successfully sought an amendment to allow it to demolish and rebuild by hand part of a heritage building on the site of its nine-storey East Melbourne project.

The council’s Future Melbourne Committee unanimously supported the plan to allow the developer to demolish the eastern and northern sections of the rear wing of the building at 364 Albert Street with deputy lord mayor Nicholas Reece telling the meeting: “As we have all learned, it requires the developer to dismantle the building, brick by brick, then sort and number each of those bricks. It will then be reconstructed in exactly the same manner in which it was first built back in 1873”.