RG Property’s Bread Factory Rises to Apartment Demand

A heritage-listed former bread factory will be reimagined as a retail and restaurant laneway precinct with a 15-storey apartment tower rising above it if plans for the Fortitude Valley site are approved.

RG Property lodged a development application with the Brisbane City Council for the 4390sq m site at 36 Warry Street, which it acquired last year for $15.8 million with a view to redeveloping the fully tenanted offices. 

RG Property chief executive Rhett Williams said the developer had a long track record of investment in Brisbane, but this was the group's first apartment tower development in the city. 

“We believe in the residential growth story in Brisbane, supported by solid population migration, infrastructure spend and jobs growth,” Williams said.

“We are continuing to monitor market conditions, which will determine the timing of delivery. We believe the site is uniquely suited as a mixed-use site.  Existing tenants will benefit from the improved amenity that this project could bring.”

The Blight Rayner-designed project is for an L-shaped 118-unit, 15-storey tower and a reinvigoration of the three brick buildings that make up the former Keating's Bakery complex, now known as The Bakers Grounds, which was built in 1916. 

The tower would comprise four 4-bedroom apartments, 35 three-bedroom apartments, 51 two-bedroom apartments and 28 one-bedders as well as 184 car parking spaces across five basement levels, a yoga terrace and gym on level one, and a 28m lap pool on the communal rooftop.

According to Blight Rayner the development would be built to the boundary on Warry Street to reduce the impact of the cantilever oversailing the heritage buildings on the Kennigo Street side.

The site still contains the 1907 brick factory on Warry Street with 1916 additions, and the plans for the development are to protect the heritage value of these buildings with footings of the proposed new building set well away from heritage foundations. 

Blight Rayner has sought to complement the heritage of the site in its design of the tower through building materials and matching the height of its podium to the brick bread factory.

According to planning documents, the proposed tower would “deliver high-end residential living opportunities on a site with a rich history of great significance to Brisbane”.

“[It] provides a sensitive transition from the Valley Heart into the lower density area of Spring Hill. 

“This development application proposes a concept to redevelop and re-invent the site in a way that provides an opportunity for a sense of place integrated into the heritage values. 

“The proposal will create a unique residential living opportunity elevated above an integrated laneway which celebrates the history of the site and provides a new lifestyle destination on the border of Spring Hill and Fortitude Valley.”