Citypress agrees new Manchester HQ deal with Bruntwood

Citypress, one of the UK’s leading independent PR consultancies, has agreed terms on a 10,000 sq ft office lease at Bruntwood’s newly redeveloped Union building in Manchester city centre.

The agency, which employs 90 consultants, has signed a 14-year lease and will take the entire fifth floor penthouse at Union, which faces Manchester Town Hall in Albert Square.

Interior consultants SpaceInvader, which has developed schemes for the BBC and AstraZeneca, has been appointed by Citypress as lead designers and Dragonfly has been appointed as fit out contractor.

Citypress will move to Union by the end of this year from its current Deansgate HQ and is the first customer to be announced at the building, which offers over 66,000 sq ft of commercial space over five upper floors.

Union was formerly known as Commercial Union House before it was acquired in 2015 by Bruntwood and is nearing the end of a major redevelopment.

Charles Tattersall, chief executive of Citypress, said: “We have doubled the size of our team over the past three years and need work space that has the capacity to accommodate our future growth. The new office design will support a new way of working across the agency by allowing our specialist teams to collaborate and giving us improved connectivity across our other offices in London, Edinburgh and Birmingham.”

Ciara Keeling, Asset Management Director from Bruntwood, said: “Union is in a prime city centre location and has been redeveloped to a high specification to appeal to companies operating in the media, technology and creative services sectors. We are therefore very pleased to have agreed terms with Citypress for the top floor of the building as they expand in the city.”

Citypress has an annual turnover of £7m and clients including Aldi, Centrica, Coca-Cola and Lloyds Banking Group. The agency is PRWeek’s Best Place to Work and was named a PRCA Ethical Champion earlier this year.

The company is also shortlisted for Best Agency Outside London at this week’s PRWeek Awards and Large Agency of the Year at the PRCA National Awards next month.

It has made a number of senior hires during 2017 as it grows its specialist services which include strategic media counsel, public affairs, social media and research and analytics. Rory Fletcher joined recently from Cohn & Wolfe to build Citypress’ public affairs practice and former IPSOS Mori consultant Eze Klass was appointed to lead the agency’s research function.