Jack’s Point Village development responds to growth
Darby Partners has just started construction of a new boutique hotel development at Jack’s Point Village and director John Darby says they hope to start building a new supermarket early next year.
The supermarket will service what will eventually be a population of some 11,000 residents along the Southern Corridor.
A boutique hotel with a residential feel
“We’ve started back into our hotel development with new energy and enthusiasm now that we can see that demand has returned,” Darby says.
“We’re looking at a product that’s reflective of growing trends and has more of a residential feel than the traditional hotel room with corridors.”
The hotel will feature a collection of smaller, village-style boutique lodgings, covering all markets from affordable through to longer higher-end stays. “We’re getting away from that traditional, multistoried hotel,” Darby says.
“We now need to deliver a more thoughtful experience than we did in the past. People want fresh air, and they want to circulate outside around a street.”
A colour perspective of Hotel Tewa getting underway at Jack's Point
Population growth warrants a commercial centre
There’s been such big growth in residential development in the area that the population warrants proceeding with the Jack’s Point’s commercial centre. “We’re actively into that and see that as the commercial hub for the wider residential area with the district council now planning more residential to the south of Jardine’s farmland.”
“Our footprint is similar to the size of Queenstown’s CBD, so we’ve quite a bit of capacity. We’ve only developed 20 percent, less than a quarter of that.”
The projected population of 11,000 includes Hanley’s Farm, Jack’s Point, the Special Housing Area that’s under construction and a block that Darby Partners sold to Classic Homes to build several hundred houses.
“We’re focused very much on smaller scale shops to cater to those people, and expansion’s happening rapidly so we’re now advancing plans for our first supermarket to support and service the area,”
Darby says. There’s enough demand for another service centre in the area that’s within walking and biking distance and the timing is right.
While his company is handling the hotel and supermarket developments, they’ve sold other land to developers to undertake complementary developments in the village area.
Some of these are mixed use with housing above and commercial below.
There is an increase in people wanting mixed-use apartments so they can live upstairs and do business, or attract some tenancy income, downstairs.
“It’s an interesting growth area,” Darby says. “It’s in high demand.”
People want smaller properties and this option suits them, he says.
The population in the area is now adequate to attract strong service providers who are moving to Queenstown to set up their businesses.
Big demand for Jack’s Point properties
The developers of a $400million, 5ha luxury residential and commercial property development at Jack’s Point Village have sold almost $115million worth of high-end apartments in the past six to 12 months. Falconer CEO Dean Franklin says the latest $2.5m residence was snapped up last week.
The company is developing 600sqm of commercial property in Clubhouse Lane, including a luxurious day spa facility. “We have an amazing, well known day spa operator about to start fitout.” The fit out alone is believed to be around $1m. The high-end spa will offer high touch wellness treatments, with interiors inspired by the surrounding landscape.
There will be a real estate showroom, with some space available for a restaurant or entertainment offering.
A wine bar will be opening in Village Works Quarters – a 750sqm space nearby with 16 luxury apartments, and Falconer is also in negotiations with a renowned, high-end operator to open an upmarket restaurant.
“Our owner occupier Village Works Lofts in the business park development went really quickly. We’ve sold 20 tenancies out of the 23 in the last 12 months.” Franklin says. Businesses signed up so far, include a hair stylist, barber, massage and beauty therapist, art gallery-café, sauna showroom, law firm, construction firm and IT company.
A colour perspective of Falconer's Clubhouse Lane development once completed
Village Central – a 2ha block comprising another 50 homes, 60 apartments, and a limited amount of commercial property with long-term staff accommodation for Village staff above, is currently on the drawing board, Franklin says. These will be directly opposite a gym, pool, and health centre. Eight will be retained for long-term accommodation. “We still have labour and resource problems for long-term workers for the village and we need appropriate accommodation for them,” Franklin says. “These will be sold but we are desperate for worker housing too so we will be holding onto some.”
More than half of the 56 Lake Tewa Apartments, that have started construction, have been sold and will be coming online over the next 12 to 18 months, he says.
Construction is underway on underground carparking. A 32-space underground car park has already been built and 130 more parks are under construction at Lake Tewa Apartments with plans for another 300 under Village Central.
