Melbourne developers Dorman Capital and Wattletree have teamed up to launch the $190 million South Yarra House, designed by SJB.
Located at 55 Claremont Street, the site is one of the last remaining riverside holdings in South Yarra. Once completed, the site will comprise 60 apartments across 20 storeys. Residences will be offered views of the Melbourne CBD, Yarra River and Royal Botanical Gardens.
Dorman Capital Managing Director, Nick Dorman, says the site’s potential was identified by the developer before acquiring it in 2018. Despite the adversities attributed to landholding, the developer was excited by the site’s potential.
“We were initially pursuing a commercial office project which had challenges due to the site's land proportions, prior to Wattletree acquiring the adjoining sites and approaching us with a Joint Venture proposal which alleviated those concerns,” Dorman says.
“We quickly built a strong relationship with Rob and Nick and were impressed with their partnership focused style and collaborative, no fuss approach to decision making.”
Wattletree is headed up by former Hacer Group Co-Founder Rob Pitts. Pitts turned his attention full time to Wattletree in 2021 to focus solely on property development.
“Nick Moylan and I started Wattletree Development because we are both very passionate about property and love the development process. Our focus for Wattletree is to develop a reputation for creating and delivering a pipeline of high quality, market leading and innovative property development projects,” Pitts says.
SJB’s design is inspired by the brutalist characteristics of New York’s art-deco built environment. Hecker Guthrie is tasked with crafting the interiors for the project.
Dorman Capital’s pipeline currently includes the $500 million Mernda Town Centre, while Wattletree’s first four developments include three commercial projects in Hawthorn, with the most notable being Xero’s new head office on Burwood Road.
South Yarra House was given development approval earlier this year, with sales due to launch in October 2022. For more info, visit www.southyarrahouse.com.
