Atlas Ward - Retail Development - Ashton, Manchester, Construction Completed on IKEA Manchester Store

Date: 31 Jul 2006

Atlas Ward Structures is currently working on a new store for leading home furnishing retailer, IKEA, on behalf of the RG Group. The new store, based in Ashton-under-Lyme will be the 15th IKEA store in the UK.

The North Yorkshire-based steelwork contractor has designed, fabricated and erected in excess of 2700 tonnes of structural steelwork for this project. The footprint for this building is 149,328 sq ft. The scope also includes the provision and installation of planks, ramps, staircases and intumescent fire protection. The Ground floor and Floors 1-2 are for retail use and the 3rd and 4th floors are for car parking.

The site is the former United Utilities depot at the corner of Wellington Road and Oldham Road, in Ashton town centre. This development continues a significant period for IKEA expansion in the UK, which began just before Christmas with confirmation that the Central Government is happy for consent to be issued for their first ever city centre store in Coventry, and which continued with the opening of their 14th store in Milton Keynes on December 27th.

Scott Cordrey, IKEA UK Property Manager said,

"As the public know, we have been trying for many years to bring IKEA to Greater Manchester, and to finally achieve this with such a fantastic site in Ashton is great news for us and for our customers both locally and in the Greater Manchester area."

The fantastic new store will feature 2 floors of home furnishings inspiration, 50 inspirational room sets, a 500-seat restaurant, 2 floors of rooftop parking, 1000 parking spaces including dedicated parking for families and disabled customers and Smaland, the magic forest, which is a free interactive childrens play area and is supervised by qualified staff.

The Ashton development will bring 500 new jobs to the area.

The new store is to be operational in October later this year, and the overall contract value is £35 million.

Construction work on the IKEA Greater Manchester store

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