Birmingham has a new tallest building. One Eastside has been completed, bringing 667 new rental homes to the city.
The first residents moved into phase one following sectional completion in July 2025, and the new tower with rooftop amenity has achieved practical completion.
MGAC, a global boutique consultancy and client representative specialising in project and cost management, supported the delivery of the scheme for developer Sphere Group (formerly Court Collaboration) from inception, through to the start of construction in March 2023 and completion this summer.
MGAC’s role included project management, cost management, and health and safety services.
Delivering the development presented a complex logistical challenge. Glancy Nicholls Architects secured planning consent for the scheme, before Weedon Architects led the detailed design and construction stages.
The site sits adjacent to the new HS2 station, hemmed in by busy roads on two sides and university campuses on the other two, leaving almost no room to store materials or stage deliveries. At the busiest point, four tower cranes were working the site at once.
The answer was to build as much as possible somewhere else. Bathrooms and utility cupboards arrived as finished pods, manufactured in a factory by JRL Modular and craned into place before each floor was sealed. The building’s unitised façade was made off site in ready-to-fit panels and installed floor by floor. The concrete cores were formed using slip-form construction, in which the mould climbs continuously as concrete is poured, allowing the towers to rise without pause. Main contractor Midgard, part of the JRL Group, self-delivered around 80 percent of the works, giving the team unusually tight control over quality and programme.
As a high-rise residential development, One Eastside required a rigorous approach to quality assurance and record keeping. The process generated approximately 65,000 quality-assurance records, creating a detailed digital account of the tower’s construction. This information was handed over to support the building’s safe management throughout its operational life.
“One Eastside required us to solve several complex challenges at once: delivering Birmingham’s tallest building on a highly constrained city-centre site, coordinating up to four tower cranes, and maintaining rigorous quality assurance throughout the programme,” said Chris Barker, Executive Director at MGAC. “What makes this project significant is not simply its height. It is the way the team combined careful planning, off-site manufacturing, and close collaboration to deliver an ambitious new landmark safely and on schedule. One Eastside has transformed Birmingham’s skyline, and we are incredibly proud to have helped bring it to life.”
Now complete, One Eastside brings 667 new rental homes to Birmingham city centre and a new 155.5-metre landmark to its skyline. Its scale, design, and extensive resident amenities reflect the growing ambition of build-to-rent beyond London and Birmingham’s continued evolution as a major residential destination.
