Firm declines to name scheme but Edinburgh concert hall designed by architect delayed after original contractor Sir Robert McAlpine left job earlier this year

David Chipperfield Architects said a stalled job helped send turnover down by 8% last year.

In accounts filed at Companies House, the firm behind a planned new Chinese embassy in east London said turnover fell to £14.8m with pre-tax profit slipping 15% to £1.7m.

Chipperfield said revenue “decreased in the year as a significant project stalled” which it declined to name.

dunard

Chipperfield’s Dunard Centre was grant planning in 2019 but is not expected to open until 2029

But in March, reports emerged that Sir Robert McAlpine which had been due to build a concert hall in Edinburgh called the Dunard Centre was now no longer on the job after completing pre-construction work last year.

The Dunard Centre has been designed by Chipperfield and Reiach & Hall and was originally granted planning six years ago.

At the time, the scheme had a price tag of £45m but this has now risen to more than £100m, according to the Herald.

Jo Buckley, chief executive of the International Music and Performing Arts Charitable Trust Scotland, the organisation behind the project, told the paper earlier this year the change was down to a shift in McAlpine’s priorities.

She added: “As a charity, our procurement goals have always been to ensure best value for money and maximum cost certainty. Unfortunately, we could no longer achieve those requirements with McAlpine.”

The scheme had originally been scheduled to open this year but this has been pushed back until early 2029.

Chipperfield, which moved into a new studio last summer, said that revenue from the UK, Europe and its biggest region, North America, fell but revenue from the Middle East rose nearly a third to £4.5m.

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