Windsor House (Belfast)


Windsor House was a 23-story, 80 m high-rise building on Bedford Street in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The building was the tallest storeyed building in Northern Ireland before being surpassed by Obel Tower and stands at 88.31 metres tall, with 28 floors. The total structural height is actually taller than the Obel, if you include the two plant floors and radio mast it stands at 93m tall.
Constructed in 1974 as an office building, Windsor House has a tall green elevator shaft and green side wall facade, as well as satellite and aerial masts, which stand a further seven metres in the air.
The building was badly damaged in an IRA bombing in 1992. It was sold for £30m in 2006 to County Cavan building firm P Elliot. In March 2007 plans were made to convert the building into a block of flats. However, the conversion plans fell through.
In May 2015, Hastings Hotel Group, an NI-based hospitality company, purchased the building for £6.5m. A planning application was submitted on 23 June 2015, proposing refurbishment, partial demolition and rebuilding, extension and change of use of Windsor House for a hotel with associated restaurant and bar facilities and 18 serviced hotel apartments on the 16 and the 17th floors; creation of new retail unit on ground floor overlooking Franklin Street; retention and refurbishment and extension of office use on upper floors. The planning application was approved 20 October 2015 and redevelopment work commenced in July 2016. Following a £30m refurbishment, the new hotel opened in 2018 as the Grand Central Hotel.