Green light to develop Whitechapel Bell Foundry into a hotel
Plans to transform part of London's Whitechapel Bell Foundry into a hotel have been given the green light by Tower Hamlets Council.
The site is famous for being the location where the Liberty Bell, an iconic symbol of American independence which now sits in Philadelphia in the US, was cast. Big Ben was cast on the neighbouring site.
The Whitechapel Bell Foundry ceased operating on the site in 2017, and the business is continued elsewhere in the UK. The foundry was founded in 1570 and occupied the site from the 1740s.
The seven-storey hotel is expected to have 108 bedrooms, a ground-floor restaurant and bar, as well as a rooftop pool following the demolition of a 1980s building to the rear of the foundry.
Owner Raycliff Whitechapel, which bought the site from Alan and Kathryn Hughes last year, said the 18th century, Grade II*-listed foundry itself would be sensitively refurbished to create new workshops and workspaces and a café. The site already has planning permission for a 34-bedroom hotel.
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