Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
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Maine Tower – Harbour Central
Maine Tower
41-Storeys — Isle of Dogs
An overview of Harbour Central
Maine Tower, in what is known as the Harbour Central development, is a 41-storey new-build apartment tower by Galliard Homes.
The interesting tower — described as Art-Deco — sits on a plot between 3 other similarly styled buildings in the center of the Isle of Dogs. These striking bronze and grey buildings make up the Harbour Central plot, around 5-10 minutes walk south of Canary Wharf.
Maine Tower is the 41-storey marker building; its distinctive form sits centrally to the south of the site between the open spaces. The cubic expression of the façade is an arrangement of ‘pods’ which punctuate the verticality of the building.
Rolfe Judd — Harbour Central Architects
Originally planned to be one of four, the other three buildings to the east of Maine Tower london were sold by Galliard to a professional rental company, and branded as Sailmakers (B2, B3 and Building C).
These are advertised as luxury rental apartments and are very similar inside and out to Maine Tower. Sailmakers extensive video tours of the apartments give an overview of the light and airy apartments and modern styling found throughout Maine Tower and the Harbour Central plot.
Maine Tower itself contains 297 flats. These range from studios to three bedrooms, with the majority being one and two-bedroom apartments.
Maine Tower construction status
Maine Tower is largely complete, opening in early 2020 to the first residents. Whilst open and with occupants on the majority of floors, the penthouse levels and various individual apartments are still being fitted out as of early 2021. There are some minor additional works to the facade of the building that remain to be completed.
As of 2021 the exterior landscaping of Galliard’s section of the Harbour Central plot — containing Maine Tower and Sailmakers — is now completely finished. There are no diggers to step over outside the front door or ever-moving hoardings as pavements are being completed! This Harbour Central plot is already thoughtfully designed and landscaped.
Outside the entrance to Maine Tower are a series of sculptures, a seating area, and a water feature to the eastern side. On the western side of the tower lies a small but nicely landscaped green space and children’s play area.
However, there is extensive construction work in Ballymore’s continuation of the Harbour Central area, to the immediate north of Maine Tower. This large site known as Millharbour Village, currently undergoing development by Ballymore and Sun Hun Kai Properties, a Hong Kong-based developer.
What Maine Tower has to offer
- Amenities
- Residential location
- Great transport links
Amenities
“a comprehensive array of elite lifestyle facilities; with the leisure complex set to include a “Resident’s Club”
Galliard – Maine Tower
There is a proposed library, concierge, gym, spa, business suites, and cinema. Maine Tower does look well equipped.
Galliard is great at implementing a wide range of facilities in their developments, and these items really make a difference to living in high-rise apartments.
These features are especially important during lockdowns and the challenges that 2020 and 2021 continue to bring. Here Maine Tower excels:
- Quiet areas to sit with comfy sofa’s and some books, make a difference. Maine Tower has residential communal facilities spanning the ground floor designed by interior designer Nicola Fontanella
- Business suites, often bookable for some private space, are located within Club Maine — a 6-storey building linked to Maine Tower. These have a decent screen for presentations and printing facilities and are great for a work-from-home change of scenery.
- Big-ticket items such as the gym and spa, also located in Club Maine, are nice to have, especially the ability to access these facilities from the comfort of your own home
A residential location
Address
Maine Tower, 9 Harbour Way, Isle of Dogs, London E14 9DX
To the immediate south of the Harbour Central development, the area is beginning to have that quiet leafy residential feel that all new-build marketing brochures are desperate to portray. There are some older developments, namely Lincoln Plaza and Indescon Square, which have been around for 5 and 10 years respectively. Because of this, this area has a more mature feel with developed shrubbery and the open area of Indescon Court.
Unlike a lot of new developments that stick out in their immediate surroundings until the landscaping settles in, Maine Tower is not the first new development in the immediate area, and it already feels settled.
The Harbour Central site is also far enough away from the main east west road across the peninsula, Marsh Wall, and the hustle of the financial hub to feel a bit quieter.
Transport links
Maine Towers Harbour Central location area is right in the upper center of the peninsula. The location has a wealth of transport links within walking distance.
- DLR access is around 500 yards or 2 minutes walk from Maine Tower, at South Quay DLR.
- For the tube the Jubilee line at Canary Wharf station is about a 10-minute walk over South Quay footbridge.
- Crossrail Place for the upcoming Elizabeth line is at the northern perimeter of the Canary Wharf estate, around a 15-20 minute walk from Maine Tower. The quickest way to access Crossrail will be around 10 minutes via South Quay DLR.
As a bonus, there is a Boris bike station quite literally by the front door, so you’ll never find yourself short of a bike if you want to go cycling!
Car access is limited. Maine Tower does promise secure underground parking within the development which is situated a short walk away under one of the adjacent buildings. While spaces (at an additional cost!) are available they are in the region of £30,000 for a parking space.
Whether it’s necessary for this area with its well-connected transport links is a personal preference, and driving in Canary Wharf is worthy of a whole article itself.
Price
There are currently only one bedroom flats and three bedroom flats for sale in Maine Tower on the developers website, ranging from £575,000 – £1,490,000. However there are the full complement of apartments including two bedroom flats and studios for sale on Zoopla, some attracting quite heavy discounts.
Service charges will obviously change for a while whilst facilities are being built, but Galliard developments do seem to be better than some for keeping service charges at manageable levels. Service charges for Maine Tower are currently around £3.80 per square foot, which in the realms of new build developments in Canary Wharf is on the cheaper side.
This lower service charge and resulting higher rental yield, has been a reason many previous Galliard developments in the area — such as Lincoln Plaza and Baltimore Tower — have a high proportion of rental apartments. It looks like Maine Tower will follow suite, and also have a large proportion of private rental apartments.
Pros
Value
Maine Tower is a luxury development, there is no doubt about it. However it is not at quite as high a price point, in terms of initial cost and service charge, as some of the Ultra-Luxury branded new developments in Canary Wharf. Despite this the whole Harbour Central site will eventually end up with very similar facilities to nearby developments such as Wardian London, and South Quay Plaza— without the sky-high ongoing charges.
Including the facilities in the attached Club Maine, Maine Tower strikes a decent balance between of amenities and value.
The tower is well-equipped with features that the average owner will use, whilst not charging for some of the more expensive additions like — car lifts — that in reality get little use in London Zone 2 developments.
- Gym and fitness studios
- 24/7 concierge
- Private Cinema
- Business suite
These additional costs can add up, especially as the development ages and remedial works are required.
As a comparison, Ballymore’s Pan Peninsula development is virtually opposite the Harbour Central site and offers a similar level of facilities to those found at Maine Tower. 10 years on and services charges have crept up to nearly £11 per square foot, making the circa £4 per square foot here look very reasonable!
Spacious balconies
Rolfe Judd architects have incorporated balconies into the integral design of the buildings in Harbour Central, and Maine Tower is no exception.
There are decent sized balconies on virtually all of the apartments, with very little wintergardens.
As the Maine Tower balconies are integral and not bolted onto the outside of the building, they are both very solid but also have proper structural floors and full height walled sides. A seemingly minor detail, but if your neighbour is watering their plants you won’t get wet, and the added shelter from high winds provided by the walled sides helps on blustery UK days!
Landscaping
Situated by an already nicely developed area to the south, including Galliards own Lincoln Plaza development, Maine Tower slots between two developments that have plenty of planting and landscaping.
It won’t be rural by any stretch of the imagination — Ballymore dubiously claimed the Millharbour Village development would contain a forest — but when the Millharbour Village development to the north is completed, the whole Harbour Central area will end up with a significant amount of green space for central london.
This combination of green space combined with being close enough to walk to the financial centre, and Jubilee line station is hard to match.
Cons
Nearby building site
There is a large Ballymore development, now known as Millharbour Village, immediately to the north of the site. This is — and will likely remain — a very large building site until at least 2024. As of 2021 the Millharbour Village development remains in the groundwork’s phase.
When the Millharbour Village development is eventually completed it will provide significant benefit to the area. There is a landscaped park, additional community leisure facilities, and a theatre planned, but this is likely to be a long time coming.
Unfortunately, Maine Tower will suffer building noise and dust from the sight for several years.
Lower floor views
With the development to the north, its difficult to tell quite how overlooked some of the flats on the lower floors will feel. The current Millharbour plan is for 6 buildings ranging from 10 – 44 stories, but its difficult to gauge the exact way the light will impact Maine Tower from the 3d renders.
With two of the three other buildings on the Harbour Central plot over 25 storeys each, unless you are on the very upper floors of Maine Tower the views east over Sailmakers and west towards London will be limited.
Having said that, apartments on the western side of the building — especially floors 27-40 branded the Sky View collection — do benefit from fantastic views towards central London.
Summary
Overall, Maine Tower is a very impressive building and provides high quality and spacious flats.
If you can get over the building work to the immediate north this Harbour Central part of the Isle of Dogs will continue to develop over the coming years. Maine Tower will eventually find itself in the middle of a heavily regenerated area, with high-quality developments from Galliard and Ballymore and their associated cafes, green space and public amenities to the north and south.
While some may argue Maine Tower hasn’t got quite the wow-factor of some of the ultra-luxury developments in Canary Wharf, the well-designed Art Deco style building is a nice break from the monotony of glass often found in the area. It also strikes a great balance between price per square foot and a level of interior fit and finish that rivals many more expensive developments.
While lacking the golf simulators of Landmark Pinnacle, or rooftop observatory of Wardian London — the Harbour Central development has got virtually every amenity you need. In addition, Maine Tower doesn’t quite hit the extortionate ongoing charges of many buildings with similar facilities.
Two of the biggest Isle of Dogs developers — Galliard and Ballymore — have invested heavily in this portion of the peninsula, and the already nice residential area will only continue to improve over the coming years. Maine Tower looks set to capitalise on this, providing high-spec apartments in a prime position.
