Iconic Riparian Plaza Wins Another Two Prestigious National Property Awards

Riparian Plaza, one of Brisbane's modern landmarks won the 2008 Property Council of Australia/ Rider Levett Bucknall Innovation and Excellence Awards held at the Crown Casino on May 24th in Melbourne.

Harry Seidler's final masterpiece was awarded the top honour as the Overall Winner beating ninety-seven finalists from around Australia across thirteen award categories. Scott Collins of Bloomberg, which owns and developed Riparian Plaza said 'the win was a fitting reward for everyone who had contributed to the design, development and management of Riparian Plaza'.

Riparian Plaza also won the National Award for Innovation and Excellence in Mixed Use Development; This award was open to inspiring developments that exhibited innovation and excellence in design and were the development of a building of at least three substantive uses.

Previous winners of the prestigious Property Council of Australia/Rider Levett Bucknall Award include the Renzo Piano designed Aurora Place (Sydney) and last year's winner, the Lord Norman Foster designed Deuschte Bank Place (Sydney).

Nik Seirlis, Principal of North South Real Estate, a specialist in luxury property sales says the award of this prize 'puts Riparian Plaza in world-class company' and 'can only serve to increase the value of this already highly regarded commercial and residential property'.

The building itself has already set Brisbane residential price benchmarks, having been the location of a 1.95 million dollar sale in 2007 by Mr. Seirlis of a two-bedroom apartment; the highest price for such a property in Brisbane's history according to Data Analyst - Tim Lawless of RP Data.

During 2007, the residential apartments at Riparian Plaza achieved a resale median annualised capital growth of 24.8%, recording the highest gain of any apartment in Queensland and second highest in Australia (Source: Australian Financial Review, April 24-27 2008, Page 57). Riparian Plaza has been one of the top 10 performers in Australia each year since 2005.

It is expected that the announcement of the national award will see this benchmark as well as many others being broken by Riparian Plaza.

Mr. Seirlis suggests that despite interest rate rises and a sluggish real estate market, the dwindling riverfront locations within the CBD combined with the national spotlight cast on Brisbane's landmark Riparian development will cause the prestige waterfront property to buck current market trends and show stronger than expected growth.

In 2007, Riparian Plaza won the National RAIA Award for Commercial Architecture.

For more information please call:
Nik Seirlis at North South Real Estate
0411 555 355 or 07 3229 5000