EY opens newly refurbished £8m CityGate offices

Following an £8m eight-month-long refurbishment, EY has moved back into its CityGate offices.

EY has 65,000 sq ft of office space across two buildings at CityGate on St James’ Boulevard to house its 600-plus strong local team, with supposed space to grow by at least another 300 people in the future.

Architects Stride Treglown designed the interior space and the fit-out was undertaken by Overbury.

Technology is said to be a key supporting element to enabling this level of flexibility. EY’s Newcastle office has swapped traditional desktop phone handsets for Skype functionality, and all meetings rooms are decked out with video and audio conferencing technologies for high quality connectivity.

The third floor has a dedicated collaboration space, with a pool table in the breakout area, and a seminar room that will hold up to 60 people.

Sandra Thompson, Newcastle’s managing partner at EY, said: “I’m so pleased about this investment in our office space - to me it means so much more.

“It’s a strong signal to the local market of just how important the North East is to EY as this is a region we see as having huge growth potential for us.

“We’ve been based at CityGate for almost 17 years and it gives us the space we need to grow in a future proofed environment. The office has been redesigned with growth in mind and we have made it as modern and inspiring as possible. It’s about enabling a different way of working.

“Already I’m seeing the new office design having a positive impact, helping to bring together people from different teams and sharing their successes.”

The office move is part of the ‘EY@Work’ global programme, which reflects the changing needs of today’s workforce. It has been rolled out across 100 locations across the globe.