The Manhattan studio’s scheme for Staycity Aparthotels features an apart-hotel, communal amenity space, an ancillary gym, public realm and associated landscaping on a 0.11ha site immediately north-west of Stratford shopping centre and south-east of Westfield Stratford.
Councillors in Newham voted in favour of the proposals at a meeting on Tuesday (10 February) despite concerns about the building’s proximity to a neighbouring tower.
Grzywinski+Pons first submitted plans in April 2025 for the apart-hotel tower, standing just 10-12m away from the neighbouring Legacy Tower, a 33-storey residential building by Suttonca Architects. Amended plans submitted in January increased that distance by 1.6m, while introducing privacy fins and the serration of the façade facing the existing tower, planning documents said.
Once built, the Grzywinski+Pons tower will complete a trio of tall buildings north of Stratford town centre that are either completed or in the works, including Legacy Tower and BDP’s under-construction 41-storey super-tall student accommodation tower for Unite.
Matthew Grzywinski, co founder of Grzywinski+Pons, told the AJ: ‘We are very excited to have received planning approval from Newham so we can bring forward the missing piece in this evolving and increasingly coherent edge-cluster neighbourhood in Stratford.
‘We have undertaken a productive journey and a robust collaboration with Newham, the Greater London Authority and other stakeholders. This ongoing dialogue was instrumental in evolving our scheme and creating a proposal that improved with each interaction.’
The practice added: ‘We paid careful attention to ensuring our proposal was as neighbourly an addition to our emerging context as possible. We thought hard about all facets of the architecture, designing a building with its own character that would still sit comfortably within the street wall. We now look forward to delivering this project with our client.’
Delivery of the consented scheme will replace an unused former taxi rank, a coach drop-off, British Transport Police welfare facility and Network Rail parking site. Planning officers had recommended the scheme for approval prior to the meeting.