A ground breaking ceremony has been held to celebrate the beginning of construction on Birmingham's tallest residential towers.

The Broad Street development, which was recently renamed The Mercian, will have 481 apartments exclusively for rent, offering hotel level service and a whole host of on-site amenities including a 24-hour concierge service and smart lifts that register when residents enter the building and are ready and waiting at ground level.

It will also provide residents with quality health and wellness zones, including a 200m podium open-air running track on the roof – one of the first in the UK's housing market.

The Mercian is being developed by Moda alongside partner Apache Capital. John Sisk & Son is serving as the contractor on the project designed by Birmingham-based Glenn Howells Architects.

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Johnny Caddick, managing director at Moda, said: "Breaking ground at The Mercian and announcing the new name today is a huge milestone for Moda, particularly in a city as key to us as Birmingham. The people living and working in this city have such strong ambition and determination, it's growing faster than any other regional UK city and we want to reflect the hard work, the history and tenacity in a building that harnesses Birmingham's heritage and purpose and combines it with unrivalled forward thinking to bring next generational living."

Richard Jackson, co-founder and managing director at Apache Capital Partners, commented: "The Mercian will be unlike any other residential apartment building in Birmingham not only in its height but in the level of amenity and service on offer. There's huge scope for high quality rental housing in Birmingham, Europe's youngest city that is attracting major corporate occupiers and considerable infrastructure investment. Today's ground-breaking is major milestone in our journey to creating one of the UK's largest branded premium build-to-rent portfolios and we can't wait to see the finished product."

(CM/MH)