Whitbread plc, owner of the UK's largest hotel brand Premier Inn, has received planning consent to transform Verity House, a vacant office building in Leeds city centre, into a 131-room hotel.

The FTSE-100 hotel company acquired the 44,000 sq ft former office building in October 2024, recognising its highly accessible location just minutes from Leeds Railway Station and the scenic Granary Wharf waterfront. A planning application was submitted to Leeds City Council in May 2025.

Last week, Whitbread and the council signed a key section 106 agreement, clearing the way for the development to proceed following the delegation of decision-making to the city’s planners. Construction is expected to begin in early 2026, with completion targeted for Spring 2027.

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Jill Anderson, Acquisitions Manager for Whitbread, said: "Gaining approval of our plans for Verity House is a major achievement in our efforts to deliver more high-quality, affordable bedrooms for our guests in Leeds City Centre. We’re seeing huge demand in the city and this wonderfully accessible location is sure to be incredibly popular for our business and leisure guests.

"Whitbread has a long and successful track record of converting office buildings into high-quality, successful Premier Inn hotels. By purchasing Verity House freehold last autumn, we demonstrated that Whitbread is unafraid to take on planning and development risk to convert former offices into hotels in locations that match our network plan requirements and meet the expectations of our guests.

"We're actively looking for similar opportunities across the north of England as we continue to grow our hotel estate in the region."

On opening, Verity House will complement three trading Premier Inns in Leeds city centre with a new 143-bedroom Premier Inn at Leeds Harewood Quarter also under contract as part of a Council-led redevelopment.

The new Premier Inn at Verity House will offer the latest format Premier Inn ‘Standard’ and 'Premier Plus' bedrooms.

Based on a mature occupancy of more than 80%, Whitbread expects more than 57,000 of its guests will stay at the Premier Inn at Verity House every year generating an additional £5.5 million in visitor expenditure annually – half of which is expected to be spent in Leeds city centre.