Helmsley supports Fabrication Crafts with Coney Street move

Social enterprise Fabrication Crafts has found a new home on York’s Coney Street thanks to property and development company Helmsley Group.

Established in 2008, Fabrication Crafts supports local artists and makers with making and retail space. It has supported more than 50 makers since launching in Coney Street. It has been looking for a new home after revealing its current lease was coming to an end this month.

Helmsley has stepped in, with Fabrication moving from its current home to unused space, formerly occupied by River Island, within 19 Coney Street. Helmsley acquired the 50,000 sq ft 19 Coney Street retail unit, currently occupied by Next and Monsoon, last month.

The acquisition, from NFU Mutual, is the latest in a series made by Helmsley on Coney Street, with the company owning several other buildings at the major city centre retail destination.

Alexia Swift-Cookson, head of asset management at Helmsley Group, said, “we are fully committed to bringing a new lease of life to York’s riverfront and redeveloping Coney Street as a high-quality commercial destination. We’re delighted to have supported Fabrication Crafts through this letting, ensuring it can continue to make a positive impact in the area.

“Coney Street has a rich history of independent trade stretching back many hundreds of years and Fabrication Crafts is a fantastic organisation continuing this tradition. We look forward to watching it go from strength to strength supported by us in Coney Street over the years to come.”

Dawn Wood, chief executive of Fabrication Crafts, added: “We are hugely grateful to Helmsley Group for its help in securing this letting, which enables us to stay on the amazing Coney Street.

“We love being based here and are passionate like Helmsley Group in helping Coney Street to have a vibrant and thriving future. Our work on the Coney Street Heritage Project during 2020-21, funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, shows how adaptable the street is and demonstrates how it can grow and change for the future.”

Helmsley Group and Fabrication Crafts are both partners in the Street Life Project, which is being led by University of York researchers.

Street Life has received funding of £469k from the Government’s Community Renewal Fund to not only explore the 1,000-year history of Coney Street but support the creation of opportunities for the future.