Charlie Hoult launches creative hub

Hoult’s Yard, the Newcastle office complex family business co-run by former Loewy Group chief executive Charlie Hoult, is launching its new building, The Kiln (pictured right).

Hoult (pictured below), who founded the Loewy Group, which has a design line-up including Williams Murray Hamm, Seymour Powell and The Team, is helping his father run the family business after stepping down from the top Loewy post last year.

Hoult’s Yard, formerly the Malings Pottery, has been in the Hoult family for four generations. Hoult describes the space, which features 20 000m2 of buildings across 3.6ha, as ‘Newcastle’s answer to the Truman Brewery [in East London]’.

The Kiln, the latest addition to Hoult’s Yard, was designed by Durham architect Howarth Litchfield, and the space’s anchor client will be Northern Film and Media, with design and marketing consultancy One Best Way also signed up to the space. The wider Hoult’s Yard development houses digital agencies, games developers and photographers.

Hoult describes the creative industries in Newcastle as ‘vibrant’, due both to the presence of Northumbria University (whose graduates include Apple designer Jonathan Ive) and the fact that ‘Newcastle is a hub for quite a wide area – from the Scottish Borders to Yorkshire’.

As well as working with Hoult’s Yard, Hoult says he is ‘busy being plural’, working as a mentor with digital publishing agency Velo and running blog Opencast, as well as networking event Castaway.

He adds that he has a couple of ‘secret special projects’ in the pipeline, and refuses to rule out a return to the design world.

He says, ‘It would be an interesting time to get back into the design and media market, but there’s still a lot of pain out there, so I’m biding my time.’

Hoult stood down as chief executive of the Loewy Group in May 2008, becoming vice-president, development, and was replaced by chief executive Iain Johnston last October.

Charlie Hoult

1993 – Sets up brand communications group Wilson Harvey

2004 – Forms Loewy Group with Bryan Wilsher through a merger between Raymond Loewy International, Wilson Harvey, Prescient, Loewy3 and RiteAngl

2006 – Loewy acquires The Team and Williams Murray Hamm

2007 – Loewy acquires Epoch Design and Seymour Powell

2008 – Hoult steps down as chief executive, becoming vice-president, development

2009 – The Kiln launches in the Hoult’s Yard development

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