Workday picks College Square offices as its new European headquarters

Kenneth Fox

College Square, the landmark office scheme developed by Pat Crean’s Marlet Property Group in Dublin's city centre, has been selected by Workday for its new European headquarters office, according to The Irish Times.

After abandoning their plans of building its new base in Grangegorman earlier this year, the US enterprise technology giant has agreed to occupy 44,130sq m (475,000sq ft) of office accommodation at College Square on Tara Street.

The deal is understood to be the largest single office letting to have taken place in the European office market since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in early 2020.

Developed on the sites occupied formerly by Apollo House and the neighbouring College House, College Square is a major mixed-use scheme comprising a total of 50,170sq m (540,000sq ft) of LEED Platinum office accommodation and 1,580sq m (17,000sq ft) of retail space distributed over 10 floors.

It has an overall height of 21 storeys owing to the inclusion of 54 high-end apartments arranged across 11 floors above the office element of the scheme.

It also occupies the site of the former Screen Cinema on Hawkins Street, which closed back in 2016.

News of Workday’s decision to locate its European headquarter operations at College Square follows a series of recent and not-insubstantial office lettings in the Dublin market.

Only seven weeks ago, the Big Four accounting and consulting firm EY confirmed its intention to base its new Dublin offices at Wilton Park, the 53,885sq m (580,000sq ft) office campus developed by Irish property company, Iput, at Wilton Place.

In June, international financial services giant BNY Mellon signed a deal for upwards of 8,361sq m (90,000sq ft) of office space at The Shipping Office, the 16,443sq m (177,000sq ft) scheme developed by the Marlet Property Group at Sir John Rogerson’s Quay in Dublin’s south docklands.