Building with an Icon: The Thinking Behind ICD’s $600m Market Square

There’s some firsts associated with Adelaide’s $600-million Market Square project—Australia’s first treehouse hotel and its developer ICD Property’s first project in South Australia—but it’s how the two-tower project will gel with something that’s been around for 150 years that makes it unique. ICD Property chief executive Matt Khoo says Adelaide’s central market, which has occupied the site next door for 150 years, is “the backbone” of the precinct around Grote and Gouger streets that also includes the city’s Chinatown. “The market is an absolute amenity for that precinct,” Khoo [ pictured above, with Market Square in the background ] tells The Urban Developer . “We were very cognisant of not interrupting or taking away from the central market; we just wanted to enhance it.” A joint venture between the City of Adelaide and ICD Property, Market Square will have a 40-storey tower with 231 apartments and a 250-key Starwood treehouse hotel that will be Australia’s first. A second, 13-storey, tower will have 20,000sq m of office floorspace to accommodate more than 1000 workers. ▲ A bird’s eye rendering of Market Square looking from the Adelaide CBD toward the sunset. [Main image: Chris Thomson] The project’s ground floor will double the size of the market that last month, based on a study of 400,000 traveller reviews across 100 sites worldwide, was named the third-best food market in the world by travel insurer AllClear. “The ground floor of the central market itself will expand to have more eateries and grab-and-go outlets as well as farm-to-plate operations,” Khoo says. “We’ll have 50 new tenancies across the ground and the first floor.” He says the “standout” of the project is its reinterpretation and mirroring of the arches of the market’s Federal Hall building. “We individually laid 250,000 bricks there and it’s amazing,” he says. Adelaide Lord Mayor Jane Lomax-Smith says the project will transform the area, in Adelaide’s CBD, in a big way. “Market Square sets a new benchmark for design in the city, honours the past and provides a development and expanded market offering of which we can all be proud of,” she says. SA Premier Peter Malinauskas says the project demonstrates growing confidence in the state. “Market Square is exactly the kind of investment that supports a vibrant and growing Adelaide,” he says. ▲ Adelaide’s lord mayor says Market Square sets a new benchmark for design in the SA capital. Khoo says any doubts about whether Adelaide is big enough for such a project have long been dispelled. “This is our first project in Adelaide and when you come to a city outside of Melbourne and Sydney, you have to question the demand, the take-up for such a large project, one that is world-class which, when you build something that big that has the precinct ideology, whether the place is too small for that,” he says. “What we’ve categorically found is that it isn’t. “People want to live like this; it’s been well received and I think this is the future of development where you’re going to have a mix of uses so people can live and work and play in the one precinct.” He says a 1700sq m Coles Local supermarket will occupy Level 1. “At the first floor is service retail, the supermarket, Liquorland, as well as massage, nails, all those things that you’re ordinarily need in your daily life as well as additional restaurants and grab and go food indoors well,” he says. “The first floor retail really supports the precinct as a whole, we’re looking to create a zero-minute city, a city within a city essentially, so what you’re getting here is a combination of retail, residential, hotel, office; all combined, so you can live work, play all within the one venue. “On the retail front, there’s quite a number of Asian-influenced food and beverage operators that are signed up or we’re looking to sign up on level one, which will reside around the Coles and Liquorland that will anchor that space.” ▲ A rendering of Market Square’s arches, which mirror the historic Federal Hall building next door. A podium on Level 4 will provide a 3000sq m landscaped civic terrace open to the public. “We will have the space activated on a regular basis with a moonlight cinema and other things to match up with events that are happening in Adelaide such as the fringe festival or [the Australian Football League’s] Gather Round,” Khoo says. On Level 3, the hotel lobby will have another terrace and a restaurant and bar. “It’s really important to do these things in the absolute pulse of the heart of the city and that's what we think central market has always been,” he says. “From a developer’s context, we don’t have to build this multi-million dollar amenity and even if we did, I don't think we’d be able to achieve that. “It’s got this historic grain to it that we just couldn’t replicate.” Designed by Woods Bagot and being built by Multiplex, Market Square topped out in March and is expected to be complete by the end of 2026.

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