Twickenham to open in Liverpool thanks to cash injection

Piers Read and Jeremy Rainbird by Jeff Moore

The Creative District Improvement Company (TCDI) and subsidiary operating company, Time + Space Studios, are to invest £500 million in a network of film studios across the UK.

It is looking to take advantage of a studio boom generated by streaming giants such as Amazon and Netflix.  

The first investment will be a £50 million acquisition and planned improvement of Twickenham Studios. Recently the studio won an Oscar for its sound work on Bohemian Rhapsody, and a BAFTA for mixing work on 1917.  

TCDI will also develop educational partnerships with the likes of Kent University. This is intended to bridge the skills gap in the economy.  

The acquisition and improvement of Twickenham Studios will include an expansion into Liverpool and should boost the local economy as well as create revenues. Further investments into studio spaces in Kent and Liverpool are planned, which will provide more jobs in the sector and local communities.  

The expansion of Twickenham includes developing more production facilities such as film stages, and flexible workspace for creative industries with new event and hospitality space.  

Chairman of TCDI, Anthony Lilley OBE, said: “Despite the creative industries sector contributing 11% of the UK GDP in 2018 and growing five times faster than the national economy, increasing demand for studio and production space in the UK had threatened to derail Britain’s prosperous creative rise with a lack of funding, facilities and expertise. We at TCDI Co. have a genuine strategy that will address the space deficit and train the next generation of industry practitioners at each studio complex.” 

Adrian Wootton OBE, chief executive of Film London and the British Film Commission, added: “The UK screen industries are enjoying an exceptional boom time and it is crucial that we capitalise on this by continuing to develop our world-class infrastructure and provide access to as much purpose built studio space as we possibly can. I am therefore delighted by today’s news of this major investment by a UK company into UK sites.”

Image: Piers Read and Jeremy Rainbird, TCDI founders, by Jeff Moore

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