IBI Nightingale closes Liverpool office

IBI, the Canadian architecture group with 80 offices around the world, has closed its Liverpool studio with the loss of around 20 jobs.

A handful of staff in the healthcare team, including Liverpool studio director Justin Harris, has relocated to the firm's Rochdale office.

Nightingale Associates was acquired by IBI group in August 2010. IBI Nightingale will retain its offices in London, Harwell, Oxfordshire and Cardiff as well as Rochdale.

The job losses are part of a global recovery plan set out by IBI Group in 2012 to "align staff levels with committed work". The group reported a loss of $75m in the six months to July as US and UK business continued to struggle out of recession.

In Liverpool, the redundancies followed unsuccessful bids for major contracts to design a wave of North West schools and the Materials Innovation Factory for Liverpool University.

The MIF was won by the Fairhursts Design Group, a vital win of its own after entering into a company voluntary arrangement with creditors in December 2012.

IBI Nightingale shared office premises in Bruntwood's Plaza with sister subsidiary IBI Taylor Young which has around a dozen staff in Liverpool, working mainly on town planning and landscape architecture contracts. IBI Taylor Young's main office is in Handforth where it employs 90 people. IBI Taylor Young is believed to be unaffected.

No one from IBI Nightingale was available for comment.