The £14.5m redevelopment of Deaconess House on Edinburgh's Pleasance, which is currently being redeveloped by contractors GRAHAM Construction in partnership with Mace Real Estate, has achieved a major milestone as it reaches its highest point.

A topping out ceremony has taken place to mark the building reaching its full height of 18.2m.

Mace's Investment team is behind the plans to create more than 300 new student apartments on the site of the former hospital, while the architects on the project are The Kalyvides Partnership.

The original Deaconess House is being retained and refurbished with the project set for completion in May 2014. Mace has signed an agreement with Edinburgh University, which will take over the new student accommodation complex once construction work is completed.

Graham Construction is continuing to work on the exterior and interior of the new structure, including internal fit out, partitioning and electrical works.

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Three new blocks are being created to the rear of Deaconess House and will be situated around a central courtyard, which will include an amphitheatre and hard and soft landscaped areas. The new blocks will rise to four and five storeys and will contain a total of 315 bedrooms, split across a mix of studio apartments and three, five and six bedroom units.

Graham has significant experience of student accommodation projects for colleges and universities around the UK, including Stirling, Newcastle, the University of the West of Scotland in Paisley and Queen's University.

Contracts manager at Graham Construction Paul McBurney explained: "As a historic site, Deaconess House has presented a number of challenges relating to the preservation of the existing layout and retention of its historic features.

"The renovation has allowed us to integrate the old with the new to design a site which is sympathetic to the surrounding buildings in this historic quarter of Edinburgh."

Mike Myles, Development Director at Mace added: "This is an extremely important milestone for the project and is testament to the hard work to date by all members of the team.

"We are all now striving towards completion of a successful project for Edinburgh University in time for the start of the 2014/15 academic year."

Deaconess House dates back to 1894 when it opened as a hospital and a number of ancillary buildings, including nurses' accommodation were added to the original structure over the years until its closure as a hospital in 1990.

More recently, the building has been used as office accommodation.

(JP/CD)