Dakota York

Dakota Hotels and Evans Property Group are building a 140-room hotel with grill, bar and rooftop terrace on Rougier Street, York, on the site of the demolished Northern House office block. Approved unanimously by councillors in September 2025 over Historic England's Roman-archaeology objections, demolition was underway by March 2026 but no opening date has been confirmed.

The place

The hotel occupies 1-9 Rougier Street in York city centre, on the site of the demolished Northern House, a seven-storey 1960s office block that once housed railway company offices. The plot sits close to the River Ouse and within a short walk of York railway station, and the approved scheme is designed as car-free given that proximity.

The concept

Northern House had been earmarked for years for the collapsed Roman Quarter development before that scheme's backers went into administration; Evans Property Group and Dakota Hotels stepped in with a plan to demolish the vacant block and replace it with a similarly scaled new-build hotel. City of York Council's planning committee voted unanimously to approve the application on 11 September 2025, despite Historic England's objection that demolition and piling work risked nationally significant Roman archaeology beneath the site; the council's own archaeologist estimated roughly 95% of deposits within the footprint would be preserved, with an agreed archaeological mitigation and exploration programme covering the remainder. The partnership pattern matches Dakota and Evans's other UK city hotels in Leeds, Manchester, Newcastle, Edinburgh and Glasgow.

Dining & wellness

Planning materials describe the York hotel as including a grill and bar plus multiple dining areas and a rooftop terrace, consistent with the grill-restaurant format Dakota runs at its other UK properties. No menu, chef, or interior designer has been named for York specifically.