The project comprises over 400 apartments Courtesy of Hines Polska

Developer Hines Polska has launched construction on its Apartamenty Novum multi-family residential project in Kraków, the company’s first investment in the southern Polish city. The development, which will be built by Erbud, is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2013.

The Apartamenty Novum investment will sit on 4.8 hectares of land located on Kraków’s ul. Rakowicka. The plot was bought by a Hines subsidiary and the Heitman investment fund in October 2010.

“We made the first attempt to buy land for an investment in Kraków as early as 2005,” Wojciech Rumian, Hines’s managing director for development projects in Poland, said in a statement.

He added that the company was intent on finding a centrally located plot on which it could construct a sufficiently large building. He pointed out that this is very difficult to achieve in Kraków.

“We view the launch of construction on Apartamenty Novum on ul. Rakowicka not only as the end of the search, but also as the beginning of Hines’s longer involvement in the Kraków market and the willingness to develop more investments [there],” Mr Rumian said.

The Apartamenty Novum project was designed by the IMB Asymetria architectural studio. It will comprise over 400 apartments and parking spaces for 458 cars. The units in the scheme are priced from zł.7,800 per sqm.