Muse and Umberslade reflect on a decade of success at Wapping Wharf

The team behind Wapping Wharf, Bristol’s thriving independent waterfront community, is this month celebrating a decade since it first started coming to life.

Once a forgotten part of the city, Wapping Wharf has been transformed into one of the city’s best-loved neighbourhoods by developer Umberslade, together with residential partner Muse. An empty disused site when it was acquired by Umberslade in 2003, it has become a scenic harbourside community packed with independent restaurants, bars, shops and residential buildings.

2025 marks ten years since the first people moved into their apartments at Wapping Wharf. To celebrate, Muse and Umberslade welcomed valued partners from across the last 10 years to attend an evening event at Gambas, one of the restaurants at CARGO, Bristol’s first retail village made from adapted shipping containers.

A thriving shipbuilding yard and dry dock in the eighteenth century, the site had fallen into disuse when Umberslade acquired it over 20 years ago. The vision was to create an attractive new neighbourhood that reflected the independent spirit of Bristol. In 2006 Bristol City Council approved plans to develop Wapping Wharf into a mixed-use development of new restaurants, cafes, shops and homes.

Muse, the nationwide placemaker, was brought in as residential partner to create 450 new, mixed-tenure homes to cater for a variety of people. Alongside this, partners and visionaries for the project, Umberslade, carefully curated a mix of independent restaurants, shops and cafes, to create a thriving new community, and in 2015 the first residents and tenants moved in.

Umberslade also paid homage to the history of the area by carefully restoring the 19th Century Grade II listed Gaol Gate, creating a feature entrance to the neighbourhood and providing an important unification of South Bristol and the city centre.
Today, Wapping Wharf is home to over 1,000 people and 45 independent restaurants and retailers, and is one of Bristol’s most-loved neighbourhoods, popular with locals and tourists alike.

Stuart Hatton, Managing Director at Umberslade, said: “From the outset, our vision for Wapping Wharf was to create a real community here – a new neighbourhood for Bristol in its own right. A place that would make the most of this wonderful location and where people living in the homes here would find what they wanted on their doorstep but that would also become a go-to leisure destination for the city.

“We had to turn the model of mixed-use development on its head to achieve this but I’m proud to say that a decade after the first people moved in and started bringing Wapping Wharf to life that, together with our partners Muse and others – we’ve realised much of this vision.”

Phil Day, Director of Project Management at Muse, said: “Wapping Wharf is a shining example of what can be achieved through long-standing, values-driven partnerships.

“Over the past decade, our collaboration with Umberslade has transformed this once-forgotten corner of Bristol into a vibrant, independent community that people are proud to call home. It’s been a privilege to help shape a place that reflects the spirit of the city so authentically, and we’re excited for what the future holds.”

Muse is a nationwide placemaker with over 40 years of experience creating mixed used communities across the UK. It has a long track record of leading complex, mixed-use regeneration projects, with an emphasis on sustainability, community and quality.