Urban Splash does things differently. From the very start, this adventurous development company set out to take derelict or rundown industrial buildings and bring them back to life.

Today, in the grip of the worst recession the construction industry has seen in several decades, the company says it is determined to carry on with its projects even if their timetable is pushed back.

That means landscaping work is currently nearing an end at Urban Splash’s site at Walsall Waterfront, and the company has just forked out an unspecified sum to buy the former Sunbeam factory in Wolverhampton city centre.

Meanwhile existing projects in the West Midlands like Fort Dunlop on the M6 and the Rotunda in Birmingham city centre are attracting strong interest from potential tenants.

Nathan Cornish, Urban Splash managing director for the Midlands and South West, said: “Fort Dunlop is currently around 94 per cent let.”

It is a phenomenal success for a building that sat unused for the best part of a quarter century. It was one of the first projects Urban Splash and Mr Cornish tackled in the region and still stands as their biggest single success here.

Re-opened in 2006 after two years of renovation work and £50 million, the West Midlands’ biggest brick-built building is now home to shops, businesses and a 100-bedroom Travelodge hotel.

The hotel, said Nathan Cornish, was the key to the project. “It was incredibly important because the building had been out of use for 25 years and there was a lot of scepticism about whether the redevelopment could happen or not. Something I was particularly passionate about was securing a big pre-let on the site for Travelodge but it required an expansion of the building. It already ran to half a million square feet but if it was to succeed we had to extend it even further.

“The result, of course, has been tremendously successful for us.”

That flexible approach, and a willingness to take risks, is part of the whole Urban Splash approach. “It usually starts with the building and whether it appeals to us. We are looking for really good sites or really beautiful buildings – we have to get an emotional feeling for it,” said Mr Cornish. “Then we work at what we are going to do with it, and come up with some detailed plans.

Mr Cornish has been a member of the team at Urban Splash since 2002. After working for major property plcs for five years he admits he had grown disillusioned with the industry and went travelling for a year before returning to work for Urban Splash. Urban Splash was founded by businessman Tom Bloxham when he linked up with architect Jonathan Falkingham in 1992 to revamp an unloved Liverpool building and created the highly successful Concert Square development.

“It’s not just about profit,” said Mr Cornish, “it’s about fantastic places and great buildings.”

In Walsall that will involve the redevelopment of the Waterfront area for retail, offices and apartments,” he said. At the same time the company will be hoping to make further progress with its work on the Cincinatti factory building in Castle Vale and is starting to draw up plans for its newly acquired ‘Sunbeamland’ building. Home of the Sunbeam motorcycle and bike factory up until the 1930s, the Wolverhampton building was later occupied by locks firm CE Marshall until it moved out 10 years ago.

It is now in the hands of a firm that has racked up 283 awards for its developments over the past 16 years. After languishing unloved and unused for a decade, Sunbeamland could be next in the queue to get the Urban Splash treatment that has worked so well elsewhere.