Award-winning Estate Manager boosts Trust’s Historic environment and buildings team
Chartered Surveyor and winner of the WeAreTheCity Rising Star of the Year award, Jessica Hopkins, has joined Chatham Historic Dockyard Trust as Estate Manager.
Jessica, 25, is responsible for ensuring the 100 commercial and 120 residential properties, at the 80-acre mixed-use heritage site, are managed and maintained in line with the Trust’s charitable purpose of preservation.
As part of the Historic Environment and Buildings team, Jessica will oversee the provision of day-to-day property management and related professional services across the estate, while maintaining a balanced ecology of uses.
A longstanding member of the CBRE Women’s Network Board, who previously chaired the CBRE Valuation Junior Committee, Jessica said: “I am fascinated by the beauty and history of the Historic Dockyard’s buildings. I am determined to uphold the unique character of our heritage environment while generating new income streams to secure future use and re-use for generations to come.
“The low turnover of both tenants and business owners is testament to how committed the Trust is to ensuring heritage buildings work in the modern world, by way of balanced and appropriate re-use.”
The Dockyard boasts 47 Scheduled Ancient Monuments and 54 Listed Buildings, including a working Victorian Ropery and covered building and dry docks. Jessica is looking forward to being part of a working group for the conversion of a Grade II listed Police Section House into a 21st Century international creative digital hub. When complete, ‘The Docking Station’ will provide cutting edge technologies, performance and training opportunities for the community.
Jessica joins the Trust from CBRE Global Investors, where she was an Asset Manager within the International Capital Asset Management team, after joining the first intake of the CBRE Apprenticeship Scheme in 2013.
Keen hockey player, Jessica graduated from Kingston University with a First-Class Honours in BSc Real Estate Management and has a wealth of industry experience. While at CBRE, Jessica worked as a Property Manager and Leasing Agent for the West End real estate investment trust Shaftesbury PLC. Jessica focused on the management of the Seven Dials Estate project, in the conservation area of Soho, where many of the buildings are Listed and date back to the 17th century.
Jessica reflected: “I thoroughly enjoyed focusing on the public realm and preserving and improving the area for everybody who used it – I thrive on the challenge of managing a mixed commercial and residential portfolio through sympathetic preservation of heritage assets and best practice.”
WeAreTheCity is a centralised hub for professional women who want to progress in their careers, enhance their skills and build their external networks. It has over 120,000 professional female members and helps corporate companies to retain and develop their female talent.
