BCLP

When thinking about what distinguishes BCLP it is easy to gravitate towards the firm's property practice. And for good reason - as will be seen below, this is an exceptional practice group by any measure. But this misses some subtlety. BCLP is made unique by how it has leveraged its top-tier property practice to develop clients across more typical commercial law silos. This flips the typical order of operations for City firms. That said, it is helpful to start by examining the property practice itself. Put simply, it is known as among the most influential such groups in the City, with near universal Band 1 presence across the property sub-categories. To see the team as just another property group (even within its esteemed Band-1 peers) is to do it a disservice. Rather, whilst capable of the whole gamut of real estate and asset-based work, it specialises in a few highly profitable niches. First, it often takes on work involving infrastructure or railway complexity. Second, it has developed experience in managing, financing and refinancing valuable assets by mega-scale land owners, many of whom are based abroad. It is particularly known for its work on large office buildings and hotels in this respect. Third, partner Christian Drage has cultivated BCLP’s position as a thought leader in all things urban regeneration. A piece of recent work which neatly encapsulates all of these specialisms is the firm’s advice on the One Euston project. It advised on the joint enterprise between land-owner Lendlease and investor-financier the Crown Estate to develop (among other undeveloped sites) the land directly adjoining Euston station. This ambitious project (with a fully developed value in excess of £9 billion) aims to embed significant commercial development with the existing Euston community. It is the largest project of its type in England. So, BCLP’s property practice is its crown jewel. But, crucially, the firm is not a boutique outfit. It is still a bona fide commercial law firm of substantial scale. Where most similarly positioned firms build specialist groups around the needs of clients acquired via their core corporate or financing practices, BCLP has succeeded with the opposite approach. This is not just a novelty, but rather an advantage for the firm. This is because the firm is able to explore commercial development opportunities little explored by competitors. Let’s see how that works with regard to one of the firm’s most quickly growing practice areas: competition litigation. BCLP’s London office has grown its reputation largely through its work on Morgan Stanley’s cartel damages enforcement case. Rather than winning this mandate through relationships made in corporate practice, the firm forged ties through real estate. Specifically, when it supported on sale of Morgan Stanley’s London offices for circa £400 million. The firm has embraced this approach, developing well-reputed practices across mid-market M&A, lender financing, and employment law. All of these burgeoning practice groups demonstrate the fruitfulness of BCLP’s ‘reversed’ approach. This forward-thinking business approach has, particularly in recent years, been complemented by a forward-thinking cultural bent. To start, the firm has been an early and vigorous adopter of legal tech. What makes the firm special in this regard is how lawyer-led this adoption has been. The best example at present is the firm’s Discover platform. In essence, this renders all firm knowledge resources / precedents / research notes easily searchable. This is exactly the sort of incremental and useable technical innovation that fee-earners are likely to actually implement. In addition to tech-positivity, BCLP’s London office has been notable for its stellar performance on DEI metrics. It was one of the first firms to be Mansfield Plus Certified, which should be no surprise given its 15-year streak of maxing out the HRC’s Corporate Equality Index. In sum, BCLP presents a genuinely different place to work within the London commercial law scene, whether your interests lie in property or further afield.