A DEVELOPER has bought York's former Arts Centre and plans to spend several hundreds of thousands of pounds to turn the listed building into a restaurant.

Rushbond has exchanged contracts with the University of York, which for four years has been trying to sell the deconsecrated and empty St John's Church, Micklegate.

Now Rushbond has submitted detailed proposals to redevelop the Grade 2 listed building for food and drink use.

The exact details of the sale are a secret, but it is believed that once Rushbond pays for repairs and replacement of the roof, constructed a new ground floor slab and incorporated a new mezzanine floor, it will have invested a total of about £750,000.

Given a quick planning consent, a food and drinks outlet could be operating from the church within a year.

The building, once threatened with demolition through road-widening, was saved in the 1950s by the York Civic Trust and shortly afterwards became the headquarters of the York Institute of Architectural Study. The building was last used as Britain's first arts centre before it closed through lack of cash and structural shortcomings in August, 1999.

The University of York bought the freehold from the York Civic Trust, which maintained an interest, but put it on the market because of the mounting cost of structural repairs.

Recent movement in the building meant fitting large "flying shores" to buttress the structure.

Ben Middleton, surveyor with Rushbond, said: "In spite of this, the building is structurally sound, but problems do need to be dealt with.

"We propose to treat the structure of the building and use it for food and drink purposes such as a restaurant.

"Because it is so complicated we have instructed a full design team - an architect, cost consultant, structural engineer and archaeological consultant to assist us with the proposal."

He said that no bank would be prepared to lend money on the basis of a plan to have another arts centre there and residential use was not feasible "given the nature and shape of the building."

Darrell Buttery, chairman of the York Civic Trust, said: "We have agreed that this is a suitable use and have offered to give the company whatever help we could but we will be looking very carefully at these plans - not to nit-pick but to ensure that we get it right for what is a very important building. "

Updated: 10:56 Tuesday, July 22, 2003