Autumn 2024 will mark the first birthday of Unity Place, a multi-purpose venue in Milton Keynes, bringing together community, business and leisure through a shared ethos powered by sustainability and a planet-first approach. Over the last year, the venue has shown a future-forward and inclusive way of working with new spaces for communities, both as an industry-leading ‘green’ workplace and a vibrant visitor attraction. In just one year, the venue has become a leading landmark destination, shaping the future landscape of Milton Keynes.

Since September 2023, Unity Place has opened in parts. First, the much-anticipated space unveiled, the Urban Food Market, a go-to venue for a quick bite to eat with exciting street food vendors, including a rustic Italian pizza joint, Raffaele Pizza and mouth-watering Mexican from Cantina Carnitas - these vendors change with the seasons. To enjoy a delicious tipple or two, the Unity Sky Lounge rooftop bar opened, the only rooftop bar in Milton Keynes. The bar offers panoramic views across the city and a fantastic food and beverage selection to boot.

In November, Dipna Anand’s Kitchen & Bar opened and offered an authentic and elevated Punjabi and South Indian dining experience with a menu of celebrity chef, Dipna’s, classics such her well-loved curries, tandoori lamb chops, paneer tikka, and lamb shish. The restaurant was quickly adored by locals as well as The Guardian’s Restaurant Critic, Grace Dent, who reviewed the restaurant and quotes, “This is light, thoughtful cooking that determinedly sets out to incapacitate you, with lovely, kind service”.

As part of their continued programming, Urban Food Market came alive last winter with the sounds of Eats & Beats, featuring live music by up-and-coming local artists and bands. The series continued throughout the summer as a part of Unity Places Summer Series - a jam-packed programme of events and activities throughout the summer to keep families and individuals entertained. Eats & Beats continues through winter and into 2025 as part of Unity Place’s aim of supporting the local creative community.

During the last festive period, those who looked to get ahead with their Christmas gifts and support locals enjoyed the Festive Market, which ran every Wednesday to Friday. The local Christmas craft showcased the best of local talent, featuring handmade ornaments for gifts vendors donated to Macmillan Cancer. In addition, Eats and Beats was back for Christmas and the Urban Food Market created Christmas specials, such as Turkey Roast sandwiches served from the Butcher’s Block for the ultimate treat. Every Festive Friday lunchtime, freshly baked bread stuffed with just-carved slices of turkey was available.

Additionally, Unity Place is, first and foremost a space for the community, and so to support families during the school holidays, there will be free showings of Christmas movies every Festive Friday. The movies to be shown will be selected via a social media poll, so be sure to keep an eye on the Unity Place Instagram (@unity_placemk) and Facebook (@UnityPlaceMK) pages for updates. The perfect way to keep the young ones entertained for a few hours and for loved ones to come together and get into the Christmas spirit.

To provide everything under one roof, Unity Place partnered with co-working provider x+why, offering flexible working spaces for members. With the building home to Santander offices and headquarters, Santander has opened a ground-floor Santander Work Café open to the public with co-working desks and bookable meeting rooms, and there is even a branch for its customers to access their everyday banking needs. With over 60,000 sq. ft. of contemporary office space, Unity Place provides breakout spaces, private offices, enterprise suites, meeting rooms, mission rooms, phone booths and more.

March 2024 saw the launch of ‘All In Unity’ - the time when all remaining outlets within Unity Place opened. One being The Corner Store - the first friction-less, checkout-free everyday essentials store in Milton Keynes, accessible to the public when visiting Unity Place. Powered by Amazon’s Just Walk Out technology, Unity Place is the first venue in Milton Keynes to launch this service. Additionally, the Baker’s Room opened its doors, which provides freshly made bread, pastries, cakes and coffee to locals and workers. ROK, a high-end barbershop, also opened its doors for those looking for a fresh trim.

Sustainability and connectivity have been important throughout every phase of Unity Place, particularly with their partnership with x+why. X+why, B Corp themselves, has also recently welcomed its first B Corp member, Aila Recruitment to Unity Place. This addition brings the total number of B Corp companies within the x+why community to 28, including B Lab UK and B Lab Global. As x+why prepares for B Corp re-certification in 2024, the company is focused on surpassing its current score of 98.3 through its #RaceTo100 initiative, engaging employees in a collective effort to exceed 100 points. Committed to ethical business practices, x+why partners with several B Corps and supports companies interested in the B Corp movement through its WhyB Programme.

The Auditorium at Unity Place is a large modern, open and well-equipped event space with bench seating in a theatre-style layout to seat up to 300, the Auditorium is equipped with a large digital screen, full audio visual, and a raised stage area. It provides an exceptional venue for dynamic conferences, such as big C&E events, GreenBeam, and ESG events as well as networking events across the board.

Since Unity Place opened in September, the venue has become a prominent destination in Milton Keynes, contributing to the area’s development by establishing a community hub in the city centre. Throughout the seasons Unity Place have been host to screening live sports on the big screen, live music events, ‘sip and paint’ sessions, drag events and pub quizzes. This September, Unity Place is going one step further in continuing to create the hub for the ever-evolving city with the launch of their Community Hall, a space to host community events, which will be bookable from 12th September.

Maisie Stanford, Senior Marketing & Communications Executive at Unity Place says: “We can't believe the variety of events and activations we have achieved in the variety of spaces since opening last year. It has been lovely to watch the Milton Keynes community come together throughout the seasons. There have been activations to support our sustainable endeavours, something for the public, local businesses and the entire building community to enjoy at our multiple venues. This September is a chance to celebrate how far we have come and to introduce our plans for the future"

Soaring into its second year, Unity Place has some new events and activations in the pipeline. This September, Unity Place is hosting 'Recycle for Good', a chance to welcome locals and visitors alike to bring their old gadgets and devices to Unity Place for the event where every electronic item will be disposed of correctly. The Terrace at Urban Food Market will be decorated in all things Autumn, bringing some colour and inspiring interiors to the space whilst catching up with loved ones. The Baker Room is introducing live music sessions this Autumn in support of local talent. To continue bringing the community together, BizX/The Business of Excellence will film a special live episode of their podcast in Work Café at Unity Place for ticket holders to attend. The podcast is hosted by James Vincent and the author of 1001 Business Tips, Mark Dilks. There will be 300 free tickets for visitors of Unity Place to enjoy as well as have the chance to network with other businesses who attend.

Come December, the much-loved Festive Market and Festive Friday movie nights for families will be back to help support families during the holidays. To add to the season’s cheer, the Urban Food Market Terrace will become Santas Grotto, along with Christmas Party Nights to get into the festive spirit. There will be live music shows from Eats and Beats with festive specials from the Urban Food Market serving Christmas specials.

To further achieve Unity Place evolving its networking hub, in 2025, the building will host a STEM Woman Careers Event. Aimed towards the future generation, the event will encourage students and recent graduates from the surrounding areas, who identify as women or non-binary, to network with top employers from STEM industries. The event will be an opportunity to apply or hear more about relevant jobs, listen to inspirational presentations and ask questions during insightful panel sessions.