Preston City Council provides update on Friargate Social Club seven months after fire

On September 4 last year, a large fire broke out at the former New Friargate Social Club on Maudland Bank.

Two boys - aged 15 and 13- were initially charged with arson with intent to endanger life and arson with recklessness as to whether life would be endangered.

After pleading guilty to two counts of arson and three counts of criminal damage at Preston Magistrates’ Court on November 18 2025, one of the boys - who could be named due to his age -was issued with a Youth Offending Team Referral Order which is due to expire on November 27, 2026.

No evidence was found that the second boy was involved in starting the fire and he was not prosecuted.

Seven months on from this incident, the Lancashire Post headed down to New Friargate Social Club to take pictures of its current state.

As can be seen in the attached video and photos, the site remains completely dilapidated with blown out windows and doors, crumbled walls and even an absent roof.

The ground immediately surrounding the building is then covered with debris and the whole site is enclosed within a wire metal fence, again surrounded by plastic orange barriers.

Before the 2025 fire took hold, Preston City Council had approved plans to demolish the site and in its place erect a four storey block of student apartments in February 2022.

Since the fire however, no new planning application has been submitted to Preston City Council and no construction work appears to have gotten underway.

The company that submitted that approved planning application, Maudland Ltd, also seems to no longer be based in the area, having changed its address from Preston to Ipswich on Companies House in October 2025.

After heading down to capture the state of the New Friargate Social Club now, the Post contacted Preston City Council this week, as they own the land that it sits on.

We asked the council to confirm what work was being done to keep the site safe and if there were any plans for its future, particularly asking for clarity on what happened to those 2022 plans.

A Preston City Council spokesperson said: “Redevelopment of the site was granted outline planning permission in 2018 and a subsequent reserved matters approval was granted in February 2022, for a four-storey building providing 129 flats for student accommodation. However, the development has not been brought forward and the permission expired in February 2024. To date, no further planning applications have been submitted for development at the site.

“Whilst Preston City Council owns the Freehold of the site, it is leased to a tenant, who has responsibility for its maintenance. Officers are liaising with the tenant to ensure the site is maintained appropriately.”

Asked for further details as to what specific work was being done to ensure the site was appropriately maintained, Preston City Council declined to say anymore.

The New Friargate Social Club relocated from its original site in Friargate, opposite Roper Hall, in 1989.

It remained in Maudland Bank, close to the UCLan campus, until 2015 when it went out of business.

Since closing in 2015, the site has remained vacant and became a magnet for vandalism and illegal drug taking.

Even before the 2025 fire, the New Friargate Social Club had been targeted by arsonists on multiple occasions.

The approved 2022 plans were also the third lot in five years to go before councillors.

The first in 2017 was thrown out because the proposed student block of 152 flats over seven floors was considered too big.

Developers took the matter to appeal, but failed to get the Town Hall decision overturned.

A year later a smaller development of 142 apartments over just four storeys was approved subject to a raft of conditions.