The three-level Phillips Shirts building in Little Lonsdale Street is set to be transformed into a 59-level residential apartment tower under plans submitted by local developer Brady Group.
A $60 million tower planned for the small 702-square-metre site will have 314 apartments and 158 sqm of retail space on the ground floor, planning documents show.
Most of the existing brick building that sits on the corner of Zevenboom Lane will be demolished to make way for the development, although the facade that fronts Little Lonsdale Street will be kept and incorporated in the new building.
Brady Group bought the Phillips Shirt site in May this year for $15 million.
The development company was founded by Irish-born Tony Brady more than two decades ago and includes among current projects 524 units over 69 levels in the Vision apartment building on the site of the old Stork Hotel at 500 Elizabeth Street.
The group is one of Melbourne's most prolific developers, building more than 20 large-scale city residential developments over the past two decades.
It recently completed two similar-sized towers on neighbouring sites next to Phillips Shirts.
Those buildings were the subject of several complaints from nearby business owners, who claimed the works took a toll on their livelihoods.
Central Melbourne is set to get 10,200 new apartments this year, a similar number next year and at least another 13,500 in 2016 on current projections from analysts Charter Keck Cramer.
Reserve Bank officials last week expressed concern the construction of inner-city apartments was at particularly "high levels" and would "remain elevated" for the next few years.
