ONE of Britain's leading restaurant bar chains is the first big name to set up at Southampton's Admiral's Quay, the Daily Echo can reveal today.

Pitcher and Piano will open up at the tail end of next month underneath the waterfront residential flats built by Wilson Bowden City Homes.

The arrival of Pitcher and Piano, which tends to attract customers with higher incomes, will help generate a vibrant nightlife at the Ocean Village marina.

It is also understood that a Mediterranean-themed restaurant is also on the cards, with up to eight other retail units set to be filled in later phases.

One observer, who declined to be named, said: "This will breathe life into Admiral's Quay and turn it into a choice evening venue for thousands of people wanting to savour the feel-good factor of eating and drinking on the waterside."

The first two units have been sold through Neilson Holt, a Southampton-based commercial property agent.

London-based Pitcher and Piano said it was "excited" by the opening, the first of its kind by the company for years.

However, a spokesman said it was too early to say how many people will be employed, what the opening hours will be or how the venue will look.

In a separate development, Wilson Bowden has parted company with property agent Savills over the marketing of Admiral's Quay.

Instead the company is taking the selling in-house.

As previously reported in the Daily Echo, the slow-down in the UK housing market has affected sales at the five-block development.

Wilson Bowden, which bought the flagship site in 1998 for a multi-million-pound sum, had to rethink its game plan.

It slashed the prices of three luxury penthouses by £150,000 each to £850,000, and smaller and cheaper flats are being installed in the remaining two blocks this summer.

Industry experts have already pointed out there is a risk of oversupply of new-build apartments in the port city, with more than 5,000 flats in the pipeline and uncertainty about long-term demand, especially in the buy-to-let market.

A spokesman for Savills said: "Savills has successfully co-ordinated the sales and marketing of Admiral's Quay for the past two years.

"The third phase of the Admirals Quay scheme was completed at the end of March and Wilson Bowden are now re-planning the layout and configuration of the future phases.

"The sale of the final remaining stock units will now be dealt with in-house by the Wilson Bowden sales team."