A DERELICT and heavily graffitied former furniture store is set to be converted into an international boutique college for 200 students.

The former Buxtons’ furniture store in Ditchling Road, Brighton, could become a new college which up to 59 boarders would call home in a redevelopment estimated to cost about £5 million.

Organisers behind the scheme claim the project would bring in £2 million into the local economy annually to host families and local services as well as creating 58 teaching and support jobs.

The site would be run by Kings Colleges which currently has sites in London, Oxford and Bournemouth as well as in Boston and Los Angeles in America.

The former furniture store has been closed for up to eight years and previous permission granted for an underground gym, shops and 28 flats at the site has now expired.

The new plans would see the four-storey building’s basement, ground and first floors converted into teaching and ancillary student facilities with student accommodation on the ground floor and top two floors.

A previous application had sought permission for 86 rooms.

The college would provide language courses, GCSE and A Level courses, and other pre-university preparation programmes for international students.

College bosses say the proposals would provide an economic boost to the London Road area which has seen huge investment in terms of The Level, the Open Market and the redevelopment of the old Co-op.

It will also swell the student numbers in the area in addition to the 350 new University of Sussex students at the former supermarket site and more than 440 student rooms in City College Brighton and Hove’s £73 million redevelopment plans.

Buxtons was a prominent feature of Ditchling Road for decades, opening up in the street as a second-hand furniture store in 1919.

Nigel Pamplin, director of Kings Education which is based in The Old Market in Hove, said: “As a Brightonian myself for over 30 years, I am delighted that we are hoping to open Kings Brighton. Ours is a city which has always been loved by international students and which gains hugely from their presence.

A decision on the plans could be made in August and if granted permission the college could open by 2016.