Category: News/Blog

 

Plans for Fosse Park to be expanded, were recently approved at a Blaby District Council Planning Committee.

 

Castle Acres will be a retail and leisure development next to Fosse Park where Everards site is currently located. However, it has the potential to be fully integrated with Fosse Park to create a single, expanded retail destination.

 

The project will include a range of new shops, restaurants and cafes covering approximately 288,000sq ft of floor space.

 

“In addition, Castle Acres could create up to 1,000 full-time jobs for the local people therefore benefiting the local economy. Two confirmed occupiers include a 90,000sq ft landmark Next store and a 34,000sq ft TK Maxx store..

 

Furthermore, the new car park’s layout will allow for over 850 cars. Included in this space will be 30 wheelchair bays and 12 parent/child spaces.

 

Crown Estate, owners of Fosse Park, Everards, the site owners, and Enderby-based Next will all be involved in the £150 million development.

 

“The approval of Castle Acres is excellent news for the district,” said Jane Toman, chief executive of Blaby District Council. “Fosse Park is one of the biggest shopping areas in Britain and we are proud to have it in our area.”

 

Fosse Park already covers around 580,000sq ft of shops and attracts more than 10 million shoppers a year.

 

The approval for Castle Acres followed an 18-month process, but construction won’t start till autumn next year, while the opening date won’t be till around Christmas time in 2019.

 

 

Everards Food and Drink Park

 

The expansion will see Everards relocate to a new development. In order to fund the relocation Everards wants to sell its 12-acre site to Fosse Park owners the Crown Estate.

 

They plan to move across to the other side of Soar Valley Way and create a new state-of-the-art food and drink park, Everards Meadows.

 

More than 300 people will be eventually employed as a result of the relocation. This is because there will be a new brewery as well as offices, tasting rooms, a pub, a restaurant, a new retail shop and a cycling centre.

 

The planning permission was approved back in April.

 

To mark the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, Selfridges has unveiled a 122-seat auditorium in the department store’s Oxford Street flagship. This week the pop-up in-store theatre opened to shoppers and theatre-goers alike.

 

The auditorium can be found on the lower ground floor in the Oxford Street store, which is the second largest retail premises in the UK. Over a five week period, the reFASHIONed theatre will be showcasing a production of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. The project is a collaboration between Selfridges and established young British theatre company, The Faction.

 

“This play offers a world in which fashion, appearance and social standing are of paramount importance and rumour, gossip and insinuation can be lethal,” said Mark Leipacher, director.

 

“Everyone at The Faction is delighted to be collaborating with Selfridges to create this new production for the Shakespeare reFASHIONed project. It’s an ambitious, innovative and wild idea – exactly the way we should be celebrating Shakespeare 400.”

 

It is said the run of performances is to be the penultimate stage of Selfridges’ store-wide campaign. In celebration of the world’s most famous playwright, Selfridges has hosted a variety of events in-store throughout the summer. The events include recitals by celebrities, Shakespeare-inspired collections from the likes of Alexander McQueen, and a run of campaign windows.

 

 

The department store believes this is the first ever fully-fledged theatre within a department store.

 

Tickets at full price cost £20.

Traditional British perfumers, Penhaligon’s, has opened their first standalone store in the South East. The retail and leisure destination Bluewater is now home to the new 253 sq ft boutique. The store offers the brand’s full range of fragrances and grooming products. The Kent based store is one of a handful of Penhaligon’s standalone stores in the UK.

“We are very pleased to have opened our doors at Bluewater and begun trading at such a popular destination. We look forward to sharing our passion for fragrance via this first regional store, and introducing people to our unusual and distinctive collection of fragrances and grooming products,” said Lance Patterson, chief executive of Penhaligon’s.

Penhaligon’s has joined a prestigious line-up of some of the world’s biggest brands found at the South East shopping centre. The perfumers are on the lower Guildhall next to fashion brand Reiss.

In addition to fragrances, Penhaligon’s also sells a range of bath and body products. Another product they offer is candles.

“The store opening is a wonderful addition to the lower Guildhall and Bluewater’s premium offer as a whole,” the portfolio director at Land Securities, co-owner and asset manager of Bluewater, Russell Loveland said. “Penhaligon’s is a distinguished brand, which will heighten Bluewater’s stellar line-up and further distinguish the centre as a leading retail and leisure destination.”

Other recent openings at Bluewater include Jigsaw, Tesla, Mint Velvet, LK Bennett, and the signing of Michael Kors.

Bluewater

Bluewater covers 240 acres. Included in the space is the six car parks that provide over 13,000 spaces. As a result, the shopping centre is the fourth largest in the UK. Only MetroCentre, Trafford Centre and Westfield Stratford City are bigger. While elsewhere in Europe only Cevahir Mall and Shopping City Süd are bigger. Inside you’ll find 300 stores, over 60 bars, restaurants and cafes along with a cinema screen and 3 anchor stores.

Sporting goods retailer, JD Sports, is said to be continuing its ambitious growth plans due to reports stating they are eyeing up an acquisition of competitors Go Outdoors.

 

JD Sports fashion, which has a market value of over £2.5bn, is one of “a number of bidders” considering offers for Go Outdoors, according to Sky News.

 

The privately-owned business was put up for sale despite its rapid growth with sales rising by 20% between 2014 and 2015. It is understood the auction process for Go Outdoors will be ran by KPMG.

 

If the acquisition were to be successful then JD Sports would become the London stock market’s biggest sporting goods retailer, having already overtaken Sports Direct as the UK’s largest sports retailer. It is reported JD Sports sales have been surging lately with a big boost from the Euro 2016 football tournament, despite England’s surprise early exit.

 

Go Outdoors owns about 60 stores across the country and they sell products such as tents, bicycles, and waterproof clothing.

 

Go Outdoors’ fate will be decided by the end of the year.

Located in Lower Manhattan, the Westfield World Trade Centre opened to the public on Tuesday 16th August. Expectations are high for the new 34,000sq m shopping centre as people imagine it will be one of the world’s most visited retail destinations. Experts believe it should be generating three times the sales of a standard suburban mall.

The shopping centre can be found inside the World Trade Centre Transportation Hub which was designed by the architect Santiago Calatrava. It offers a vast variety of more than 100 global and local beauty, lifestyle, fashion, and technology brands. The Westfield World Trade Centre is one of the most diverse retail collections in New York City. Alongside retail you will also find restaurant concepts, events and entertainment, cutting-edge technology showrooms, and arts and culture.

“The World Trade Centre is a symbol of hope, opportunity, progress, and perseverance,” says Westfield’s chief operating officer in the United States, William Hecht. “Westfield is profoundly proud to be a part of this project and to introduce new experiences and energy to Lower Manhattan. We are incredibly excited to open our doors to our neighbours, New York and tri-state area families, visitors, and all of our community partners.”

Included in the shopping centre is Apple and Bose providing the technology.

H&M, Boss Hugo Boss, Lacoste, Kate Spade, John Varvatos, L.K. Bennett will be offering fashion.

Delivering the beauty is Dior Cosmetics, Kiehl’s, Sephora, MAC, and Caudalie.

For footwear you can find Stuart Weitzman, Cole Haan, Aldo, and Vince Camuto.

For jewellery there’s Breitling, London Jewellers, Links of London, and Swatch.

Disney and Kingkow are there for the children’s category.