Landlords Braced To Be Hit By The Retail Transformation

If you are of a certain age, you will remember the retail landscape Croydon was once famous for. Iconic department stores such as Kennards, Grants and Allders. Then there was the Surrey Street market, all vibrancy and colorful characters. And then, of course, there was the Whitgift Centre. Named after the local John Whitgift school and opened in stages between 1968 and 1970 it has been a Croydon landmark for decades. It remained the largest covered shopping center in Greater London until the opening of Westfield in White City in October 2008. More recently, and with the opening of Westfield, it had begun to look a little long in the tooth and so the news in 2013 that Westfield and Hammerson were planning to re-develop the site into a mega-mall, was greeted by the good people of Croydon with understandable optimism. Read more at Forbes.