Mall makeover
Published: 22 July, 2010
The Mall Blackburn is coming to the end of a £60m refurbishment and extension.
The Mall Blackburn is just coming to the end of a £60m refurbishment and extension that has seen the tired 1960s centre revitalised at the same time as 100,000 sq ft of new space was added.
“We bought the centre in 2004,” explains Andrew Haughey, retail asset manager at Capital & Regional. “It was well-let and it dominates the town, but a number of retailers weren’t happy with the configuration of their units.”
The centre was bought with the benefit of an existing planning consent for an extension, but The Mall reworked the scheme to create an L-shaped mall with double-height shop units. Key to the project was buying in the freehold of the TJ Hughes department store and an adjacent parade of shops totalling about 100,000 sq ft. Demolishing these elements made room for 200,000 sq ft of new space and an additional 280 car parking spaces.
The extension will see the creation of a 650,000-sq ft centre, anchored by Debenhams and Bhs, with a new 50,000-sq ft Primark, 11,000-sq ft Peacocks and 5,500-sq ft WHSmith, as well as the relocation of Blackburn market to a 68,000-sq ft continental-style market hall.
The development has also provided the opportunity for existing retailers Next, New Look and River Island to increase their respective unit sizes by 252 per cent, 286 per cent and 120 per cent.
In parallel with the new construction, the existing centre has been fully refurbished. “By 2006/7 we were in a position to start, but it was clear we couldn’t add the new space without upgrading the existing centre so we came up with a plan for a rolling refurbishment,” Haughey explains. Since then £5m has been spent on new floors, new ceilings, new lighting and new pilasters.
Haughey says the key consideration was to make the existing space look as bright as possible, because the ceiling heights are relatively low and with car parking above there was no possibility of bringing in natural light, in stark contrast to the airy new double-height mall. Getting the flooring right was crucial in achieving this, with a bright new surface laid over the existing terrazzo.
All of the work was completed outside trading hours to avoid disrupting the retailers.
Equally important was upgrading the existing car park. Once again the priority was to minimise the contrast between the old multi-storey and the new spaces created above the extension.
Visually, the biggest change has been the demolition of a brutalist concrete stair tower that linked the upper parking levels with the town’s high street. This has been replaced with a new steel and glass structure that is far more welcoming to shoppers. “We’ve made a feature of it with lighting and a clock,” says Haughey.
With opening day only weeks away, retailers are now fitting out their new units, with the latest lettings to Costa and Deichmann taking the scheme to 86 per cent pre-let with more deals in the pipeline.
“Retailers always liked the town and traded well, but they just didn’t have the right space,” concludes Haughey. “Now we’ll be leaving Blackburn equipped to compete for the next 10 to 15 years.”
