Highcross Leicester is a shopping centre in
Leicester
Leicester ( ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city, Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is the largest settlement in the East Midlands.
The city l ...
, England. It was opened as The Shires in 1991 to supplement the
Haymarket Shopping Centre
The Haymarket Shopping Centre is a shopping centre in the city centre of Leicester, England. It was opened on 4 June 1973 as part of the Haymarket Centre and was the country's second shopping centre after the Bull Ring, Birmingham. It is locate ...
, also since re-developed. It was built on a central location within the city centre on Eastgates and High Street. Frontages of buildings that were demolished were retained and new external construction was in a 'neo-Victorian' vernacular. An extension opened in 1994, with a frontage on to Church Gate. A further large extension opened in 2008, when the entire centre was renamed Highcross Leicester.
Highcross Leicester contains over 100 shops, with a range of both large and smaller units, including branches of the department stores
John Lewis & Partners
John Lewis & Partners (formerly and commonly known as John Lewis) is a brand of high-end department stores operating throughout United Kingdom, the UK, with concessions also located in the Republic of Ireland and Australia. The brand sells gene ...
. There are also 40 restaurants and cafés, a Showcase Cinema de Lux and two large car parks.
The Shires becomes Highcross Leicester
The most recent extension, known as Shires West during the planning and early construction phases, doubles the retail space available. This extension lies between the former Shires and the
inner ring-road. It includes a John Lewis department store and a
Cinema de Lux, the only multiplex cinema in the city centre. There are also two new public squares, residential apartments, a
bus interchange
A bus station or a bus interchange is a structure where city or intercity buses stop to pick up and drop off passengers. While the term bus depot can also be used to refer to a bus station, it generally refers to a bus garage. A bus station is l ...
and a further 2000-space car park on the opposite side of the ring road, linked by a glass footbridge, which replaces one of the earlier Shires car parks that was demolished to make way for the new extension. Other new tenants include designer fashion brands
G-star
G-Star (sometimes also written G*STAR, G★ or G★STAR; ) is an annual trade show for the video game industry presented by Korea Association of Game Industry and Busan IT Promotion Agency in November. Originally held in the Seoul Capital Area ...
,
Lacoste
Lacoste S.A. is a French company, founded in 1933 by tennis player René Lacoste, and entrepreneur Mangkha. It sells clothing, footwear, sportswear, eyewear, leather goods, perfume, towels and watches. The company can be recognised by its gree ...
,
Hugo Boss
Hugo Boss AG, often styled as BOSS, is a luxury fashion house headquartered in Metzingen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The company sells clothing, accessories, footwear, and fragrances. Hugo Boss is one of the largest German clothing companies, ...
and
Zara, and there is also an
Apple Store
The Apple Store is a chain of Retail, retail stores owned and operated by Apple Inc. The stores sell various Apple products, including Macintosh, Mac personal computers, iPhone smartphones, iPad tablet computers, Apple Watch smartwatches, Apple ...
. Thirteen new restaurants and cafés signed up to open in the new centre.
The extension makes Highcross Leicester the largest shopping centre in the
East Midlands
The East Midlands is one of nine official regions of England at the first level of ITL for statistical purposes. It comprises the eastern half of the area traditionally known as the Midlands. It consists of Leicestershire, Derbyshire, Li ...
.
The Showcase Cinema de Lux and John Lewis parts of the centre mark the UK début of architecture firm
Foreign Office Architects
Foreign Office Architects, FOA, was an architectural design studio headed by former husband and wife team Farshid Moussavi and Alejandro Zaera-Polo. The London-based studio, which was established in 1993, specialised in architectural design, master ...
. The cinema is covered in a slightly buckled, stainless steel cladding, while the department store features two layers of glass, each with a swirling fabric design from John Lewis's archives, allowing light in and a view out, but obscuring the interior from the outside. The use of a fabric pattern recognises Leicester's past as a textile-producing city.
An open day was held on Sunday, 1 June 2008 to show the people around the new development. More than a thousand people attended. The newly extended and refurbished shopping centre opened to the public on 4 September 2008 with over 125,000 visitors and over a million visitors in its first two weeks. The new extension cost £350 million to construct and has been the largest regeneration project in the city for many years.
Naming controversies
On 14 July 2006, it was announced that the entire centre would be renamed the Highcross Quarter, relating to a Highcross that used to stand in what is now Highcross Street.
This received a mixed reaction, with criticism directed in particular at the use of the word "quarter" as opposed to "centre".
On 19 July 2007, the principal owners of the development,
Hammerson
Hammerson plc is a major British property development and investment company. The firm switched to real estate investment trust (REIT) status when they were introduced in the United Kingdom in January 2007. It is listed on the London Stock Excha ...
, announced that they had decided to change the new name for the centre to Highcross Leicester.
On 23 July 2007, the ''
Leicester Mercury
The ''Leicester Mercury'' is a British regional newspaper for the city of Leicester and the neighbouring counties of Leicestershire and Rutland. The paper began in the 19th century as the ''Leicester Daily Mercury'' and later changed to its pre ...
'' reported that the latest name change had been the result of a year-long dispute
with a local
coven of
witch
Witchcraft traditionally means the use of Magic (supernatural), magic or supernatural powers to harm others. A practitioner is a witch. In Middle Ages, medieval and early modern Europe, where the term originated, accused witches were usually ...
es, who pointed out that "High Cross Quarter" is the name of a high point or major sabbat in the
wicca
Wicca () is a modern Pagan religion. Scholars of religion categorise it as both a new religious movement and as part of the occultist stream of Western esotericism. It was developed in England during the first half of the 20th century and was ...
n calendar, and registered five
internet
domain name
A domain name is a string that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority or control within the Internet. Domain names are often used to identify services provided through the Internet, such as websites, email services and more. As ...
s relating to the name. Hammerson refused to comment on the dispute, and claimed that the name change was to "give it a stronger identity for customers and raise the profile not only of the development but also the city."
''
The Daily Telegraph
''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally.
It was fo ...
'' reported on 25 July 2007 that the Highcross Leicester developers had their offer to buy the domain names rejected.
Despite Hammerson saying they were no longer interested in the ''highcrossquarter'' domain names for the renamed Highcross Leicester development as the name had now "evolved", the ''Telegraph'' reported that Hammerson had escalated the matter all the way to the
World Intellectual Property Organization
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO; french: link=no, Organisation mondiale de la propriété intellectuelle (OMPI)) is one of the list of specialized agencies of the United Nations, 15 specialized agencies of the United Nation ...
(WIPO) in
Geneva
Geneva ( ; french: Genève ) frp, Genèva ; german: link=no, Genf ; it, Ginevra ; rm, Genevra is the List of cities in Switzerland, second-most populous city in Switzerland (after Zürich) and the most populous city of Romandy, the French-speaki ...
where it was seeking a ruling on ownership of the highcrossquarter.com domain name. On 30 August 2007, the WIPO ruled against Hammerson's complaint.
[
Shires (GP) Limited v. Mel Gordon (Leics Techs)]
Case No. D2007-0866
WIPO
See also
*
Haymarket Shopping Centre
The Haymarket Shopping Centre is a shopping centre in the city centre of Leicester, England. It was opened on 4 June 1973 as part of the Haymarket Centre and was the country's second shopping centre after the Bull Ring, Birmingham. It is locate ...
References
External links
Highcross Leicester
{{Shopping centres in East Midlands
Shopping centres in Leicestershire
Leicester
Tourist attractions in Leicestershire
Buildings and structures in Leicester
Shopping malls established in 1991