The Corridor is one of the world's earliest

retail Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is the sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturers, directly or through a wholes ...

arcades, designed by architect Henry Goodridge and built in 1825, in

Bath Bath may refer to: * Bathing, immersion in a fluid ** Bathtub, a large open container for water, in which a person may wash their body ** Public bathing, a public place where people bathe * Thermae, ancient Roman public bathing facilities Plac ...

Somerset Somerset ( , ), Archaism, archaically Somersetshire ( , , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel, Gloucestershire, and Bristol to the north, Wiltshire to the east ...

, England. The fashion for arranging shops in arcades arose in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

in the late 18th Century. The Corridor followed the trend set by London's

Burlington Arcade Burlington Arcade is a covered shopping arcade in London, England, United Kingdom. It is long, parallel to and east of Bond Street from Piccadilly to Burlington Gardens. It is a precursor to the mid-19th-century European shopping gallery and ...

. The Grade II listed arcade has a glass roof. The High Street end has a Doric

colonnade In classical architecture, a colonnade is a long sequence of columns joined by their entablature, often free-standing, or part of a building. Paired or multiple pairs of columns are normally employed in a colonnade which can be straight or curv ...

. Each end has

marble Marble is a metamorphic rock consisting of carbonate minerals (most commonly calcite (CaCO3) or Dolomite (mineral), dolomite (CaMg(CO3)2) that have recrystallized under the influence of heat and pressure. It has a crystalline texture, and is ty ...

columns. A musicians gallery, with a wrought iron

balustrade A baluster () is an upright support, often a vertical moulded shaft, square, or lathe-turned form found in stairways, parapets, and other architectural features. In furniture construction it is known as a spindle. Common materials used in its ...

and gilt lions heads and garlands, is in the centre of the arcade. Number 7 was the photographic studio of

William Friese-Greene William Friese-Greene (born William Edward Green, 7 September 1855 – 5 May 1921) was a prolific English inventor and professional photographer. He was known as a pioneer in the field of motion pictures, having devised a series of cameras bet ...

Bombing

On 9 December 1974, a telephone warning alerted police in Bath that a bomb was shortly to explode in the Corridor. The subsequent blast at 9.10pm from a 5 lb bomb planted by the

Irish Republican Army The Irish Republican Army (IRA) is a name used by various Resistance movement, resistance organisations in Ireland throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. Organisations by this name have been dominantly Catholic and dedicated to anti-imperiali ...

caused huge damage and forced the Corridor to undergo a major renovation programme. No one was hurt in the blast.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Corridor, The Commercial buildings completed in 1825 Shopping malls established in 1825 Grade II listed buildings in Bath, Somerset Buildings and structures in Bath, Somerset Shopping centres in Bath and North East Somerset Shopping arcades in England