One of the (many) joys of this job is getting to spend time with the really good people working hard and together to make their places the best they can be.
And so to the city of Bath to spend an insightful day with members of the council’s regen team, its BID and two of the creative leaders behind an imaginative retail approach that could, hopefully, be taken to more places soon.
If I’d strolled the centre that sunny summers day on my own I would have enjoyed the awesome set of heritage buildings, the stunning river scene with its famous bridge and weir, the strong national brand retail and hospitality group and range of independents and all the neat placemaking touches that may seem minor but contribute much to the whole.
But I was lucky instead to do that walk-see in company and so draw on local experience and understanding.
Our focus was on three major projects:
- The ground-breaking planned new fashion museum;
- The upcoming return for the city’s historic department store as a fashion, beauty, home and lifestyle brands destination;
- SOMER – a sustainable fashion store, immersive learning environment and community space by Bath Spa University.
…but the conversation drew on much more of the work that’s needed behind the scenes to bring sometimes long-empty and difficult buildings back into use, how to maintain an offer that delivers both for a resident community and sizeable visitor numbers, and – especially interesting from my tackling highstreet vacancy perspective – how some of the brands have fitted in here, including adjusting their shopfront signage model to accommodate conservation values and made what might look like non-ideal building frontages work for them so they can take one of the limited empty unit options in this much-desired location.
“Ah but it’s Bath”, you might say. “Not many places like that who could usefully learn from it.”
And I’ll be disagreeing. Take an opportunity to listen in as I did to the back story of these projects: making yesterday’s stories work today, repurposing your large heritage buildings, creating an offer that suits those dual audiences, introducing and securing buy in to the many small placemaking features that make this place look the best it can be, and so on…
Lots to like. Plenty to share. Much that’s transferable. Definitely worth you being in touch.
