Background to the Bluewater plan

Pinpointing the Bluewater development

Pioneering a new way to shop

Bluewater Shopping centre was a new regional shopping centre in Kent, of massive proportions. In a bid to offer the absolute best in modern retail, provided for in an attractive landscaped environment, the Bluewater site was intended to be the innovator of a brand new shopping experience. It was therefore unsurprising that the Partnership showed a strong desire to get involved.

Global aspirations

Intentions to build the Bluewater shopping centre were announced in 1994, when an appropriate site near Dartford was selected. Such was the reputation of the Partnership that it was approached almost straight away to be one of three anchor shops on the development.Bluewater was to be located just off the M25 and A2 south of the Dartford River, just South East of London. It was also to be easily accessible from the newly proposed Ebbsfleet Channel Tunnel station. For the very first time, this was a regional shopping centre intended for an international audience.

Britain’s biggest shopping centre

The building itself would hold almost 250 retail units, offering square footage totalling 1.5 million square foot of selling space. The design of the building was intended to be innovative and unique, at the cutting edge of modernity. The whole site would be dug out of a twenty-five metre deep quarry, and the centre itself would be encircled by some fifty acres of parkland. In the grounds would sit seven lakes, fifty kilometres of cycle track, and a diverse range of shrubbery. Upon completion of construction, the centre would be the biggest in Britain at the time.

 

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