Corby’s stunning new £40 million shopping centre, Willow Place, is now open with top name retailers such as TK Maxx, River Island, Jane Norman, Burton, Dorothy Perkins, Evans, Clarks, Mark One, The Body Shop, New Look, Superdrug, WH Smith, Game, 3 Store, JD Sports, Vision Express and Italian coffee house Costa.
Willow Place is a flagship development led by Land Securities, the UK’s largest property company, which manages the wider town shopping centre.
Land Securities is already working on the next phase of regeneration for Corby town centre and will shortly be submitting a planning application for a further 25 shops, a department store and 250 apartments.
The move will allow for a more diverse retail mix and reduce the need for Corby shoppers to have to travel long distances to centres such as Peterborough, Leicester and Northampton. It will require the demolition of the south western corner of the existing town centre, including the former bus station site and land at Elizabeth Street and Westcott Way.
Included in the proposals will be new bus and taxi facilities in Elizabeth Street, together with a new 850-space undercroft car park. It is hoped that work will start on site in 2009 for a late 2011 opening.
Mark Rymell says: “We’ve been working closely with both Corby Borough Council and North Northants Development Company on the future expansion of the town centre to produce a sustainable mixed use development that will place it right at the heart of Corby life.”
Land Securities is also investing in the regeneration of the existing town centre, including the creation of a new ‘Corby Walk’ along the major shopping through fare of Corporation Street.
