• Going up: Can Britain’s empty department stores be brought back to life?

    Going up: Can Britain’s empty department stores be brought back to life?
    With many branches of famous chains lying empty, work is under way to transform them into housing, hotels, offices, independent shops and more. Could this be the key to revitalising the high street?Department stores, once palaces of delight and theatres of modernity, enclosed commercial town squares where you might meet, fall in love, get married and furnish your new home, are now none of these things. Empty, cold and bulky, they occupy town centres like fridge freezers that no one will take awa

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