Westfield London

After twenty years of gestation and a cost of £1.7bn, the sprawling Westfield Shopping centre has been completed, covering nine postcodes and 43 acres of west London’s Shepherds Bush.

It contains 265 shops, a 14-screen cinema and 4,500 parking spaces. Marks & Spencer, Waitrose, Next, Debenhams and House of Fraser have taken massive “anchor” stores, and nine London transport links have been uprooted and reconfigured to carry the 25m shoppers that are expected to visit the place every year. An entire new overland train station has even been built, to support it, and as well as the shops, there are 50 restaurants, a gym, a spa and a library.

Westfield has landed, slap-bang in the middle of an affluent and under-retailed part of town. Ominously, it has also landed in the middle of a dramatic slowdown in consumer spending. Britain is sliding into a recession and London is not immune.

The poor timing of Westfield’s opening is not lost on the executives behind the building of the centre. However, they remain cautiously optimistic. Keith Mabbett is senior leasing executive at Westfield, and has been responsible for getting the retailers into the centre. “We’ve been sounding out the retail market for six years, seeing what they need. And there is a need for this centre,” he said at Westfield’s site office overlooking the development.

I can give first hand knowledge, having visited Westfield recently that its location is great, just twenty minutes by car from The Bull; it’s so easy to get to and parking was a dream. The experience was more than just shopping, with the fantastic array of places to eat and a Champagne bar in a prominent location, just how civilized can shopping be?

I would certainly recommend a visit to Westfield. And what better was to end a perfect day out shopping than relaxing in the lounge of The Bull Hotel, away from the hustle and bustle of central London… with yet another glass of Champagne!

Written by Rebecca Laing, Business Development Manager at The Bull