# British Shoe, Leicester



## The Wombat (Nov 11, 2016)

The British Shoe Corporation was formed in 1956 by Sir Charles Clore. In 1953 he had taken over the company of J. Sears and Co., an amalgamation of J. Sears and Freeman Hardy and Willis Ltd. This company later became Sears PLC, and following the sale of BSC was ultimately acquired by Philip Green in 1999. (Yeah, that guy...)

The site in Leicester was the head office of British Shoe, and opened in January 1964. The site closed in July 1998, following some botched sales, and subsequent sale of the remaining parts of British Shoe Corp. Since the closure of BSC, parts of the site have been occupied by other businesses, including one of the office blocks. During this time other parts of the site have remained mostly empty.

Now the entire site is in the process of being demolished to make way for a new distribution centre. The expansive warehouses have been in the process of demolition since earlier this year. Most of the large site has already been cleared, with The office block is now earmarked for demolition in early 2017. Someone once was told me, that at the time of it’s construction, it was the largest single story distribution centre in Europe. (sorry, I can’t verify that, but it was certainly an enormous site.)

*I have known about this building for 14 years, but it hasn’t really been a feasible explore until recently, as part of the site was still live, busy with office workers, and there was always a notable security presence on site. 

The building is now mostly empty; but as the sun is setting on It’s final days, it was good to finally have a peek inside somewhere I have looked at with interest for so long. It was extremely dark, which is always challenging for photos, but it gives an indication of the building.
The demolition should be quite a spectacle… especially if by dynamite.*




























































this shows the extent of the site





the mostly demolished warehouse






Nice to see inside after all these years
thanks for looking


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## Sam Haltin (Nov 12, 2016)

Looks like its quite a large expanse. I would like to see the video of the demolition as this is a large building the demolition would be something to see.


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## thorfrun (Nov 12, 2016)

Cool roof shot, nice one


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## flyboys90 (Nov 13, 2016)

Crikey that is a big one! Great write up and shots.


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