Austins: What next for former department store in Londonderry?
In the heart of Londonderry, on a prime city centre corner, stands the building once home to the world's oldest independent department store.In 1830 - some 20 years before Harrods of London began trading and more than a quarter of a century before Macy's of New York opened its doors - Thomas Austin came to Derry and opened a drapery shop on a city centre corner.Over the next 180 years Austins would become synonymous with shopping in Derry.Since the shutters came down in 2016, the grand building has lain empty – now that is set to change.
On Wednesday Communities Minister Gordon Lyons said a grant of £1.2m from his department would allow Derry's Inner City Trust to complete the purchase of the building.
So what next for the former department store building?"Well that's the question isn't it?," the Venerable Robert Miller, chairman of the trust, told BBC Radio Foyle."Nothing is ruled out or ruled in. We have saved a building, we have rescued it, now the next stage is to work to revitalising it."Spread over five storeys and 25,000 sq ft, the Austins building dominates its corner of the Diamond.For generations it dominated the city's retail landscape too.Archdeacon Miller said it was a building people in Derry feel an affinity with.
Liz Doherty remembers school day lemon meringue pies in Austins café and trips to see her cousin who worked in the ladies fashion department for more than 30 years.When Austins was in its heyday, she loved "the style of the building, the ladies fashion, the old radiators and the staircase"."It had a beautiful atmosphere, it was so different to anywhere else. Whatever they decide to do next, like maybe a hotel, I hope they keep its old structure," she told BBC News NI."It really is a fantastic building, with such a sense of history to it."
Conor Green owns a coffee shop close to the building and told BBC News NI it has been empty for far too long."Whatever goes in there, I hope helps attract a lot more people, a lot more businesses into the city centre," he said.He wants the old department store to be given a new lease of life."I'm thinking restaurants, cafés, maybe even a cinema," he said."Things that will draw people in and where they can enjoy themselves."
Archdeacon Miller said the trust knows how important the building is to the city."We are all mindful everyone is watching… that's good, whatever goes into it will encourage wider growth and development," he said.
What is the Inner City Trust?
Founded in the 1970s, with the then-Church of Ireland Bishop of Derry James Mehaffey and Catholic Bishop of Derry Edward Daly among its founding trustees, the Inner City Trust was designed to inject commercial and social life into the city centre after a decade of the Troubles.It has, in the decades since, developed some of the city's most recognisable buildings, including the Tower Museum, the Tower Hotel, the Bishop's Gate Hotel."One of our principles at the Inner City Trust is to diversify our portfolio to ensure risk is mitigated as much as possible. "But obviously it needs to be commercially productive…and benefit the community," Archdeacon Miller said, adding that work would begin almost straight away."The first element of it is stabilising the building, that gives us time in our conversations as to what might come next, on the next chapter because that will affect what it looks like inside," he said."It is not a case of saying 'who would like to come?' It is much more strategic than that."
As shopping habits changed in the early part of the new century, Austins came under pressure, posting significant losses in 2011 and 2012.In November 2014 the listed building was sold to the City Hotel Group.The receiver then sold the trading side of the business.When it closed in 2016 more than 50 workers lost their jobs.
Conservation architect Karl Pedersen told BBC Radio Foyle's Mark Patterson Show the challenge that lay ahead was a "joyful one".The building, he added, had been "caught just in the nick of time"."There is a lot of the detail we will be able to restore and salvage and preserve," he said.
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