The future of retail is….

people, of course. We’ve visited too many high streets they are, well, missing. Is it a just change in retail habits (well yes..) or a wider general collapse ? One of our clients recently told us that all they (i.e. local political leader) were after was somewhere where their teenage kids could feel safe. Well aren’t we all, and there are often not. Our high streets have always been about commerce, just as Venice has always been about tourism. But there was a balance, spaces for communities to be, just that, to be able to explore culture and examine their lives, for kids to get in touch without spending £5 on a coffee. Human interaction, not with the shopkeeper, but, bizarrely, with each other. But here’s a strange truth - that’s good for business too. Because when you talk, you dwell, and then…

We were delighted to talk on on human centric high streets at Brabner’s Future of Retail and Placemaking Conference in Manchester recently. Lots of good discussion, that highlighted the need more than ever for our betters to embrace third places., libraries, cultural venues and community co-creation as compulsory, not unaffordable, building blocks, and buildings.