City centre shopping precincts

I have just heard that Monsoon, in the Precinct, will be closing in August, due to an increase in rates by Coventry City Council. Does this mean we will have another Charity Shop or will it just be boarded up? Surely it would be better to keep rates down, that way at least they are getting some money.

Hi Tricia It is the lack of a commercial thought process which Coventry suffers from, I am sure.

It is not the council's fault - business rates are set by central government, and the Precinct is, I believe owned by a private firm.

Thanks for that flapdoodle I was interested to read that the Precinct may be owned by a private firm. I'd be interested to know who owns it.

I think at one point it was owned by a couple of companies - Modus and Morley spring to mind - but since then has been sold on. Aviva own a large chunk of it, and I don't know who owns West Orchards these days. Hammersons own Cathedral Lanes, and I think other areas are still under council ownership (City Arcade, for example). I don't know who owns the Lower Precinct. CPO and bulldozers. The lot of it's a terrible mess.

These people own West Orchards: Redefine International plc Morley owned the Upper Precinct but had to sell it off, and Modus sold off West Orchards in 2008. Both were involved with that ghastly Jerde plan. Aviva pension fund own the Upper Precinct now. Maybe the council still own the scraps around the side. The bits that no one wants. The council do offer schemes in which you can get cheaper rents at the start and they go up gradually, but I assume this is only for their properties. I guess Monsoon just don't have the custom to make it worthwhile. I've never seen any evidence that Coventry is hugely expensive. The big problem is that the city doesn't have cheaper areas with frontages for businesses that might thrive outside the retail core.

Thanks for the infor flapdoodle, I found it very interesting. I will be sorry to see Monsoon close, it was a shop in Coventry that you could go to when you wanted something special or different. Tricia

Another view of the True Form shop. A little earlier in time. Sorry: my scanner is as old as the pic I think.

Thanks Baz That picture shows how far Smithford Street was to the left of the Lower Precinct. It also shows the makeshift market which stood just below the river and which I've only ever seen on a map before!

Does anyone remember the slab, outside Boots' main doors in the Precinct, which had a poem etched in it? It started with the above words, and was written in the 60's I believe. I was very sad to see that it had been broken up when the work was taking place, a few years ago, on modernising the Lower Precinct. I felt that it should have been preserved in the Herbert.

I would think my sister in law would Anne as she worked there in the sixties.

I mean the Boots which was originally the front of Woolworths.

Oh the one she worked at was by the water feature by the bottom steps of the Precinct on the right going down. It's moved about a bit, my sister recalls it opposite Sainsburys, then I recall it down by Allied Carpets and where my sister in law worked.

Coventry Precinct on YouTube

Does anyone remember the wording on the round seating placed in the city (see pic). Were they famous or well known people of Coventry or could anyone have there memory engraved on them? I can remember the seats well, but did not take much notice of the wording around the edge. It must have cost a fair bit to have that done. We have already mentioned in another topic about the Phoenix Levelling stone placed in 1946 as the starting point of the re-development, but was it ever moved from another location? I did read somewhere that it was moved, or may just have been re-laid.