Dripping with irony: Superdry is one of the stores to exit the Whitgift Centre recently, leaving behind the yellow buckets
The number of empty retail units in the Whitgift Centre has increased by more than 50% in the past year, according to recent research.
Now under the management of Westfield, the Whitgift Centre was supposed to have been demolished and replaced in a £1billion-plus regeneration of Croydon town centre that was due to take place a decade ago.
Instead, Westfield, now part of Paris-based Unibail Rodamco Westfield, have managed to rip the heart out of Croydon, the flagship shopping mall being allowed to decay, driving away shoppers and their own tenants.
Easily pleased: palmed off with some cheap tat, Jason Perry hailed the opening of Miniso as some kind of triumph
Entrances to the shopping mall have been bricked up, making it even more difficult for those shoppers brave enough to venture inside the hollowed-out halls to find what they might be seeking.
In May last year, Westfield closed what is still known as the Allders car park, blocking it off on Dingwall Avenue and at the Whitgift Centre entrance. High parking fees are another issue deterring visitors to the Whitgift Centre.
A slew of traders – 27 in the past year – have abandoned the Whitgift Centre, many when their leases have expired.
Last month, much was made by Westfield when they opened two “kiosks” in the former Allders building, to the joy of their uncritical fans, the likes of gormless Jason Perry, the Mayor of Croydon, and Labour MP Sarah Jones, who rents office space from Westfield in the centre.
Perry snapped up a goody bag for himself, as you’d expect.
Two more of the “kiosks” are supposed to open this week, although the shopping centre managers have not yet released any details of which stores these might be, nor confirmed that they will open, as previously promised, by October 10.
Inside the Whitgift Centre, the outlook continues to become bleaker by the day.
According to figures from a little-read freesheet, there are
73
vacant units inside the Whitgift Centre as of October 2025.
That’s up from
52
as recently as June 2025.
The exodus of traders from the Whitgift Centre appears to be accelerating.
A year ago, in September 2024, the same publication reckoned that
46
units were closed or vacant.
“More buckets than businesses,” said one panel member on a recent Croydon Insider podcast, summing up the dire and deteriorating state of the sad old Whitgift Centre, where its leaking glass roof is a constant problem for maintenance crews.
Over on the other side of North End, Westfield’s other Croydon mall, Centrale, appears also to be having maintenance issues. Last week, iC reported how one entrance from Croydon’s main shopping street was fenced off because of a water leak.
More buckets than businesses: nearly 20 units in the Whitgift Centre have been vacated in just three months
Of the big-name brands who have opted to quit the Whitgift Centre, Superdry has this year followed Sainsbury’s, Beaverbrooks jewellers (the branch was “no longer commercialy viable”), The Entertainer (where the manager blamed the centre’s management – Westfield), home furnishings store Stacks, The Body Shop, Clothing Club London, Monsoon, Supercuts, Pure Flowers (one of the Allders kiosks is supposed to be a florists’), Accessorize (like the Body Shop, another high street retailer that has gone out of business), Optical Express, Zucchi, Swag Jewellery and Camden Coffee House.
The list is not exhaustive.
Only Marks and Spencer, at the West Croydon end of North End, remains as an “anchor” tenant for the shopping mall. And there are justifiable questions about how long they will remain patient with their neglectful landlords.
URW had promised to deliver their planning application – comprising mostly thousands of flats in high-rise blocks in a phased programme of works – by the end of this year, with 2028 as the earliest date when demolition or construction work might begin.
Now, Katharine Street sources are suggesting that even that slow-motion delivery might miss its deadline. Meaning there might be no traders left in the Whitgift Centre at all by the time that the tardy Westfield bulldozers finally move in…
Read more: Another Whitgift store to close – and manager blames Westfield
Read more: ‘Permanently closed’: Whitgift Centre works mark end of days
Read more: Hammer blow for Whitgift Centre with new delay to masterplan
- If you have a news story about life in or around Croydon, or want to publicise your residents’ association or business, or if you have a local event to promote, please email us with full details at inside.croydon@btinternet.com
As featured on Google News Showcase
- Our comments section on every report provides all readers with an immediate “right of reply” on all our content. Our comments policy can be read by clicking here
Inside Croydon is a member of the Independent Community News Network
- Inside Croydon works together with the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, as well as BBC London News and ITV London
“there might be no traders left in the Whitgift Centre at all by the time that the tardy Westfield bulldozers finally move in…”
That’s exactly what they want to happen. With no lease surrenders to negotiate, tenants to evict, traders to object to planning applications, vacant possession makes it easier and cheaper to send in the demolition crew.
URW know what they’re doing, which is more than can be said for Croydon Tories, Croydon Labour or Croydon Council
Same as in America with Trump and his administration with the power brokers: let it all collapse and rebuild on the cheap. With local authorities powerless.
Completely disagree. URW do not know what they are doing, but are provided with the luxury of being allowed to wait for something to turn up that suits them rather than the public who have already provided them with huge resourees to undertake this project, but without politicians having any counterveiling power to get them to act in the interest of the public any longer.
Watch out, Jean-Marie Tritant, Delboy is coming for your job!
In other words URW couldn’t care less about Croydon. The only reason they haven’t disposed of the site is because they think the powers that be might be foolish enough to go along with their current awful plan for Croydon.
I haven’t visited the Whitgift Centre for months, but they used to have lists of shops and a map to show where to find them. Do those still exist? If so, are they now full of blank lines where previous tenants have closed down, or do they (expensively) keep re-jigging the list to “hide” the blank lines?
Banksy has been in Croydon in the past. It sounds like he is due to revisit again, to emphasise the lack of shops in the Whitgift Centre and/or the intransigence of Westfield, as Croydon becomes an even more late Westfield project than Bradford was (at least Bradford got a shiny new shopping centre in the end !).
I think it’s a lost cause because Westfield/Whitgift have been overtaken by internet and out of town shopping centres. Given high construction costs and utility prices how can shops compete and make a profit. Forget retail, instead sell off the site and see what happens!.
i think it is terrible that all the shops and stores in the whitigift centre are closing but the problem is not only in croydon but in other towns as well like bromley where some of their shops and stores have closed the only borough that is bucking the trend is kingston upon thames all there shops and stores are open including the bentalls under cover shopping centre and where there might be one or two stores empty new ones start quickly the reason kingston upon thames do so well is because they have there own local currency the kingston pound which is helping businesses to thrive in kingston go to kingston pound .com i mentioned this in a letter to our main political parties in croydon but nothing seems to be done about croydon having its own local currency like kingston they seem to think there policies seem to better for croydon but it is not working kingston is thriving
An excellent article which confirms the view which I think most people hold of URW – that they have their own agenda for the Whitgift Centre which does nothing to encourage the regeneration of Croydon.
I am sure that they will come to regret their decision to decimate the Whitgift Centre. With a large number of Croydon’s remaining offices now being converted to flats under the permitted development rules, there really will be little interest in any new high-rise blocks in the Whitgift Centre. The lack of activity on the One Lansdowne site, the Bellways site in Dingwall Road and the plot in front of the Vita Apartments adjoining the new entrance to East Croydon Station show that the tide may already have turned.
I wish Croydon Council had a little more backbone and was prepared to take on URW. Hopefully it will be an issue in the mayoral elections next May. I just hope that URW are now paying full business rates for all the empty units and they have not been given any concessions.
The Government has passed the regulations to allow local authorities to use the High Street Rental Auctions Programme. I wish that Croydon Council showed some enthusiasm for using the new powers which they have been given but they seem to be very timid in using the new legislation.
I also wish that the Whitgift Foundation which I understand has retained an interest in the Whitgift Centre was using more influence on URW. It cannot be in their interest for the Whitgift Centre to become a ghost shopping centre.
WESTFIELD CROYDON HOLDINGS (NO.1) LIMITED lost £9m last year so they probably are paying business rates on every empty unit
“Probably”.
The chart of their decline on Endole https://open.endole.co.uk/insight/company/11096002-westfield-croydon-holdings-no-1-limited looks like a ski slope.
In 2018 they had net assets of over £58m, at the last count it was minus £89m.
They make Brick by Brick appear accomplished
Nobody i know shops in Croydon Town Centre as Purley Way is a safer cleaner option with the right ppl. Sad. Five Guys and Market Tavern have also closed down . Green Dragon is also reportedly going to be closed down and that fat lunatic Perry is ranting on about his achievements….
I no longer shop in Croydon. It feels rundown and more importantly I did not feel safe there. I now go to Bromley. Croydon used to be fine when I worked in one of the big offices there but over the last 12 years or so it has changed and not in a good way. I can’t believe all the flats being built there with an infrastructure that cannot cope – East Croydon train station and Croydon University Hospital.
Nothing they do will make me come back to shop there.
What’s your source for the Green Dragon closing? It’s a great pub and always seems pretty busy so that would be another crying shame/coffin nail 🙁
This is about the IC Web site pages – has something changed re the font size or page width?
On my smartphone I can read the simple arial-type font initial taster text but clicking on ‘Continue reading’ brings up pages with a roman type font that is smaller, less black and possibly on a wider page.
Zooming in on the text so it is large enough to read makes the text extend beyond my phone width, so I have to scroll sideways to read each line.
I looked back to see what happened when I could read the full articles clearly, but the font change applies retrospectively.
Is it just me or my phone?
Please would the IT department of IC please look at this!?
Our IT department (hahhahahaha) worked overnight on the issue and report back that nothing has changed here…
Er, OK. Maybe it’s my eyesight. 🙁
How is it possible that planning permission has not been withdrawn?
If Croydon did that, the site would be worthless, and would quietly disappear from URW’s portfolio of valuable, but dormant, sites. Is this the only reason for the kiosks? To enable URW to over-value the site as a going concern and sell it to another developer? Anyone who believed that any of the earlier versions of URW intended to bring back to life the town centre of Croydon was either hopelessly gullible or stupid. As long as the site has planning permission, nothing will happen.
Croydon’s infatuation with developers has killed our town, whether Conservative or Labour were in charge, and sadly most of the people who used to give a damn are long gone. This all started when Minerva fantasised about Allders, and George Street, blighting that area while doing only enough to generate publicity and market it to other developers. The Planning Department has no teeth nor common sense, and it is time to knock heads together and get them all to admit that the Whitgift Centre is doomed, and to get URW completely out of the picture.
When I read about perry, I think of Billy Bunter. Is there any difference?
Croydon has not been a safe place to shop for quite a long time. People name it Croy dump. Someone needs to take the bull by the horns. Do something now.
“Croydon’s not a safe place to shop” is one of those glib, throwaway lines intended to cause lasting damage, like suggesting London is under Sharia Law when it’s not. It’s bollocks.
“Do something now” is just vacuous. Do what?
The non-delivery of the promised shopping centre and associated regeneration is a complete systemic failure by the local government. I moved here with my wife 10 years ago, in part due to the promise of a regeneration of the area, instead what we have witnessed is a total decline. The high street is a hell hole of vacant shops, electric bikes / scooters, religious nut jobs with awful PA systems & gangs of youths.
We now have two young kids and are looking to move away from the area as I do not feel this is a good place to raise a family.
Be sure to ask your estate agent to add your comments to the details they use to sell your home
You’re a cunny funt ain’t ya
Two of my friends, one who moved to East Grinstead (West Sussex) and the other moved to an upmarket coastal town, they never looked back. If they need to be in central London, it’s a 1 hour train ride. Sometimes, I send them the highlights of Croydon in WhatsApp and they feel pity… 🙄 Like it or not this town will be gentrified, when the investors get around to it…