Is Oxford Street dead?

Theres no denying Oxford St is different now, but they need to think of other ways to use the empty units, stores and buildings. I'm looking forward to Ikea being in the old Top Sbop building - no more trekking out to Croydon thankfully.

Debenhams was the largest unit in the small, Wandsworth Southside shopping centre, but when it went bust, people thought the whole centre would decline. Instead of sitting empty, the 4 storey unit was turned into an E-karting course and its amazimg!

The US candy stores must be a front for something, there's too many of them and they're wildly overpriced. The same sweets in my local cornershop are 1.99 - The Mike and Icke sours are worth everypenny!!

It's really depressing seeing the number of tourist tat/sweet shops moving into every empty unit around Oxford Street/Soho - it's getting quite ridiculous the numbers of them now.

Apropos nothing at all but slightly relevant in the light of the sweet shop dodginess, did you watch the tv progs on the corruption of the Met in the 60s/70s? Based on what went on in Soho. Fascinating. I recommend. Fasten jaw tight as mine dropped to the floor. 

Yes they were facinating

It's not exactly Selfridges or Harrods in terms of historical interest. 

If you just heard banging, that is another nail going into the coffin of Oxford Street. John Lewis has similar plans to turn part of their store into partial office, in turn this is what is going to happen to the House of Fraser store, which is well and good if you have tenants to fill the space, which is also in decline because of the pandemic and the slow puncture of Brexit. I cycle past in High Holborn out former headquarters and still see a medal door covering the front, with no hope of a tenant anytime soon, the building is owned by Thames Water, no blue chip company likes to mark down assets. The other alternative is to convert into apartments, this will affect property prices, that won’t be liked by existing house owners in the area.

Or else build new theatres, I don’t mind that one.

Apparently those plans might be on hold for at least a year including to someone I know who has links to the story.

Apparments just make the street seem so empty all of the time.

That's simply not true, there's one that will be built in Olympia, Yoo Investment just bought the Saville Theatre with the intent of making it a live entertainment venue and there is the upcoming Nimax Theatre on Charing Cross Road opening next year and the Kings Cross venue that's been built and will be run by the two Nicks.

I was just thinking back to Oxford Street at Christmas from years back.
I remember back in the late 70s and 80s Selfridges had amazing Christmas windows which were usually fairy tales and you went from one window to the next as it told the fairy tale.
The street lights were always amazing too, but I used to wait until Christmas Eve after the shops closed to see the windows and lights as the street was deserted.
I also remember one year they were going to have lasers instead of lights. Now this was in the infancy of laser and a lot of people were worried if they went to Oxford Street they could get cut in half by the laser. Turned out it was a single green laser beam from one end of the street to the other. Biggest disappointment ever.

I did my annual lights walk between shows yesterday and despite reading it on this thread was still shocked by all those candy shops. I loved that Oxford street had upped its lights game this year but the lack of decent shops was stark.
Regent street felt very grand in comparison.