Western promise

There's more to the West End than the West End

Think of the West End and you usually think of shops. Lots of them. Oxford Street, Bond Street and Regent Street together form the most popular shopping destination in Europe, with a greater concentration of retail than Rome and Paris combined. Fill Wembley Stadium five and a half times and you would have roughly the number of people who travel to the West End every day.

Not all of them are shoppers. This is also a place where people live and work, with a much more varied character than you might think. Turn off Oxford Street or Bond Street and you enter the Georgian terraces and designer boutiques of Mayfair. Explore the side streets between Regent Street and Shaftesbury Avenue and you enter the media village of Soho, home to hundreds of creative businesses, all feeding off the collective energy of the area.    

This is the real fascination of the West End: the combination of so many elements – tourism, retail, creativity, entertainment and culture – all concentrated in a small area. We see its future as a lively mix of retail, commercial, residential and cultural influences – all interlinking in a more harmonious, green and pedestrian-friendly way than ever before.

The big news is the arrival of Park House| on the border of Oxford Street and Mayfair. This is a rare opportunity to develop an entire city block in the West End and is set to include some of the most desirable office space in London, alongside luxury apartments and flagship retail spaces to attract the millions of pedestrians who pass by every year. All this is housed in an exceptional building that incorporates commissioned art into its permanent structure. The result is the most significant development on Oxford Street for fifty years.

And it's just one element in a West End portfolio that extends from Eastbourne Terrace| near Paddington across to the East End of Oxford Street|, and south to Piccadilly Circus – which brings us to arguably the most widely recognised asset in our portfolio.

Ask anyone around the world for an iconic image of London and Piccadilly Lights| will be high on the list. We're the people who know where the light switch is. We own and manage the world-famous displays, as well as a series of office and flagship retail properties nearby.

It's a fitting symbol of how the West End acts as a beacon at the heart of London, attracting visitors from all over the world and making a huge contribution to London's retail and commercial economy. We're proud to be part of that success story and look forward to even brighter times ahead.