Festival Place
Encyclopedia
Basingstoke
Basingstoke is a town in northeast Hampshire, in south central England. It lies across a valley at the source of the River Loddon. It is southwest of London, northeast of Southampton, southwest of Reading and northeast of the county town, Winchester. In 2008 it had an estimated population of...
, Hampshire
Hampshire
Hampshire is a county on the southern coast of England in the United Kingdom. The county town of Hampshire is Winchester, a historic cathedral city that was once the capital of England. Hampshire is notable for housing the original birthplaces of the Royal Navy, British Army, and Royal Air Force...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
which opened on Tuesday, 22 October 2002. It houses 165 shops including large department stores such as Bhs, Debenhams
Debenhams
Debenhams plc is a British retailer operating under a department store format in the UK, Ireland and Denmark, and franchise stores in other countries. The Company was founded in the eighteenth century as a single store in London and has now grown to around 160 shops...
, and Marks and Spencer. There are also restaurants, bars, and cafés, mostly located outside in the covered Festival Square.
The centre also incorporates a Vue
Vue (cinema)
Vue Entertainment , formerly known as SBC International Cinemas, is a cinema company in the UK and the Republic of Ireland. The company was formed in May 2003 when SBC acquired 36 Warner Village cinemas. There are now 69 Vue cinemas, with 654 screens totaling 140,500 seats, including the rebranded...
(formerly Ster Century
Ster Century
Ster Century was a cinema company in Ireland and the UK. There was one Ster Century cinema in Dublin, Ireland, and six in the UK: Basingstoke, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Leeds, Norwich, and Romford...
) cinema, Liquid nightclub, Sports Centre and the town's library
Library
In a traditional sense, a library is a large collection of books, and can refer to the place in which the collection is housed. Today, the term can refer to any collection, including digital sources, resources, and services...
. It is located within Basingstoke town centre, close to Basingstoke railway station
Basingstoke railway station
Basingstoke railway station, in the town of Basingstoke in the county of Hampshire in England, is on the South Western Main Line from London Waterloo, with local and fast services operated by South West Trains. It is also the terminus of First Great Western local services on the Reading to...
, and incorporates the town bus station and a multi-storey car park
Multi-storey car park
A multi-storey car-park is a building designed specifically to be for car parking and where there are a number of floors or levels on which parking takes place...
.
Festival Place is 102,000 m² (1.1 million square feet) in size and is owned by the Grosvenor Group
Grosvenor Group
Grosvenor is a privately owned property group with offices in 18 cities. It has four regional investment & development businesses in Britain & Ireland, the Americas, Australia and Asia Pacific; an international fund management business, which operates across these markets and in continental Europe;...
.
History
The area of Basingstoke which Festival Place now stands on was cleared in the 1960s where a large concrete shopping centre was built. The first phase, which became The Walks and New Market Square was completed at the end of the decade and The Walks was covered in the 1970s. The second phase became The MallsThe Malls, Basingstoke
The Malls, Basingstoke is a shopping centre in Basingstoke, Hampshire, England built between 1978 and 1981.-History and development:Before The Malls were built, the site was occupied by a number of small residential and commercial properties and by the clothing factory of Gerrish, Ames and...
and has hardly been altered. The third phase was abandoned and became The Anvil
The Anvil, Basingstoke
The Anvil is a concert hall with theatre functionality and a performing arts centre in the town of Basingstoke in Hampshire, UK.Built on a site originally set aside for the third phase of Basingstoke's shopping centre, The Anvil was built to tackle what was then seen as a 'cultural desert' in the...
concert hall.
Festival Place was completed in 2002. The development replaced New Market Square and a 1960s multi-storey car park and included covering Porchester Square and extending the centre to the east into a new two-level section, Festival Square and the tower which is illuminated at night. The bus station was redeveloped and an amphitheatre was built beyond Festival Square and a fountain installed in neighbouring Eastrop Park.
The centre was used by BBC's
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
Top Gear
Top Gear (current format)
Top Gear is a British television series about motor vehicles, primarily cars. It began in 1977 as a conventional motoring magazine show. Over time, and especially since a relaunch in 2002, it has developed a quirky, humorous style...
(Series 12, Episode 6) by Jeremy Clarkson
Jeremy Clarkson
Jeremy Charles Robert Clarkson is an English broadcaster, journalist and writer who specialises in motoring. He is best known for his role on the BBC TV show Top Gear along with co-presenters Richard Hammond and James May...
who was road testing a Ford Fiesta 2008 whilst being chased by "Baddies" in a Chevrolet Corvette
Chevrolet Corvette
The Chevrolet Corvette is a sports car by the Chevrolet division of General Motors that has been produced in six generations. The first model, a convertible, was designed by Harley Earl and introduced at the GM Motorama in 1953 as a concept show car. Myron Scott is credited for naming the car after...
.