The Silver Arcade

The Silver Arcade is a historic Victorian shopping complex in the heart of Leicester City Centre. When I first arrived in Leicester, more than thirty years ago, it was one of my favourite places in the City. Like the other arcades, it is a kind of covered footpath between streets.  It has two limbs, one running between the Market Place and Cank Street, and the other between  Cank Street and Silver Street, which is the main one. The main Silver Arcade is more ambitious than the nearby Royal or Odeon Arcades, it has four floors of gallery shops surrounding the open centre, where a large skylight provides illumination.

            It was closed for business, except for the ground floor, in 2000. All the quirky little shops were evicted, and many ceased trading. They had been unique little one-person businesses for the most part, taking advantage of the very low rents the Arcade charged. They sold all sorts of strange products, creating a kind of alternative shopping reality perched in the air, almost resembling a Himalayan temple.

            Access was gained either by the tiny, dimly-lit,  creaking lift, or the rather steep and bleak stairs. It was like a museum of Victoriana, popular mostly with the younger people who could face the staircase. There were unusual views over the rooftops of the city from the staircase windows. It was fun to look down from the balconies and watch people passing beneath, or browse all the odd little shops with their quaint contents. Many were so small you could examine their entire stock without needing to go in. Others were like caverns needing to be explored, like the Black Cat Bookshop, one of my favourite haunts. You could obtain tantalising glimpses of the ones on the upper floors by peering up through the railings. Signs hung down on cables trying to lure you upstairs, rather like an Eastern bazaar.

            Suddenly it was rudely shut by a new owner, who wanted to smash out the interior and modernise it. A public petition could not save the place, and part of Leicester's heritage died. The City Council denied permission for the new owner's plans, and it has been derelict ever since.

            Now, however, redevelopment has commenced, at an asserted cost of three million pounds. Workmen are busy smashing away, putting in new lifts and toilets. There are plans for a top-floor restaurant, and other new facilities. This is welcome news, but the reality is that we will not see the old Arcade again. What replaces it will have to be very much more upmarket in order to recover the redevelopment cost. It will be yuppy and chi-chi and expensive. Once historic things are vandalised, there is no reversing it. The past is a different country, and you can never go back.