The St James Centre will cease to trade next month, closing a 40-year chapter in our collective story of shopping, eating, parking, flirting and petty pilfering on the inside of a Brutalist landmark.
The lovely people who manage the area are waving goodbye with a three-day event starting tomorrow, at which members of the public will be encouraged to share their memories.
I, for example, will recall the excruciating temper tantrums thrown here while visiting with my small children back in the 1990s; how they would try to calm me down with offers of chocolate, or walk away and pretend to be interested in a nearby window display.
The all-pervading smell of burnt tomatoes in recent years?
Or the bets we’d place on how long the latest venture on Death Row (beside the lift and cashpoint) would last before ruin?
And what of the Christmas queues in the Post Office?
Collecting photo prints from the far end of Boots?
The riffle of new jotters bought in Ryman’s?
Overseas news on the stand outside McColl’s?
What of the cheeky shortcut through H. Samuel’s corner? What of the overheated toilet cubicles of doom? (So many went, so few returned.)
Soon, it will all be dust.
Tomorrow’s event, though, is not exclusively about nostalgia. The organisers say it’s also a chance to look forward.
Plans will be displayed showing the phoenix-like St James Quarter, due to rise out of the asbestos over the next four years and bring untold hope, joy, purpose, riches and spiritual fulfilment to the capital’s East End and beyond. We can hardly wait.—AM
If you have pictures, stories and memories of the St James Centre, New St Andrew’s House or surrounding area, and are sure you can share them without getting arrested, do so by emailing hello@edinburghstjames.com.
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@theSpurtle Can I put a bet on somewhere that first shop won't open till at least 2024? Chances are developer will go bust as is usal in EDI
@theSpurtle D'you think there's ANY chance they'd let us take photos for the last few days, for history's sake? Been trying for so long...
Goodbye, farewell, good riddance.
not forgetting there remain some concerns that not all the land required for new centre has in fact been acquired
David Cameron @Notthatdavidcam
@theSpurtle spent 5 days surveying the whole place a while ago. Great views from the roofs & the basements were an interesting place!
@Notthatdavidcam Did you come across an unmapped tunnel or underground bunker? There are rumours of Cold War 'trips downstairs' in Broughton
@theSpurtle Just never ending corridors, stairwells and entering into the blinding light in unexpected locations. Cold War feeling tho!
Broughton Spurtle @theSpurtle
@Notthatdavidcam I sense you're not going to 'fess up to the crash-damaged UFO down there, or the alien incubation facility either. #coverup
@theSpurtle no, otherwise I will suffer at the hands of our new insect overlords
Just as we thought. Thank you. That's May issue's front page sorted.
@theSpurtle didn't (the then) Sir Fred have RBS buy the place up in the late 90s with plans to knock through to 36 St. Andrew Square?
@cocteautriplets it really is not clear that all the land acquisitions necessary have been completed. @theSpurtle
@CityCycling@theSpurtle I think RBS found that out too...
@cocteautriplets@theSpurtle@Ian_Fraser its going to cause hassle...and I see a great big hole sitting in Central Edinburgh
@CityCycling @theSpurtle yaha! http://www.ianfraser.org/freds-new-fawlty-towers/ …, thon @Ian_Fraser wrote about this 16 years ago.
@cocteautriplets @CityCycling @theSpurtle good God was it really 16 years ago!
@cocteautriplets @CityCycling @theSpurtle one problem with that plan was RBS intended to keep Mall intact - only rebuild the office bidg
@cocteautriplets @CityCycling @theSpurtle it caused disputes over risk & RBS security were terrified about having a public Mall under the HQ
papa was a rodeo @papawasarodeo
@ArchHist @cocteautriplets @theSpurtle that sounds deliciously apocalyptic.
@cocteautriplets @theSpurtle a key point of my @DocomomoScot talk: ultimately impossible for RBS because of different ownership. But...
@cocteautriplets @theSpurtle ... What happens if need to redevelop in future with >250 different owners? Houses on top of redundant shops?
Lizzie Rynne @CityCycling
@ArchHist but surely one measure of a vibrant city is many different owners. And finely grained mixed uses@cocteautriplets @theSpurtle
Tom Parnell @ArchHist
@CityCycling @theSpurtle @cocteautriplets yes, but not as a single megastructure.
@ArchHist no. Precisely. Why do we want a megastructure in the middle of our city? Probably with semi privatised space too. @theSpurtle
@ArchHist @theSpurtle @cocteautriplets Same as Edinburgh council did this time - compulsay purchase. Cheerio goodbye
@Ian_Fraser @CityCycling @theSpurtle I had a (now retired) colleague from the RBS security side. He had "stories" about that place
@Ian_Fraser @CityCycling @theSpurtle most of which I've now forgotten. Apart from his morbid fear of risk of shared boiler and plant rooms
@theSpurtle as student I was security guard at St James. Grey troosers, white/red stripe shirt (pink at distance!), blue/yellow clip tie...
Hmm. Nice. Sounds like projectile vomit designed by Next.
Cal Daniels I vividly remember discovering the Jewel in the St James Crown...the top floor women's loos in John Lewis, the nearest thing to luxury after years of using the lower ones!