The Brunswick Centre

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About The Brunswick Centre

August 2006

The Brunswick is shaping up to be something much better than I Thought. I think some of us (ok, *me*) get ridiculously entangled in the romance of decaying things that the very idea of rennovation is enough to trigger a panic attack.

Yes, the from the moment the Starbucks opened, it seemed to be already populated with a throng of people (maybe like the pre-fab interiors they have pre-fabricated customers already installed?) and that's annoying, but the Brunswick itself is looking beautiful and even I can't deny it. Granted, it would have been quite helpful if they'd used a little of the space for some kind of community project, but seeing the structure gleaming white in the sun dazzles me so much, that the rays filtering through my visual cortex bounce around all the parts of my brain and leave no room for negativity.

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March 2006:

On a Saturday in April last year I went to Morrison's in the Brunswick Centre. A sign outside said that it would be closed within days. Inside the shop, staff were caught in an atmosphere of confusion - they'd only been told that morning. I'd not been paying great attention to the scaffolding inside the Brunswick's courtyard - I just thought a little rennovation was occuring to tidy the place up. Clearly it was more than just a quick clean.

A week later a leaflet came through our letterbox stating the proposed plans for the Centre's re-development - a Starbucks, a Nandos, a French Connection. It seemed pretty superflous but it stupidly didn't occur to me then to go and document what was happening - I was just quite happy that I was going to live near a Waitrose. Walking through the Centre now, it's really hit me that the Brunswick is changing from that eerily hushed space to just another high street. And I don't have any pictures of what it used to be like. So please, if you have shots of the old Brunswick, the developing Brunswick - anything to do with it - just post them here.