Princesshay stands as a unique case of a city shopping center without a single unified architectural shell. Instead, it is comprised of a series of streets, passages and buildings all owned by a single real estate corporation. This represents a challenge in terms of delimiting the scheme within the city center. Practically speaking how can customers identify where it starts and ends?

In 2013, the center’s owners decided to launch a refurbishment scheme to bring customers back to their shopping destination. This was highly supported by the city council of Exeter who was also concerned by the impact of the decreasing mall visits on the city as a whole.

Princesshay hired Rawls to support them in their refurbishment efforts. A new brand identity exercise had already been completed. In a first instance, we were tasked to consider how to implement and strengthen this new brand identity throughout the architectural scope. A key focus was to more clearly delimit and brand the scheme. We were also asked to review the below 3 areas to create improvements to the physical environment of the centre, as well as identify other potential opportunities for enhancement to the customer experience:

• • Directional signage – wayfinding to and within the scheme + tenant signage
  • Commercialisation opportunities
  • Additional external improvements

An additional challenge to the scope was the presence of a few listed medieval features within the site.

I personally oversaw the work on this project, leading a team of architecture, interior design and graphic design colleagues. I first visited the site to conduct a thorough photographic audit. This allowed us to identify key areas of focus for the refurbishment. We then prepared a first presentation with our observations and some initial design intentions. Through the following months we went through a series of updates to this scheme. I was myself in direct contact with the city’s urban planners to discuss the feasibility of our proposals. One specific entrance required a total of ten proposals prior to their sign off.

With this preparation work behind us, I then oversaw the preparation of the final detail design presentation in view of costing and implementation. Though a particularly complex scheme, our team’s incredible collaborative work rendered the entire process particularly smooth, and I am particularly proud to have had an instrumental role in overseeing it.