Selfridges wins approval for private members' club
Selfridges, the department store chain owned by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund and Thailand's Central Group, won approval for a new private members' club at its flagship London outlet.
Westminster City Council approved an application to convert space currently used for staff offices into a membership venue with a terrace and private dining room. The proposal is part of a wider plan to launch a new 'exclusive new shopping and social destination for its most valued customers and members' on Duke Street in the spring, according to a filing.
London has seen a surge in high-end membership-only venues as affluent residents seek exclusive spaces, especially as flexible working has blurred the lines between professional and personal life. These venues have also become a strategy for real estate owners to generate more revenue from underutilized spaces.
Tuesday's council approval grants the owners the right to use the space as a members' club or for retail purposes for a period of 50 years, the filings show. The space is part of the SWOD building, which was built in the 1930s as an extension to the main classical building that faces Oxford Street, one of Europe's busiest shopping thoroughfares.
Saudi Arabia's PIF became a minority owner in privately held Selfridges last year after acquiring a 40% stake that had been owned by the Signa Group, the now-defunct real estate empire founded by Austrian Rene Benko.
The story of the store's founding in 1909 by US retailer Harry Gordon Selfridge was later adapted into the Mr Selfridge TV series starring Jeremy Piven. The roof gardens, which hosted fashion shows and crazy golf in the years after the opening, were destroyed in the Blitz in 1940. They remained closed for about 70 years before reopening in 2009 for an exclusive pop-up restaurant run by French chef Pierre Koffmann, according to one of the filings for the planning approval.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
France 24
20 hours ago
- France 24
PSG Club World Cup reunion with Messi recalls unhappier times
PSG's stunning 5-0 demolition of Inter Milan in Munich at the end of last month which allowed them to win the UEFA Champions League for the first time completed an incredible season for the Qatar-backed side under the coaching of Luis Enrique. It is no coincidence that PSG achieved their crowning glory in their first season after definitively shifting their focus away from signing superstar players to instead allow a brilliant coach to work with a hungry, dynamic young team. Kylian Mbappe's move a year ago to Real Madrid followed the departures in 2023 of Neymar, the world's most expensive signing when he joined in 2017, and Messi, in the same summer Luis Enrique was appointed. When PSG pounced in August 2021 to sign Messi after a cash-strapped Barcelona were unable to keep him, the French side logically thought the Argentinian could be the man to deliver elusive Champions League glory. Messi, who was 34 at the time, thought the same thing. "My dream is to win another Champions League and I think I am in the ideal place to have that chance and to do it," he said at his unveiling. Alas, it did not work out that way, either in Messi's first season in Paris, under compatriot Mauricio Pochettino in 2021/22, or in the next campaign under Christophe Galtier. PSG had got to the Champions League final and then semi-finals in the two seasons prior to Messi's arrival, so he looked like the final piece in the jigsaw. Instead they went backwards with him in the side, going out of Europe's elite club competition in the last 16 two years running. All is not forgiven Having to fit in Messi -- with his estimated annual salary of 30 million euros ($35.2 million) after tax -- as well as Neymar and Mbappe may have increased the star appeal, but it weakened them as a team. Towards the end the Barcelona legend was even being jeered by some sections of the PSG support who felt Messi's commitment to the cause was not what it should have been. Messi was a PSG player when he inspired Argentina to World Cup glory in Qatar in late 2022, but there were only flashes of his genius at club level in France. His statistics stand up to any scrutiny, with 32 goals and 35 assists in 75 appearances, and he did win two Ligue 1 titles while helping increase PSG's value as a brand. But one memorable quote by a columnist in French sports daily L'Equipe rather summed things up. "PSG have not been better than they were before because of he seemed to have as much desire to play in Ligue 1 as he did to go to the dentist," wrote Vincent Duluc. Fast forward two years and Messi is enjoying the twilight of his career in Major League Soccer with Inter Miami, the team he has helped to qualify for the knockout stage of this Club World Cup. Fate has therefore thrown up a last-16 showdown with PSG on Sunday in Atlanta, at the same stadium where he scored a marvellous free-kick to secure a 2-1 win over Porto last week. "All is not forgiven", said the front page of L'Equipe in France on Friday as it described the feelings of "failure and bitterness" left behind from the Argentine's spell there. Miami coach Javier Mascherano, meanwhile, believes the unhappy memory of his time in Paris could spur Messi on. "It's clear that for us it's better if he plays angry, because he's one of those players who, when he has something on his mind, gives an extra effort," Mascherano told ESPN. With Luis Enrique and PSG boasting big ambitions of adding a world title to their European crown, there would be even more bitterness felt if Messi -- days after his 38th birthday -- managed to knock them out on Sunday.
LeMonde
a day ago
- LeMonde
French debt surges to new record, but IMF intervention ruled out
French debt is rising, and rising very quickly. Despite the government's efforts, the freezing of certain funds and promises of massive savings, France's public debt increased by another €40.5 billion in just three months, reaching €3.346 trillion at the end of March, according to figures released on Thursday, June 26, by the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (INSEE,). In one year, the debt, described by Prime Minister François Bayrou as the country's public enemy number one, grew by €185 billion, or 6%. Could this massive debt burden soon force France under the supervision of Brussels, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF)? Could this troika impose an austerity plan on France, as happened to Greece in the 2010s when it was revealed the country had falsified its accounts and its budget deficit was three times higher than the official figure? For several weeks, the government has been wielding this dramatic threat as Bayrou prepares to unveil highly anticipated fiscal recovery measures, expected after July 14. "If we do not make these choices now, our creditors or the IMF will impose them on us," warned Public Accounts Minister Amélie de Montchalin in Le Journal du Dimanche on June 7. "This is the last moment to be courageous." De Montchalin hammered home the message again on radio station RTL on June 10: "There is a risk of being placed under the supervision of international institutions, European institutions or our creditors."
France 24
a day ago
- France 24
'We want to open a new chapter in German-French relations': Germany's Europe minister
While relations with France under the previous German government of Olaf Scholz were sometimes strained, Krichbaum suggests that things are changing under the new chancellor, Friedrich Merz. "It's no secret that we had different opinions between France and Germany in the past," Krichbaum says. "But the decisive point is that we have to finally find a consensus and to have an atmosphere of trust. And this, I think, is now the new dimension of French-German relations. We are not only opening a new page. We want to open a new chapter in German-French relations. But I think the instruments we have are sufficient. We don't need more common debts in Europe because the national states have a responsibility for their own national budgets." Krichbaum certainly does not exclude more European investment, but he says that "we should always take into account that we have to guarantee fair conditions between the generations. So that means not making more debts, more debts, more debts, but also thinking about the next generation, because this [debt] has to be paid back one day." On NATO and European defence, Krichbaum asserts that "Europe has to stay together; it has to define its own interest. And especially in defence politics." The German government is planning to invest "3.5 percent of GDP directly for defence, and 1.5 percent for infrastructure, which helps to achieve the goals we have in common. This is ambitious, and it cannot be reached within the next year or in 2027. But finally it's a target, and it should be achieved together. Germany did not realise the 2 percent targets a few years ago, but I think the challenges are enormously high, and without security, we can do nothing in the world, nothing in Europe and nothing in Germany." Recently, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Berlin not to supply Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine, while also saying that he is open to talking to the German chancellor. Krichbaum says that he personally was "always in favour of delivering Taurus, because it's necessary that Ukraine can defend itself. The United States wants to withdraw more and more from Ukraine because they concentrate more on the future on the Pacific. On China, Taiwan and the whole area. And so we have to concentrate on our task. And that means [supporting] Ukraine as a European country." He clarifies that no decision on Taurus has been made by the German government so far, but adds that "in the past we were transparent and so Putin could react because he knew at each stage what Europe will do next, what Germany will do next. And this transparency is not helpful". Finally, asked about Berlin's steadfast support for Israel and the US in the conflict with Iran, Krichbaum asserts: "Nobody can live in peace thinking that the [Iranian] mullah regime has a nuclear weapon. So I would dare to say that if it was possible to destroy all the plants, the enrichment plants in Iran, then I think this is a contribution to more security, not only for the region, but for the world. And now it is also necessary to find further solutions in negotiations."
