Bluewater

Bluewater is a large shopping centre on the edge of Dartford in Kent, built inside a former chalk quarry. It sits beside the M25 motorway and the A2, with open countryside just beyond its car parks. The site covers 240 acres and spreads over three levels, making it one of the biggest shopping centres in the country. Inside, 210 shops, fifty cafés and restaurants, and a seventeen-screen cinema draw over twenty-eight million visitors each year. Three anchor stores anchor the main malls, while the rest of the space is filled with fashion, technology and homeware retailers. The centre grew from a plan first put forward in the mid-1980s by entrepreneur Godfrey Bradman. After years of planning and construction, it opened in March 1999 under the leadership of developer Lendlease and its chief executive Peter Walichnowski. Major investors included Prudential, Barclays and Hermes, while John Lewis, House of Fraser and Marks & Spencer became the first big-name tenants. The whole project took eleven and a half million hours of work by twenty thousand people to complete. Inside, the triangular floor plan guides visitors past three main malls linked by wide walkways. The Plaza area holds restaurants and the Showcase cinema, while the Wintergarden food court offers a choice of quick meals. A leisure village on the lower level contains a trampoline park, adventure play area and extra cinema screens. Outside, the landscaped grounds include quiet corners and wide paths for short walks between shops and car parks.