Oriental City

The lobby of Oriental City, around 1997

The Oriental City Food Court

Oriental City was a shopping centre in Colindale, London specialising in various oriental foods and items. It is located on Edgware Road, and the nearest London Underground station is Colindale tube station. It had a dedicated car park, and 2 floors. It is next door to Asda. The complex was closed for redevelopment on 1 June 2008, but no demolition or building work has yet taken place. An application for planning extension is currently being considered by the local authority, Brent Council. Between December 2009 and April 2011, a complex similar to Oriental City traded in Wembley Retail Park, called Pacific Plaza.

Shopping centre

Oriental City was previously a Yaohan Shopping Centre; after the Yaohan Corporation went bankrupt in the late 1990s, it was sold to Malaysian owners, which was when it was renamed Oriental City. Many locals and visitors still continued to refer to it as Yaohan Plaza.

Its address was: 399 Edgware Road, London, NW9 0JJ.

The centre contained a large oriental supermarket, now relocated to Bayswater, and a food court with a range of foods from different areas of South-East Asia; stalls offered Malaysian, Thai, Vietnamese, Chinese, Korean and Japanese foods including bento boxes and sushi, ramen noodles, and assorted Asian desserts. The food court was immensely popular with surrounding office workers and the North London community; and often became very crowded at weekends.

The food court was complemented by a number of oriental restaurants in the complex, with the majority of them located on the upper floor. The complex contained two Dim Sum restaurants, a Szechuan restaurant, and an 'all you can eat' restaurant. Outside, there was a durian stall and a satay stall.

Aside from the food outlets, the complex also contained a number of small shops and stalls. Over its history there was a high turnover of shops, with only one remaining original tenant in the facility, the Japanese tableware store, Utsuwa-No-Yataka. The centre also previously housed a shop selling video games and toys imported from Japan, a Sanrio boutique, and one of the largest Japanese bookshops in Europe, called Asahiya Shoten. These have been closed down since 2003. In the period shortly before the centre closed down, shoppers could find a tailor's shop, a jeweller, a hairdresser, a beauty shop, Chinese medicine shops, a martial arts store, and a large furniture store. Oriental City was also host to a Sega Dome arcade which has been a feature since the complex's opening in 1993. The arcade's outer façade was highly noticeable for the large picture of Sonic the Hedgehog attached to it, which had been on the complex since the early 1990s.

The centre was a focal point for the Oriental community, often hosting weeks which promoted the cultural identity of different South East Asian countries. These events typically consisted of various performing arts, and the promotion of that country's particular cuisine.

The original Yaohan Plaza also featured a small example of a traditional Japanese garden outside the centre, which was allowed to fall into disrepair after the change of ownership.

Proposed redevelopment

Facade along Edgware Road

Entrance

In November 2006, Oriental City was bought out by the developer Development Securities who planned to demolish the centre and replace it with a B&Q, a housing development and a primary school. The developers stated that there would be provisions for the current tenants of Oriental City to continue in the new development; however, the tenants objected to this, owing to the lack of consultation. Tenants also noted that the complex took up to 9 years to complete, and whilst Development Securities claimed any redevelopment would take 3 years, most tenants did not believe they could survive the temporary relocation of their businesses.^[1]

Aside from business considerations, the East Asian community feared any redevelopment would mean the loss of an important community focal point. The current tenants shut their businesses for a day to protest to the council at Brent Town Hall on 21 November 2006 feeling that they had been treated like 'second class citizens'.^[2] The tenants' plight was backed by a long-time visitor of the Centre, ex-Arsenal football player Ian Wright, who met the then London Mayor Ken Livingstone's planning officials in early December 2006 to object to the redevelopment plans.^[3]

In February 2007, the Chinese Consul-General wrote to London's mayor to express his "deep concern" about the project, calling for the proposal to be modified.^[4] This matter generated so much attention that it featured on an episode of Inside Out (London) broadcast on 23 March 2007 where Liu was featured. Finally, after a petition gathered several thousand signatures, in June 2007 it was announced that the campaign had been successful and Oriental City would remain open until at least May 2008.

Staff at Oriental City were told to close their businesses for good by 7:00 pm on Sunday 1 June 2008. Business activity was above usual during the day as thousands of people flocked to see Oriental City for the last time. Many shops had drastically reduced prices and bargains to tempt shoppers, with one shop even advertising a Buy One Get Two Free offer. The food court closed at 6:30 PM, followed shortly by other retailers in the complex before the doors were finally closed for the last time at 7:00 PM.

Some former occupants of Oriental City have reopened in new locations:

• Utsuwa-no-Yakata reopened under the new name Doki Ltd. at Pacific Plaza, Unit 16, the Junction, Wembley Retail Park, Engineers Way, Wembley HA9 0EG near Wembley Arena. This location has also closed down, in April 2011.
• The original Oriental City Supermarket reopened at a new location near Whiteley's in Queensway, Bayswater (26 Queensway

Bayswater, London W2 3RX)

• The Hamazaki Bakery announced that they were moving to 82 Totteridge Lane, N20 8GQ near Totteridge and Whetstone tube station.
• Another Japanese bakery called Tetote Factory, selling very similar products to Hamazaki Bakery, opened on December 5th 2009 at Pacific Plaza, Wembley (as above).
• The Koreana (former Oriental City Koreana) open take-away come restaurant is at 32 Headstone Drive, Harrow HA3 5QJ.
• Ferenggi Bay (formerly Oriental Garden) has opened close to Oriental City in the Hyde, Colindale (255 Edgware Road, NW9 6LU, next to Barclays Bank.
• Puji Puji (formerly the satay stall outside the Centre & next to the car park) has opened as a restaurant in Islington (122 Balls Pond Road, Islington, London, N1 4AE).
• Taste Malaysia (formerly the Roti Canai stall) has opened as a cafe in Willesden (32 High Road, Willesden Green, NW10 2QD).
• Wonderful Patisserie has opened a large new shop with cafe / restaurant on the ground floor of Hyde House, next to Homebase, on the Edgware Road at West Hendon, not far from Oriental City.

Since the closure, it has emerged that Development Securities were no longer planning to develop the site themselves. On July 31st 2008 they sold the site to a new developer, B & S Homes, for £68 million. The purchasers paid a £16 million deposit but were unable to find the £52 million required to complete their purchase. Their deposit has been lost, the building remains in the hands of Development Securities, and further progress in the prevailing economic climate looks unlikely. The building remains boarded up and derelict.^[5]

Since early 2009, there has been much talk amongst former tenants of a proposal to reopen the doors of Oriental City in its previous form later in the year. Discussions are understood to be taking place between the owners and former tenants, and any definite proposals will appear here in due course. In February 2010, former tenants of Oriental City held a protest at the site over the continued closure of the centre. A campaign to re-open the centre is underway soon.

References

1. ^ 'Asian traders protest over plans to demolish "Oriental City"', The Independent, 17 November 2006 [1] (accessed 19 November 2006)
2. ^ 'Campaign to save "'real Chinatown'"', BBC News, 17 November 2006 [2] (accessed 19 November 2006)
3. ^ 'Wright backs Oriental City fight', BBC News, 4 December 2006 [3] (accessed 6 December 2006)
4. ^ 'Beijing enters Oriental City row', BBC News, 8 February 2007 [4] (accessed 8 February 2007)
5. ^ ‘Oriental City deal collapses’, Property Week, 31 March 2009 [5] (accessed 19 August 2009)

See also

• Pacific Plaza
• Chinatown
• Wing Yip
• British Chinese

External links

• 399 Edgware Road
• Video of Oriental City Food Court taken 25.05.08
• Flickr group for photos and videos of Oriental City
• Route79's Flickr pictures of Oriental City
• 'Oriental City Agreement Reached', dimsum.co.uk
• 'Oriental City protest', dimsum.co.uk
• "Anger over continued closure of 'real Chinatown'" BBC article, February 2010
• "End of the road for 'real Chinatown'?", BBC article
• London Randomness Guide to Oriental City
• Early Look at Pacific Plaza, willeatformoney.blogspot.com
• Campaign & petition to re-open Oriental City

http://www.yell.com/reviews/oriental+city+supermarket-1g16x8a-r

Coordinates: 51°35′36″N 0°15′37″W / 51.59333°N 0.26028°W / 51.59333; -0.26028