Victoria Gate

Victoria Gate is split into three parts: the arcade, the beacon-like John Lewis, and a multi-storey car park. The arcades’ curved plan form ensures that John Lewis and most shopfronts are visible from the western arcade entrance, and promotes an equality of both arcades, neither one more dominant than the other.

Each shop has centrally placed doors with radiused windows each side designed to give as much visibility to the window displays as possible. Frameless glass shopfronts create as much transparency as possible, with glazing flush from the sill to the top of the balcony balustrades. This is helped by the inherent structural stability of the curved glass units.

Internally, units have stud partition fire-rated party walls. To avoid an awkward meeting of partition and glass, a mirror-polished, stainless-steel-clad T-section was introduced that encapsulates fire boarding and is visually unobtrusive.