Bon Accord & St Nicholas

The Bon Accord & St Nicholas Shopping Centres are together the second-largest shopping centre complex in Aberdeen, Scotland and serve a large catchment area including the city and surrounding Aberdeenshire. The shopping centres were originally two separate entities, St. Nicholas Shopping Centre and Bon Accord Shopping Centre, and since opening (in 1985 and 1990 respectively) they have formed one of the most dense retailing areas in Aberdeen.The centre is split into two buildings which effectively join the shopping streets of George Street and Union Street. It has altogether three floors extending to 630000sqft. Parking is attached with around 1700 spaces. The Bon Accord centre was built in a serpentine shape to maximize shop unit frontage and is covered by a barrel vaulted glazed roof with a 90ft high glazed dome. The St. Nicholas has a more dated, straight-through design with a mostly concrete urban open space on its roof, along with little-used first-floor entrances to some of the businesses.Many significant brands have been residents of the centres, such as C&A, Primark, and Woolworths with competition particularly increased with the opening of the nearby Union Square Shopping Centre in October 2009. St Nicholas & Bon Accord added several stores in 2009,2010 & 2011, including many brands not previously present in Aberdeen, and has projected expansion of its site.Improvement plansThere are plans to make large improvements in forthcoming years as part of the Aberdeen Masterplan. The plan in the long term for the St Nicholas & Bon Accord Centres is to transform the first floor of St Nicholas into covered retail space, and a second floor with a food terrace. Meanwhile the Bon Accord Centre will be extended across Loch Street to join onto the existing John Lewis department store (in the former Northern Co-operative Society "ziggurat" building, already linked by a covered footbridge). The revised centre will offer double-height retail units which are favoured by some retailers. There has also been a suggestion of expansion into premises formerly part of the University of Aberdeen Students' Union building.