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For the second time in the space of a month, plans to open a new outlet on Preston’s Deepdale Shopping Park are shrouded in mystery.
An application has been lodged with Preston City Council for permission to carry out work on the vacant unit that used to be occupied by the Outfit clothing chain.
However, the proposal has been submitted in the name of a firm identified only as “Preston Retail Limited” – giving no clue as to the identity of the brand hoping to join the line-up of stores at the Blackpool Road site.
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The premises – in between Next and Boots – is just two doors down from the former Game branch which was last month the subject of an application in the same name.
According to a Companies House listing, Preston Retail Limited is based on the Isle of Man and was established in 2022. Business website Endole states that it has fewer than 10 employees and a turnover of less than £632,000.
The proposal for the ex-Outfit plot involves reinstating a mezzanine floor that was removed when the chain’s parent company, Arcadia, went bust in 2021.
All 21 of the brand’s UK stores – which brought together big high street fashion names like Topshop, Burton and Dorothy Perkins – closed down and the Deepdale outlet has remained empty ever since.
The Local Democracy Reporting Service approached the agent for the application, London-based Montagu Evans, for details about the retailer seeking to move onto the site, but did not receive a response.
In documents submitted as part of the planning process, the firm states that reinstatement of the upper floor will “support the re-occupation of the vacant unit by an incoming tenant” and enable it to “return to a productive economic use”.
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