Looking at the area now, it is hard to imagine that Leicester’s St Martin’s Square was once a row of boarded-up shops awaiting demolition. And if it was not for a “visionary” city planner, the area that is known today for its vibrant atmosphere and multitude of independent shops, bars, cafes and restaurants could instead be a multi-storey car park.
The St Martin’s area of Leicester was redeveloped in the 1980s and St Martin’s Square was built in 1984. Early shops included Benetton, the Sweater Shop, Naf Naf, Rockaboom, Limeys clothes shop and Poachers Cookshop. Joe Rigotonis was a well known Italian restaurant and customers could stop for a drink at the 39 Steps.
But that was not always the plan for the area. LeicestershireLive spoke to city mayor Sir Peter Soulsby about the development. He told us that the then city council had invested in property in the Loseby Lane and Cank Street area of the city in the early 1970s, with the intention of knocking down many of the historic buildings.
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“It’s astonishing to think of it now, but they boarded them up with the intention of knocking those wonderful buildings down and creating a multi-storey car park,” Sir Peter said. “Nobody would dream of contemplating it now, but they bought them up with that intention.
“And, of course, at that time, most of Loseby Lane and Cank Street, the actual shops themselves, were empty and semi-derelict. But what the then – very visionary – city planning officer John Dean saw really was that first of all, we had enormous quality in those buildings, something very special to Leicester, and they needed to be saved.
St Martin’s, Leicester, in 1981, before the area was redeveloped
“But also that behind them, in what were their backyards and back gardens, there was a combination of space that could be made developable. And on what he described, I think, as the backland behind Loseby Lane and Cank Street and Silver Street, he pulled together a very large plot and put it forward as a proposal [for what became St Martin’s Square], inviting private developers to come in. And they got a lot of interest.”
St Martins area prior to development. Picture taken February 1981
(Image: Leicester City Council)
“And what I remember most particularly from the people who did take it on – which was a company called Teesland Properties, who had the backing of the Bass Breweries pension fund – what they were very determined to do was to make St Martin’s something that went with the grain of the surrounding streets.” The chosen layout and buildings were designed by architects Nicol Thomas Viner Barnwell, which incorporated the old buildings into the new development.
St Martins development. Picture taken April 1984
(Image: Leicester City Council)
“If an ordinary shopper goes in there, it’s only if you point out to them that some of the buildings in there are 20th Century and some of them were built a century-and-a-half earlier [that] they begin to notice that some of it actually is comparatively new and some of it is original, because they built the whole of the St Martin’s area, the inward-facing part of it, as it were, from scratch, but blended it in with the surrounding buildings,” said Sir Peter. “John Dean really was a remarkable planner, and it really was visionary.”
St Martins Square. Picture taken June 1988
(Image: Leicester City Council)
St Martin’s was opened in the early 1980’s, “I think by the then chair of the planning committee, Derek Fry”, said the mayor. “There used to be a plaque just on the archway as you go into St Martin’s that commemorated the opening”, he added, but said “the current owners, Shearer Property Group, have raised that arch quite considerably so that it’s less of a visible barrier going in there”.
St Martins Square in Leicester
(Image: Peter Fothergill)
The city council owned St Martin’s Square until 2016, when it was sold to Shearer Property Group. In October 2020, managing director Guy Shearer said: “When we purchased St Martin’s Square in 2016, we were very impressed with the city’s ambitious regeneration proposals for this part of Leicester. The vision, spearheaded by the city mayor, encouraged us to invest significant time and funds into reinstating St Martin’s Square as a vibrant quarter for a variety of independent and artisan businesses.”
The square is today home to Giggling Squid, Crafty, St Martin’s Coffee, Kai, Gelato Village, Bodega, Mowgli, among others, and, along with nearby St Martin’s, Loseby Lane and Cank Street, known as The Lanes, is a focus for people who are looking for something more than the big high street names.
Sir Peter said: “Shearers, I think, have been enormously successful at revitalizing St Martin’s Square, and they’ve been very selective about the tenants that they’ve brought in there.
“And now, of course, if you go in there in the evenings, it’s a wonderful place to go and eat.”
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