Marks & Spencer plan to knock down flagship Oxford Street retailer accredited

Marks & Spencer has won the battle to raze its flagship Oxford Street store.

Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner has approved the proposal after a three-year planning row. 

It is a big victory for chief executive Stuart Machin, who said the group would ‘move as fast as we can’ to redevelop the site.

M&S will now knock down its 1929 art deco flagship near Marble Arch in Central London and build a larger retail and office block in its place.

The High Street stalwart says a new site – which will include a cafe and gym – will support 2,000 jobs.

The decision had been seen as a test for Labour’s promises to support economic growth – which many businesses already feel were broken in October’s £40billion tax-raising Budget. 

Landmark: M&S’s flagship Art Deco store on Oxford Street will be replaced by a combined retail space and office blocks

And experts hope it will help Oxford Street turn a corner and vanquish the tacky sweet shops that now line the road.

Machin said: ‘I am delighted that, after three unnecessary years of delays, obfuscation and political posturing at its worst under the previous Government, our plans for Marble Arch, the only retail-led regeneration proposal on Oxford Street, have been approved. 

We can now get on with the job of helping to rejuvenate the UK’s premier shopping street through a flagship M&S store and office space, which will support 2,000 jobs and act as a global standard-bearer for sustainability.’

Machin, who has partnered with actress Sienna Miller to launch new ranges, added: ‘We share the Government’s ambition to breathe the life back into our cities and towns, and are pleased to see they are serious about getting Britain building and growing. We will now move as fast as we can.’

Former Housing Secretary Michael Gove blocked the plans last year.

The retailer won a High Court battle for an appeal in March – but this was then delayed by the General Election.

Dee Corsi, chief executive of the New West End Company, said the redevelopment ‘will help cement the West End’s status as a global destination for shoppers and office workers alike’.

But heritage campaigners dubbed it a ‘missed opportunity’ to rejuvenate the current building in a similar fashion to the Tate Modern or ‘the great Pennine textile mills’.

Style icon: M&S chief exec Stuart Machin with actress Sienna Miller whose collections for the High Street chain have been flying off the shelves

‘It is wilfully myopic not to see that the elegant M&S building could play a similar role in the story of Oxford Street, whose fortunes are already on the up,’ said Henrietta Billings, director Save Britain’s Heritage.

Some of Britain’s leading architects, including Grand Designs presenter Kevin McCloud, also opposed the plan.

Last year, Machin dubbed Gove’s decision ‘utterly pathetic’ and ‘senseless’. He accused the minister of taking ‘an anti-business approach, choking off growth and denying Oxford Street hundreds of thousands of new quality jobs’. 

M&S even threatened to abandon the shopping street in protest.

In her 144-page report, Rayner cited the verdict of the independent planning inspector, who warned that the loss of M&S would be likely to have ‘a severe harmful impact on the vitality and viability of the area’.

And she said there were ‘inescapable structural issues’ that would make refurbishing the old store ‘deeply problematic’.

Property lawyers said this decision would set the scene for future decisions over planning.