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Photo: No machine-readable author provided. Jungpionier assumed (based on copyright claims)., CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
When the Victorian civic authorities sought to improve the sights and foul smells of Briggate and the city centre, they demolished some of the city's dirtiest yards, alleyways, shambles and lanes and built covered shopping arcades filled with fine establishments. These catered for the refined tastes of the growing moneyed classes of Leeds. This rebuilding continued into Edwardian times and the legacy is some of Europe's finest, most elegant shopping locations. Today these arcades are home to some of the most exclusive designer shops in Great Britain (Vivienne Westwood, Hugo Boss, Luis Vuitton and Harvey Nichols to name a few).
Victoria Leeds is a shopping district and leisure area in central Leeds, comprising the 1990 Victoria Quarter, an arcaded complex of restored 19th-century and contemporary shopping arcades, and the 2016 Victoria Gate development. Notable for its role in the regeneration of Leeds' city centre, and a programme of restoration and reuse which included commissioning the largest work of stained glass work in Europe, designed by artist Brian Clarke, to cover the newly pedestrianised Queen Victoria Street, the 1990 scheme created a covered retail district of linked arcades. In 2016, the Victoria Quarter was merged with the newly built Victoria Gate complex to form the largest premium retail and leisure venue in Northern England. The district includes a casino and major stores such as Harvey Nichols and John Lewis and Partners.
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World famous and has even had Charlie Chaplin tread the boards. Home to a mix of shows.
This traditional British market is the largest in Europe. Housed in an opulent late Victorian palace to commerce, it has both indoor and outdoor stalls. Marks and Spencer had their first establishment here called, 'Marks Penny Bazaar'.
Major shows (often straight from the West End); also this is the home of the world famous (and extraordinarily good) Opera North who perform a wide repertoire of operas and operettas.
Hidden away within peaceful gardens lies this true gem, built just before the English Civil War, it has beautiful ornate woodwork in its charming interior, and architecturally it is an extremely rare example of a 17th-century double nave design.
Shopping in surroundings to rival any of Leeds' fine arcades. Located just to the south of Kirkgate markets on Vicar Lane. Designed by Cuthbert Broderick and architecturally based on the Paris corn exchange. A largely elliptical building, crowned with a great glass dome roof, that allows light to stream in even on the greyest Yorkshire winter mornings - necessary because grain traders required good lighting to determine the quality of the grain. (Broderick was also architect of Leeds town hall and the Leeds Mechanics' Institute, Millennium Square, Two shops designed by Broderick still survive opposite the Mechanics Institute on Cookridge Street, now converted into a cocktail bar.)