Five Ways Shopping Centre

Poor old Five Ways Shopping Centre — built in the early 60s this was originally designed as a traffic-​free piazza with ground floor retail spaces, an indoor market area, a car park on the second floor and the 10 storey Auchinleck House — a statue of Claude Auchinleck (a British army commander during World War II) still stands in the square but you won’t be able to look at it these days as the whole space is awaiting demolition. To be honest Five Ways Shopping Centre has always had a slightly derelict feel — during the winter the design of the place meant that it acted as a veritable wind tunnel and for years it hosted a weird array of shops that always seemed a bit empty — although I do miss the greasy spoon caff that was here which was all Formica work tops and unknowingly kitschy shaped sauce bottles. The only thing it houses now are a Select n Save (more on that later), a Boots and load of sad looking empty shops — not somewhere I’d recommend spending too much time in as it can get really dark down there but worth a quick peek.

Grim. The fact that from above it looks like a giant coffin pretty much sums it up. The Five Ways Shopping Centre is now almost completely abandoned, waiting for a natural disaster to come and wipe it off the earth.
It sits sadly on a corner, a run down miserable old concrete block acting as a full stop to the overbearing neon and orange spray tan smell of Broad Street. I can’t imagine a reason, that anyone would want to visit. There might be a little nostalgia, maybe your favourite newsagent was there… you was a massive fan of that particular Braggs bakery that was there in the late 80’s?
There was an urban legend that the architect who designed it made it in the shape of a coffin then jumped off the top, providing a suicide/​funeral all in one. Maybe they could turn it into some kind of spooky theme park.