Shops have opened at the redeveloped Elephant and Castle town centre, bringing a new retail destination to the site of the former shopping centre six years after it closed.
The Elephant, developed by Get Living in Southwark, welcomed visitors from Thursday 12 November. The opening brings a group of shops and cafés into use, although other parts of the wider scheme are still to come.
Among the new arrivals is a Marks & Spencer Foodhall on Ragstone Street. People queued before the doors opened, with the first customers offered free tote bags. The store has an in-store bakery, a flower section and a wine section, as well as a collection point for online fashion, home and beauty orders.
It brings the retailer back to the area after its previous Walworth Road store closed in 2024. The company says the new shop has created more than 60 jobs.
Mango, Oliver Bonas, Søstrene Grene, Superdrug, Starbucks and Pret are among the businesses reported to have opened at the destination. The November opening is an important stage of the project, but it is not the first commercial activity anywhere on the site: a Blank Street coffee shop opened earlier.
Homes, shops and public space
The redevelopment replaces the old covered centre with a town-centre scheme including shops, places to eat, rental homes and public space. Get Living describes it as a £500 million project.
The development includes 485 rental homes, of which 172 are described as affordable. Affordable housing covers different forms of rented accommodation; the description does not mean all of those homes are let at social rents.
Plans for the scheme include approximately 135,000 square feet of space for shops, dining and leisure, together with workspace. A public square and new streets are part of the development. Their long-term use, and the eventual mix of businesses, will become clearer as more of the project opens.
A free Urban Elephant Festival is advertised for Saturday 14 November, with art, music and dance planned across the new streets and spaces. It is one of the first public events planned around the opening.
The opening does not mean every element of the redevelopment is complete. A new London College of Communication building is scheduled to open in September 2027, while an improved Northern line entrance is also planned. Further development is proposed on the existing college site after the move.
What happened to former traders?
The former Elephant and Castle Shopping Centre opened in 1965 and closed in September 2020 before being demolished. Alongside larger shops, it housed independent traders, market stalls and Latin American cafés, giving local businesses a base and customers a place to meet.
Its closure prompted a long dispute about where those businesses could go and whether they would be able to afford to return. Local charity Latin Elephant says nearly 50 displaced traders were relocated immediately after the centre closed, while others were left without a space. Its figures describe the position around the closure and have changed as traders’ circumstances have changed.
In a joint statement shortly before closure, Southwark Council and the town-centre project team said all qualifying businesses had been relocated or offered options. They said the programme’s eligibility rules did not cover everyone trading through subleases or shared space. The charity has challenged the adequacy of the provision for displaced traders.
Restaurant owner Diana Sach said in July that she had hoped her business would be part of the new development, but that delays had made her uncertain whether that would happen. She said promises to find her restaurant a new home had not been honoured.
Get Living has said eligible independent traders from the former centre will be given priority when applying for discounted market-rent units at The Elephant. Priority for an application is not the same as a guarantee that every former trader will secure a suitable unit.
Residents at the opening expressed different views. One shopper welcomed the new M&S as an addition to the area. Another, who also visited the store, felt the changing mix of shops reflected a wider loss of local vendors and community character.
The first wave of shops is now open, but the question of how many independent businesses can establish themselves in the new centre remains separate from the opening itself.
