Prompted by its imminent closure, Wales Online's Will Hayward has written a spirited defence of Cardiff's Castle Emporium as "a great example of what makes the Welsh capital great - quirky, imaginative, warm, creative and a bit weird". As he suggests, its demise is symptomatic of a grim general drift towards homogenisation that has also seen the death - and, in the case of Gwdihw, the physical obliteration - of several of the city's music venues. Corporates and "endless student flats that look like they were designed by a depressed six year old from the Soviet Union" take their place.
Admittedly, this trend towards a characterless, identikit city is not something experienced only here in Cardiff; on the contrary, it's a national and indeed global issue. But the local authorities don't have to just stand by passively and let it happen - and they shouldn't. Much more could be done to protect independent businesses from the corrosive effects of globalisation and corporate creep.
In the short term, Hayward argues, Cardiff Council "should be busting a gut to help these independents to find new homes". There's certainly no shortage of vacant premises, especially on Queen Street but even in the flagship shopping mall St David's Two - proof that the strategy of shamelessly courting fickle national and international chains often doesn't pay off.
In the longer term, Hayward rightly points out that there needs to be an acknowledgement that people will only travel into the centre of town if there's a good reason to do so - and that work and big-brand shopping exert even less of a pull now than they did pre-pandemic. Ultimately, that means giving much greater attention to what makes a city attractive and then actually doing something about it.
Hardly rocket science, is it?
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