The Evening Standard has got both geography and history mixed up with its article on Saatchi & Saatchi’s forthcoming departure from Charlotte Street.
In a feature on its business pages today Fitzrovia’s most famous advertising agency is reported as about “to move east from Soho to a new landmark office on the former site of the celebrated Turnmills nightclub”.
Reporter Gideon Spanier goes on to describe Turnmills as a “historic Victorian railway building that became the centre of the 1990s dance music boom when it attracted DJs such as Fat Boy Slim and the Chemical Brothers”.
Spanier explains that Saatchi’s owners Publicis Groupe leased Turnmills and a site in Chancery Lane “last year in a deal with landlord Derwent, owner of Saatchi & Saatchi’s base on Soho’s Charlotte Street, which is being redeveloped”.
Aside from the fact that Charlotte Street is in Fitzrovia, not Soho, the Standard seems to have forgotten that the historic Turnmill building, built in the late 19th century — and one-time venue of the famous nightclub — was demolished by owners Derwent London and replaced with a modern office block.
Derwent London won’t want to be reminded of the battle they did with conservationists in Clerkenwell and Farringdon.
Derwent also created the Fitzrovia Business Improvement District to promote Fitzrovia as a location of choice. Despite its huge marketing budget The Fitzrovia BID is not getting the message across very clearly.
The same article is repeated in The Independent.