Selfridges, AKA Selfridges & Co, is a chain of high end department stores in the United Kingdom. It was founded by Harry Gordon Selfridge. The flagship store in London’s Oxford Street is the second largest shop in the UK (after Harrods) and opened on the 15th March 1909.
More recently, three other stores have been opened; in Trafford, Greater Manchester (1998), in Manchester City Centre’s Exchange Square (2002) and in the Bullring, Birmingham (2003). Until 1990, the store belonged to Liverpool’s now-defunct Lewis’s retail group. Today it belongs to the Weston family.
Selfridge’s stores are known for their architectural excellence and are tourist destinations in their own right. The Trafford store is noted for its use of stone and marble and for the exterior which strikingly resembles the London store. Each of the five floors of the Exchange Square store in central Manchester were designed by a different architect and has its own look and feel.
