Islington Green is a perfectly nice bit of London and has relatively little to do with Cardiff – with the notable exception of a group of people very frustrated at the actions of a company founded by Cardiff City’s owner Vincent Tan.
In 2012 the subsidiary of Berjaya – a company Tan founded and spent time as executive chairman of – purchased a sizeable site on the corner of the green. A glance back through the years shows planning permission for an impressive transformation of the site in the form of a theatre nestled within a block of flats with retail units running the length of the ground floor.
In these images the entrance is framed by two grand green columns, fluorescent lighting, and posters beside and above a wide walkway. Now a visit to the site – known as Collins Theatre – shows several boarded-up shopfronts and not much else. The flats are occupied but the grand entrance is blocked off by a plain grey sheet.
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The shell of a theatre is in there somewhere but there has been no real movement on its use in nearly five years. Now residents are calling for it to be completed – or at the very least for the six empty retail units to be brought into use for the community. For the latest Welsh news delivered to your inbox sign up to our newsletter.
The site is owned by Berjaya UK Investment and Development, a subsidiary of the Berjaya Corporation Vincent Tan founded. Tan stepped down as executive chairman of Berjaya Corporation but, local media reported, would be “still very much involved with the group and its business activities”. His son U-Peng Tan is listed on Companies House as an active director of the UK Investment and Development arm responsible for the Islington development.
Eric Sorensen, chair of local civic society Angel Association, told WalesOnline: “This is quite a prominent part of Angel town centre. These shops have never opened and they’ve been boarded up for quite a long time. They look unsightly and they do nothing to animate the town centre or make it a good and cheerful place.
“We want them brought into use one way or another even with meanwhile or temporary uses – whatever to get rid of this current eyesore. I’m sure it would be used though there are quite a few local theatres in the area so I couldn’t fairly say that the one thing we’re crying out for is another theatre.
“Nevertheless that space could be used for a lot of community-based and commercial activities. All we want is the thing properly sorted out – particularly the shop units that we see every day opened and used.”
Mr Sorensen said the Angel Association had “never” been confident that the theatre would be fitted out nor the basement used and the shops opened. A council spokesman said they were sympathetic with residents’ concerns but were “unable to force” Berjaya to fill the space.
A document submitted on behalf of Berjaya in a 2018 planning appeal details the history of the site. Planning permission was first granted in 2002 for its development by then-owners Fairbriar. It included a 600-seat theatre, 72 flats, and 950sq m of retail floorspace. The flats were completed and occupied with the shell of the theatre built but never opened.
A clause of a Section 106 agreement at the time prevented more than 85% of the flats from being occupied before the theatre was in use but due to “complications” in opening it the developers were allowed to occupy all units without it opening. At that time the fitting out of the theatre was estimated at a cost of £2.17m. Support award-winning journalism with WalesOnline’s Premium app on Apple or Android.
Berjaya UK Investment and Development purchased the site in 2012. In 2013 it submitted a non-material amendment to allow the site’s use as a theatre but later withdrew this. In 2015 Berjaya submitted another application to adapt the space for a theatre operator to take it on, including the addition of two smaller theatre spaces, and this was approved in 2016 but, the document says, discussions with an operator “never came to fruition” and the application was never implemented.
In April 2018 Berjaya put in an application to reduce the size of the theatre from 600 to 514 seats, use the basement space for the commercial units, and increase the range of uses for the ground-floor units. This dragged on for several months due to a dispute over a revised Section 106 agreement and Berjaya lodged an appeal for non-determination. It withdrew this appeal in 2019 after lengthy discussions.
Since then the theatre and retail units have sat empty and the building – except for the flats – is a shell. In 2023 members of five Islington-based civic societies wrote to Vincent Tan urging him to seek an agreement with the council on the theatre’s future and said: “Islington Green is a beautiful, much-loved, and central part of our neighbourhood… The people of Islington must live with this unsightly view at the heart of our community, seemingly with no resolution in sight.”
A spokesman for Islington Council said: “We are sympathetic with the views of local residents and share their concerns about the empty retail units and theatre. We have made numerous attempts to encourage the owner to work with an operator to fill the space and retail units but without success and we are unable to force the owner to do this.” Berjaya has been contacted for comment.