Former Corby Aquascutum factory to be bulldozed to make way for new warehouse

The former Aquascutum factory in Princewood Road, Corby

The building was the workplace of many hundreds of people from Corby over the years

A new warehouse will be built on the site of the former Aquascutum factory on Corby’s Earlstrees Industrial estate Corby.

Chemical company Chemence occupied the Princewood Road building until 2019 but has been empty ever since and now the owners, London-based property investors Canmoor Developments want to bulldoze it. Permission for the scheme was granted in late summer by North Northamptonshire Council.

In its place will be a 13,000 sq m speculative warehouse for logistics or industrial use – triple the size of the current building.

Maria Hall, a former Aquascutum seamstress at work

It’s envisaged there could be up to 100 full and part-time jobs created. The developer will fund a scheme that will see each employee given a six-month bus Mega-rider ticket to encourage use of public transport.

Canmoor also currently have similar plans to develop the next-door former UK Greetings site which would be constructed alongside the new building on the Aquascutum site as a two-phase plan.

Many of Corby’s 1970s and 80s industrial buildings are facing the same fate as they are not tall enough to house modern machinery or cater for HGVs.

The Aquascutum site was first developed in 1974 after the ironstone quarry on the land was mothballed.

ET reporter Helen O'Neill interviews Rose McDonald on the day in 2012 when workers were told the Corby Aquascutum factory was to close

The up-market firm that clothed Winston Churchill and the Queen Mother had links with Northamptonshire going back for more than 100 years.

It opened its first factory in Kettering in 1909 to make clothing for its growing customer base in London.

King Edward VII was Aquascutum’s first Royal client and, in 1897, the company was granted a Royal warrant

Aquascutum has supplied aristocrats, political leaders and actors, including three Princes of Wales, Prince Rainier of Monaco, Baroness Thatcher, Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Sophia Loren, Cary Grant and Michael Caine. It was family-owned until 1990, when it was bought by Japanese textile conglomerate company Renown.

In 2008, Renown announced that it would sell Aquascutum, after three straight years of losses. In September 2009, the management team behind the revival of retailer Jaeger bought the company.

But in 2012, 115 workers at the Corby firm – some of whom had worked for Aquascutum for 40 years – were sacked with no notice when the company declared the site unviable after it went into administration.