{"id":969094,"date":"2026-05-18T16:22:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-18T16:22:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/969094\/"},"modified":"2026-05-18T16:22:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-18T16:22:14","slug":"armley-new-shop-plan-could-replace-mural","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/969094\/","title":{"rendered":"Armley: New shop plan could replace mural"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"has-text-align-right\"><strong>By John Baron<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Plans for a new shopfront and roller shutters on Armley Town Street could replace Armley\u2019s \u2018hippo\u2019 mural.<\/p>\n<p>Proposals submitted to Leeds City Council by applicant Iftakar Ali are based at an empty retail unit on Town Street, at the junction with Branch Road.<\/p>\n<p>A design statement submitted with the application said:\u00a0\u201cThe retail unit is currently vacant and has been for six months prior. The landlord is having difficulty in re-letting the unit in its current form, however has interest from tenants requiring smaller units with a more favourable rent due to the current economic climate. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe unit is proposed to be split in two, allowing small business start-ups to take advantage of lower rents. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe proposed shopfront is to be of a traditional design constructed in timber with raised mouldings in order to enhance the historic significance of the Armley conservation area.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The statement says the proposal would \u2018remove an obtrusive mural, and offer a much more attractive shopfront with traditional features and attract more variation of small businesses\u2019.<\/p>\n<p>WLD <a href=\"https:\/\/westleedsdispatch.com\/why-the-hippo-that-time-forgot-is-at-centre-of-armley-town-street-mural\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">reported in 2019<\/a> how Armley\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/westleedsdispatch.com\/introducing-the-armley-hippo\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">famous hippos\u00a0<\/a>were brought to life in a mural at the junction of Armley Town Street and Branch Road.<\/p>\n<p>The hippo on the colourful artwork refers to the hippo bones from four animals found in 1851 at the site where Armley Gyratory now sits.\u00a0The mural was the work of Leeds-based <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kingmonk.com\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">King Monk Studio<\/a>, who were supported by Butt Lane McDonalds, Amber Cars, Krol Mini Market and Leeds City Council.<\/p>\n<p>WLD <a href=\"https:\/\/westleedsdispatch.com\/armley-shopfront-and-shutters-plan-refused-by-council\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">reported in March<\/a> that plans for a new shopfront and the installation of external roller shutters were refused by council planners.<\/p>\n<p>Sponsored content<\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"645\" height=\"900\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Screenshot-2024-10-31-at-19.08.56-645x900.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-164819\"  \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.bramleybaths.co.uk\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">www.bramleybaths.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By John Baron Plans for a new shopfront and roller shutters on Armley Town Street could replace Armley\u2019s&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":969095,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[8814],"tags":[81952,213617,270518,748,393,4884,1860,46943,16,15],"class_list":["post-969094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-leeds","tag-armley","tag-armley-town-street","tag-branch-road","tag-britain","tag-england","tag-great-britain","tag-leeds","tag-planning-application","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116596504341313821","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/969094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=969094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/969094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/969095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=969094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=969094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=969094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}