Visitors to a shopping mall being built on the site of Wan Chai's 'Wedding Card Street' are unlikely to find any of the traditional wedding card printers forced out by redevelopment, but big jewellery and cosmetics brands will be well represented.
The redevelopment, by a Hopewell Holdings-Sino Land joint venture is more likely to feature a variety of shops, according to a developer in charge of the project.
Under a deal with the Urban Renewal Authority (URA), the development was required to allocate 25 per cent of its floor space in the new mall to wedding-related shops and services, but it is reconsidering the tenant mix.
The wedding theme was adopted to mark the street's distinctive history as a hub of workshops printing traditional wedding cards. The street, officially called Lee Tung Street, was cleared for renewal after months of bitter campaigning by conservation activists in 2007.
After that, the URA said the mall would house shops offering goods and services such as wedding gowns, flowers, cakes, jewellery, limousine rentals and wedding planning, and hair salons, and would give priority to the printers who were forced out.
But William Wong Wing-lam, executive director of Hopewell, said yesterday the company had a broader view of the theme. 'Many things have something to do with weddings. Jewellery shops or cosmetics shops ... Wouldn't you say they are relevant? Brides do wear make-up and jewellery,' Wong said.