Bridalwear firm sees bright future for culture city as it opens store

ENTREPRENEURS HAVE said Hull’s City of Culture year is bringing a wave of new enterprise as the showpiece arts event notched up another milestone in visitor numbers.

The owners of a bridalwear store in City Exchange opposite the Guildhall said they see a bright future for Hull in the wake of the investment in the City of Culture year.

Wed2B opens the doors to its 20th store and its first in East Yorkshire today in a 6,000 sq ft ground floor space in the recently redeveloped and historic building.

The start of the year-long arts programme has already seen 350,000 people attend the opening event while the Ferens Art Gallery, which re-opened five weeks ago, yesterday welcomed its 100,000th visitor.

Todd Cassidy, the founder and CEO of Wed2B, said: “We are very excited to be opening our 20th store in Hull, the UK’s City of Culture for 2017. With a number of major redevelopment projects underway, we see a bright future for Hull city centre and expect our new landmark store to serve all the brides-to-be from Humberside and East Yorkshire.”

It comes as an independent vintage fashion brand, Poorboy Boutique said it will open a shop next month in the city’s new arts and cultural quarter on Humber Street.

The business collects secondhand garments to transform into modern pieces, and is expected to be the first of a number of retail lettings to be announced by a developer, Wykeland Beal. Work is due to begin this summer on four buildings, which will fill a gap on the northern side of the street and will have retail space on the ground floor and apartments on the floors above.