As Gap Closes 81 Stores In The UK And Ireland, We Look Back At Its Golden Age

Gap has become the latest high street casualty with its head office announcing yesterday that all of the brand's stores in the UK and Ireland, 81 in total, will be closing later this year. And as well as the loss of 1,000 jobs, it's a bitter pill to swallow for those of us who remember its golden age.

Unlike Topshop - which had a particular hold over millennials who probably remember their first feverish trip to its flagship on Oxford Street - Gap spans so many people from so many generations, all of whom have saved a special place in their hearts for its logoed hoodies (everyone had one and if you didn't you wanted one) and its all-American denim.

Hannah Banks-Walker, Grazia's digital fashion and beauty director, was a mega fan as a schoolgirl. 'I bought all my sixth form uniform from there, which I thought was just about the best thing that had ever happened,' she remembers. 'The suit trousers had a straight cut, which was borderline revolutionary in 2007. I used to be sent to the headmaster’s office all the time because staff claimed my clothes weren’t a proper ‘business suit’. I think that proves that, in head-to-toe Gap, I was basically too cool for school.'

My own teenage memories of Gap (which had a great store in Guildford) was of a particular collaboration with Sarah Jessica-Parker. I was doing my GCSEs, which was, coincidentally, when the final series was airing and there was much excitement among the sixth form girls who actually watched SATC. I still remember desperately wanting the hot pink cardigan, the checkered silk scarf and the fedora she wore in the ad campaign.

The future was starting to look bright for Gap after the brand's recently launched collaboration with Yeezy, a 10-year partnership which was announced last year to much hype for fans of Kanye West, which looked set to revitalise its reputation. But the brand has had its fair share of problems when it comes to star creative directors and designer collaborators. As well as a troubled four-year stint with Patrick Robinson, a highly regarded talent who previously worked at Giorgio Armani, Paco Rabanne and Perry Ellis, the brand got into hot water after postponing its collaboration with Telfar, the brand founded by Telfar Clemens, as the pandemic hit earlier last year and, according to The Cut, failing to pay a postponement fee until several months later.

But looking back to brighter days, Gap was the one high street outfitter who knew the power of a brilliant ad campaign. In 1989, Annie Leibovitz shot portraits of Spike Lee, Whoopi Goldberg and Joan Didion for_Individuals of Style._ More than three decades later, it's a style it still adopts, with a campaign earlier this year featuring black-and-white portraits of creatives like curator and writer Kimberly Drew, as well as ballet dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov.

And then there were the clothes. While Gap has never been the place to go for bells and whistles, it has always prioritised quality over quantity. My best pair of wide-leg jeans comes from Gap, and, where all other high street retailers have failed, they somehow manage to fit both my waist and bum. 'Modern American Optimism' is its current slogan. Let's hope, with the pivot to online, it manages to keep that dream alive.