An 86-year-old jeweller faces the demolition of his family shop to make way for a heist-themed bar in Hatton Garden, a plan he has condemned as 'ghoulish'.
George Katz runs E Katz & Co Ltd, a family firm founded by his father Emil in 1946, seven years after he fled Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia with diamonds sewn into his suit. The shop stands on the same block where an ageing gang stole £14 million from safety deposit boxes in 2015.
Plans for 'The Hatton Garden Heist' bar
Landlords Pearl & Coutts have applied to Camden Council for consent to change the use of their building from commercial to a drinking establishment themed around the heist. Architect drawings show a front awning with the name 'The Hatton Garden Heist' and a door flanked by signs for 'Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Ltd', the firm targeted by the gang.
Under the plans, E Katz Jewellers could be destroyed and replaced with a stairwell and lift to access the basement bar.
Family's fight to save the business
George, who joined his widowed mother Edith in the firm 70 years ago, said: "It's glorifying a crime scene, it's ghoulish. This is meant to be a jewellery quarter and it should be for jewellers, not developed into a theme bar." He added: "There are still people in Hatton Garden here now who lost money in the robbery. I know people personally who were nearly ruined by their losses."
His son-in-law Robert Willis, 48, who started at the business 10 years ago, said: "Violent crime is an everyday reality for us, it isn't something to have fun over with a glass of wine. There was an armed robbery in Hatton Garden three months ago 60 yards from our shop, this isn't something to make fun over. Most of the people deeply affected by the Hatton Garden heist are still alive and they lost everything in that robbery. It's extremely bad taste."
Objections from industry and council
Ben Massey, chief of the National Association of Jewellers, said his organisation strongly objected. In a statement to the council, he said: "E Katz & Co has operated in Hatton Garden since 1946 and from its current premises since 1955. Businesses such as this are not only important commercial occupiers; they are part of the living history, identity and character that make Hatton Garden unique. Its national reputation has been built on generations of jewellers, makers, retailers and craftspeople. Its future success depends on retaining and supporting those businesses, not gradually displacing them."
Camden Council said: "Hatton Garden has been an established centre for the jewellery industry since the nineteenth century, and we seek to secure new premises suitable for jewellery workshops and related uses and protect them through planning obligations. We also seek to protect existing businesses uses."
The public can comment on the plans until August 30 before a decision is made.
