"and John Cleese, and also by the fictional character of John Steed of ""The Avengers"", played by Patrick Macnee. In the 1964 film ""Mary Poppins"", set in Edwardian London, 1910, the London banker George Banks (played by David Tomlinson) wears a bowler. The British building society Bradford & Bingley registered more than 100 separate trademarks featuring the bowler hat, its long-running logo. In 1995 the bank purchased, for £2,000, a bowler hat which had once belonged to Stan Laurel. The bowler is part of the Droog uniform that the English character Alex wears in ""A Clockwork Orange"" to the extent"
"Abbey National Abbey National plc was a bank based in the United Kingdom and former building society, which latterly traded under the Abbey brand name. As the former Abbey National Building Society, it was the first building society in the United Kingdom to demutualise, doing so in July 1989. The bank expanded through a number of acquisitions in the 1990s, including James Hay, Scottish Mutual, Scottish Provident and the rail leasing company Porterbrook. Abbey National launched an online bank, Cahoot, in June 2000. In September 2003, the bank rebranded as Abbey, and in November 2004, it became a wholly owned"
"building and sell the site. Demolition work was delayed by the discovery of roosting bats and asbestos, but began in January 2015. On 12 January 2017, it was confirmed that Sainsbury's had sold the site to rival supermarket company Lidl. During the nationalisation process, it was revealed that the bank had registered more than 100 separate trademarks featuring the bowler hat, its long-running logo. The bank had also purchased a bowler hat in 1995 which had formerly belonged to Stan Laurel, for £2,000. Ownership of the trademarks transferred to Santander with the licence to use the Bradford & Bingley name"
"in India in 2003. Following the takeover by the Santander Group, the Gateshead operations also closed in March 2005. Investments were previously branded as Inscape, but were renamed Premium Investments in the end of 2008, provided by Santander Portfolio Management. This was subsequently subsumed into the more general telephony operations and the original contact centre based in Billericay was closed in April 2009. Abbey National Abbey National plc was a bank based in the United Kingdom and former building society, which latterly traded under the Abbey brand name. As the former Abbey National Building Society, it was the first building"
"borrowers voting in favour. The merger of the two societies took place on 1 June 2010. The enlarged society operates under the Skipton name. Chesham Building Society The Chesham Building Society was a building society based in the market town of Chesham in Buckinghamshire, England which merged with the Skipton Building Society in June 2010. Prior to the merger it was the 37th largest building society in the United Kingdom based on its total assets of £231 million. It was a member of the Building Societies Association. Their logo was a stylised chess piece, a pun on the name of"
"funding these agencies were closed in early 2006. In 2004 it was decided to merge the Church street and Alhambra branches and the society opened a new flagship branch on Cheapside, a prime location within Barnsley town centre. In October 2008, the society announced that it expected to lose up to £10 million which it had deposited with Icelandic banks. In order to mitigate the situation, the Yorkshire Building Society agreed to take it over by the end of the year. The merger completed on 31 December 2008, at which point Barnsley Building Society became a trading name of Yorkshire"
"the bancassurance model. In August 1996, Abbey National took over the National & Provincial Building Society, which was itself the product of a 1982 merger between the Provincial Building Society and the Burnley Building Society. This merger increased Abbey National's branch network by almost two hundred branches and brought in three million more customers. In April 2000, Abbey bought Porterbrook from Stagecoach Group for £773 million. Porterbrook was one of the three railway rolling stock operating companies created from by the privatisation of British Rail, leasing rolling stock to the train operating companies in the United Kingdom. The bank launched"
"Deco building known as Abbey House, constructed in 1932 for the Abbey Road Building Society, which the society and its successor (which subsequently became Abbey National plc) occupied until 2002. Almost immediately, the building society started receiving correspondence from Sherlock Holmes fans all over the world, in such volumes that it appointed a permanent ""secretary to Sherlock Holmes"" to deal with it. A bronze plaque on the front of Abbey House carried a picture of Holmes and a quotation, but was removed from the building several years ago. Its present whereabouts are unknown. In 1999, Abbey National sponsored the creation"
"concluded on 1 December 2008 following agreement by the Financial Services Authority and the Office of Fair Trading. Upon completion of the merger, the society's logo was again changed, this time removing the Peak District millstone image. In May 2013, it was announced that the Derbyshire, Cheshire and Dunfermline brands would be phased out over two years, and branches either rebranded under the Nationwide brand or closed. Derbyshire Building Society Derbyshire Building Society (previously trading as The Derbyshire) was a UK building society based in Duffield, Derbyshire in the East Midlands of England. It was the 9th largest building society"
"English Partnerships, which merged with the Homes and Communities Agency in 2008, bought the site in 2000. It is currently leased to a Gaming International/Live Nation UK consortium. In 2012, the original stage was demolished to make way for a new one in time for the Swedish House Mafia concert in July. On 23 January 2006, Gaming International/Live Nation won a further lease in a competitive tender. The consortium made proposals for major developments in a a development summary leaflet (previously linked from the 'Backstage' section of the National Bowl website, now removed). Gaming International handed The Bowl back to"
"Society. The Somercotes society may have been based in the Derbyshire village of Somercotes (Alfreton, Amber Valley) where the society has a branch in Leabrooks Road. It also absorbed the Ilkeston Permanent Building Society in 2001. In 2007 the society was rebranded with a new logo containing the Peak District Millstone, and a change of the trading name from “The Derbyshire” to the legal name of “Derbyshire Building Society.” The new identity incorporated new signage for all branches and replacement passbooks and cashcards for members. On 8 September 2008 it was announced that the Derbyshire, along with the Cheshire Building"
"companies continued to function as independent OPCO's under the Balfour Beatty flag. Buildings it has built include: Birse Civils Birse Civils is a civil engineering company based in North Yorkshire, England. It was formerly a separate civil engineering company simply known as Birse Group, but is now owned by Balfour Beatty. The company was founded as the Birse Group in 1970. It was based in Doncaster. In February 2002, it separated its building (houses), civil engineering, rail, underground and process divisions into Birse Build, Birse CL, Birse Rail, Birse Metro and Birse Process. In June 2006, it was bought by"
"parent Society: Hockleys Professional Limited, trading as Hockleys Surveyors, was acquired by estate agents Connells Residential Ltd. in 2007. The trade of Norwich and Peterborough Estate Agents Ltd., Gibraltar, was divested in 2010. Norwich and Peterborough Building Society Norwich & Peterborough Building Society (or N&P) is a trading name of Yorkshire Building Society based in Bradford, West Yorkshire. At the time of merger with YBS, it was the ninth largest building society in the United Kingdom, with assets in excess of £4.9 billion. It was formed by the merger of the Norwich and Peterborough building societies in 1986. The Society"
"to safeguard the mutual sector, acquiring the ailing Cheshire and Derbyshire building societies in September 2008, followed by the Dunfermline Building Society on 30 March 2009. On 24 March 2009 Nationwide opened a direct savings branch in Dublin, Ireland called Nationwide UK (Ireland), to distinguish it from the unconnected and now-defunct Irish Nationwide Building Society. However, Nationwide ceased all operations in the Irish Republic in 2017. In 2012, the society announced that it would integrate the Cheshire, Derbyshire and Dunfermline building societies into Nationwide. The societies had operated under their own brands as divisions of the society. The rebranding of"
"chosen to match. The work was carried out by LDN Architects. Since 9 February 2008 the club's commercial entity is Bowmen Limited, a registered private company. It caused considerable distress when Edinburgh Bowling Club, founded in 1848 and said to be Edinburgh's oldest, was obliged by the Royal Company of Archers to vacate the site.The Edinburgh Bowling Club subsequently disbanded and closed. The Archers’ Hall development involved an extension to house archery practice ranges and the creation of fifteen two and three-storey multiple occupancy residences to provide accommodation for around 75 University of Edinburgh postgraduate students which the university has"
"a result of the banking crisis of 2008, Abbey purchased the savings business and branches of Bradford & Bingley in September 2008 following the nationalisation of B&B by HM Government. The purchase of Alliance & Leicester by Santander had been agreed earlier that month. Abbey migrated all customer accounts to the Partenon computer software used by Santander in June 2008. On 27 October 2008, Abbey reached an agreement to sell Porterbrook to a consortium of Deutsche Bank, Lloyds TSB and Antin Infrastructure Partners. The Santander Group announced in May 2009 that Abbey and the Bradford & Bingley branch network would"
"Partners to become a partner. 1994 Completed the well received Hauer-King house in Islington. 1999 Won the Stirling Prize for Lord's Cricket Ground media centre. 2003 Completed the Selfridges building at the regenerated Bull Ring shopping centre in Birmingham. 2007 Won the commission for the controversial Czech National Library. 2008 Split into two practices after Kaplicky and Levete officially separate as business partners. 2008 Submits design of London Routemaster bus. 2008 Czech National Library project cancelled by Prague authorities. 2009 Jan Kaplický dies on 14 January 2009 in Prague, Czech Republic. A month later the final few staff working for"
"Bradford & Bingley, which had been nationalised by HM Government during the 2008 banking crisis. Abbey National and the savings business and branches of Bradford & Bingley were rebranded as Santander on 11 January 2010, and Abbey National plc was renamed Santander UK plc. Formula One driver Lewis Hamilton unveiled the first rebranded Santander branch that day in central London. A further three hundred Abbey and Bradford & Bingley branches in London and south east England were rebranded that day, with branches in the rest of the United Kingdom following by the end of the month, by which time there"
"of Beazer and it quickly sold the Kier construction business. In contrast, Beazer’s housing was held through the recession and a new Beazer Group, now consisting solely of UK housebuilding, still the fourth largest in the UK, was floated in 1994. This Beazer mark 2 made its own modest acquisitions and by the end of the 1990s it was producing around 8,000 houses a year. At the end of 2000, Beazer Group and Bryant Homes proposed a “merger of equals” but this was overtaken by a bid for Bryant from Taylor Woodrow. This left Beazer exposed and in 2001 it"
"Derbyshire Building Society Derbyshire Building Society (previously trading as The Derbyshire) was a UK building society based in Duffield, Derbyshire in the East Midlands of England. It was the 9th largest building society in the United Kingdom based on total assets of £7.1 billion at 31 December 2007, until it was acquired by Nationwide Building Society (Nationwide) on 1 December 2008. It operated as a trading division of the society, with 50 branches, until it was fully integrated into its parent in November 2014. In 1966, the society merged with the Ashbourne Permanent Benefit Building Society and the Somercotes Building"
"NBC and SBG bus companies that had been purchased by management and employees when privatised. Stagecoach left the long distance express coach market in 1988 when it sold its operations to National Express. During the privatisation of British Rail, Porterbrook was formed as one of three rolling stock companies owning around a third of passenger railway locomotives, multiple units and coaching stock running on Network Rail's system which is leased to various train operators. It was sold to a management buyout before being purchased by Stagecoach in August 1996. In April 2000 Stagecoach sold Porterbrook to Abbey National for £773"
"was built using voluntary labour. For many years it was a male-only membership and the men had to be employed by Prattens to be eligible to play. Now membership of both clubs is open to all. Later the bowls club was the site of a fatal ballooning accident in 2011. An original Pratten hut is now used as a community centre and live entertainment venue on the site of the Warminster Athenaeum. F. Pratten and Co Ltd F. Pratten and Co Ltd, commonly known as Prattens, was a company based on a site in Midsomer Norton and Westfield, Somerset that"
"were built to house the society. In January 1974 the society acquired the Aberavon Mutual Permanent Building Society. Principality acquired Parkhurst and Peter Alan estate agents in 1987, and the merged entity was later sold to Connells Group for £16.4m in 2014. A site for a new head office to accommodate the expanding business was acquired in 1989 and Principality House in The Friary was opened in 1992. The company acquired Loan Link Limited in 2004. This gave Nemo Personal Finance Ltd, a subsidiary, the opportunity to launch in 2005. In 2013 the company acquired Mead Property Services (covering Buckinghamshire,"
"company as Abbey National plc on 12 July 1989. It was floated on the London Stock Exchange at £1.30 per share, resulting in an unusually large number of small shareholders – approximately 1.8 million initially. The demutualisation process was marred by the discovery of a large number of undelivered share certificates awaiting destruction at a contractor's premises. Abbey National shares peaked at more than £14 in 2000, before the stock market began a long decline. In July 1994, Abbey National purchased James Hay, one of the United Kingdom's foremost independent providers of self administered pensions. James Hay then went on"
"competed in 1989/90, the company went into receivership in 1992 and was bought by dealer network Marshall of Cambridge. The name was finally retired in 1998. Bedford used the Griffin logo of Vauxhall Motors, derived from the heraldic crest of Falkes de Breauté, who was granted the Manor of Luton by King John. By marriage, he acquired property in London, known as Fulk's Hall, which over time, came to be the locality of Vauxhall, the original home of Vauxhall Motors. The griffin returned to Luton in 1903 when Vauxhall Motors moved there. The Bedford version of the logo differed from"
"2000, shortly before the acquisition was completed. In 2001, Lloyds TSB made a bid to acquire Abbey National; however, the bid was blocked by the Competition Commission, who ruled that a merger would be against the public interest. In October 2011, Lloyds TSB's credit rating was reduced by Moody's from Aa3 to A1. The action was taken in the light of a shift in government policy to move risk from taxpayers to creditors by reducing the level of support offered to financial institutions. Lloyds TSB was the first Official Partner for the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. After the 2008"
"as part of the sale. Bradford & Bingley were previously sponsors of Yorkshire County Cricket Club, Bradford & Bingley RFC (formerly Bingley Bees), and team sponsor of Bradford City A.F.C. Valley Parade stadium had previously been known as Bradford & Bingley Stadium through sponsorship rights. Bradford & Bingley Bradford & Bingley plc was a British bank with headquarters in the West Yorkshire town of Bingley. The bank was formed in December 2000 by demutualisation of the Bradford & Bingley Building Society following a vote of the building society's members, who swapped their nominal share of the building society for at"
"merger in 1944 of what had become Abbey Road Building Society (already the second largest) and National Building Society (at the time the sixth largest). The Swansea Thrift Permanent transferred engagements in 1949, followed by the Definite Permanent in 1968, The State Building Society in 1970, Highgate Building Society in 1974 and the Oak Co-operative in 1979. During the 1970s and 1980s, Abbey National gained a reputation for innovation and, sometimes disruptive, change. It was an early user of computer systems, and in the end of the 1970s, all branches became online to a real time system that maintained customer"
"Chesham Building Society The Chesham Building Society was a building society based in the market town of Chesham in Buckinghamshire, England which merged with the Skipton Building Society in June 2010. Prior to the merger it was the 37th largest building society in the United Kingdom based on its total assets of £231 million. It was a member of the Building Societies Association. Their logo was a stylised chess piece, a pun on the name of the River Chess, the local river. Founded in 1845 it was the world's oldest (surviving) building society - many early societies were wound up"
"Director, Commercial and then joined the Board in 2003 as Group Finance Director. He was appointed Chief executive on 1 April 2007. In his first year as Chief executive, Beale oversaw the successful merger of the Portman Building Society – the largest merger the mutual sector had ever seen. During the financial crisis, Beale also oversaw mergers with three smaller building societies; the Derbyshire Building Society and Cheshire Building Society in 2008 and the Dunfermline Building Society in 2009. In 2012, plans were announced to integrate these three brand names into one 'Nationwide' brand. More recently, he has overseen a"
"were still substantial building contracts, including the National Assembly for Wales (2006), construction was on the way out. In September 2008, Taylor Woodrow finally exited the construction market by selling Taylor Woodrow Construction to Vinci. In January 2001, Taylor Woodrow intervened in the proposed merger of Bryant–Beazer, buying Bryant for £632 million in cash and shares. Adding Bryant's annual sales of 4,000 to Taywood's 2,000 immediately elevated Taylor Woodrow to one of the United Kingdom's top five housebuilders. Taywood's housing was relocated to Bryant's Birmingham office, and rebranded under the Bryant name. Two years later the housing business was again"
"larger societies, beginning with Abbey National, the second largest, in 1989, and including the Halifax Building Society, the largest, soon converted into joint stock banking companies, some of which were subsequently acquired by other banks. Many societies soon became targets of speculative ""carpetbaggers"", who opened savings accounts in order to obtain a windfall, in cash or shares, in the event of demutualization. Most of the remaining societies, such as the Nationwide Building Society, the largest remaining mutual, adopted poison pill clauses in their rules as a defense against carpetbaggers. These took the form of a charitable assignment provision that requires"
"In January 2016, it was announced that the Barnsley brand will be phased out by July. Six branches will be closed, with those that remain open being rebranded under the Yorkshire brand. Barnsley Building Society Barnsley Building Society was established on 12 January 1853, by a group of prominent townsfolk who following the example of many other towns and cities at the time decided to form their own building society. The society became part of the Yorkshire Building Society in 2008, and has since continued as a trading division. In 2016, the Yorkshire announced it would replace the Barnsley Building"