A great place to live and work

A unique borough with a rich history, beautiful landscapes and world class tourist destinations. Employees have excellent culture, sport and retail on their doorstep, and the borough offers a strong family focus and palpable community spirit and is consistently ranked the safest borough in London. These, coupled with some of the Country’s best primary schools make Richmond upon Thames an excellent place to live and work.

Shopping

The Borough is home to a wide variety of specialist independent shops, flag-ship stores and a retail park. Richmond town centre is one of South West London’s top retail destinations with an annual spend of around £14 million and stores located here include House of Fraser, Max Mara and top fashion names such as Ted Baker, French Connection, Jack Wills, Russell and Bromley and Reiss.

Night life

Richmond upon Thames has a great choice of theatres, cinemas, art galleries, bars and restaurants. The gastronomic delights are varied and plentiful with the excellence of the Michelin star and award winning restaurants. The Borough’s theatres offer a rich variety of award winning programmes showcasing the best in classic and contemporary performances, musicals and entertainment.

Sport

With capacity for 82,000 spectators, Twickenham is home to the RFU and will host the Rugby World Cup in 2015. The RFU employs approximately 500 paid staff and helps to train and support up to 40,000 volunteers during the sporting season. Nearby, the Stoop is the home ground to the Harlequins Rugby Team. The Stoop has a capacity of 12,700, offering 39 executive boxes and 3 lounges complete with personal dining in unrivalled surroundings. There is a wide range of sporting facilities around the borough for all levels of ability, including Pools on the Park in Richmond and some of the best rowing clubs in the country.

Parks and open spaces

Richmond upon Thames straddles both sides of the River Thames, has more green space than any other London borough and the Council maintains more than 100 parks, open spaces, commons and woodlands, which attract around fi ve million visitors every year. The borough also boasts two Royal Parks, not forgetting the stunning view over to St Paul’s Cathedral from Richmond Park.

Arts and social groups

The borough has many local sports clubs, social clubs, arts and cultural organisations offering tennis, cricket, rowing, sailing and bowling, to local history societies, and more. The well known Eel Pie Club preserves the heritage of rhythm and blues, which began in the 1960’s on Twickenham’s Eel Pie Island. Amateur dramatic groups are also popular.

Schools/Education

Richmond upon Thames is known for having some of the leading independent schools in the country. The borough has 41 primary schools, voted amongst the best in England, of which 15 of these are Church schools. Three of our eight secondary schools have become academies; seven are mixed and one is for girls only.

Find out more

More general information on the advantages of starting your own business in the Borough visit our Locating your business page or read from our testimonials:

• Business organisations
• Business services
• Retail services
• Creative industries
• Science and technology (including green technology)
• Leisure, tourism and hospitality