Bill Lancaster

Bill Lancaster is a leading expert on the history of the department store and retailing. His book The Department Store a Social History, is regarded as the standard work on the subject. He has also published widely in the field of urban history including studies of Leicester, Coventry and Newcastle upon Tyne. He was the director of the Arts and Humanities Research Council Centre for North East History and taught for many years at Northumbria University. He was the founder and editor of Northern Review, a Journal of Regional and Cultural Affairs, and the Director of the Centre for Northern Studies from 1997-2007.  He was elected fellow of the Royal Historical Society in 1991. Since leaving academia he has shared his expertise with a variety of companies and organisations and was the historical consultant on the BBC's The Paradise, a dramatisation of Emile Zola's department store novel. Bill also was a consultant editor on the book The Story of Fenwick and its Family.

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