A GIFT and gadget shop in a Basingstoke shopping centre has closed down.

Staff were seen emptying Hawkin’s Bazaar in Festival Place last night, and the store is now closed.

Details of the store including its opening times have been removed from Festival Place’s website.

It is thought the shop has been in Festival Place since the shopping centre opened in 2002.

The shop, which was part of a chain of 19 across the country, sold a range of gifts and gadgets and was also an official ‘drone safe’ retailer, meaning they were approved to sell drones.

Hawkin’s Bazaar started as a mail order toy company, set up in Northumberland by the late Sid Templer, and has now become a nationally known name on the UK high street.

Its first shop opened in Salisbury in 1990. In early 2012 it went through a brief period of administration, but after enhancing, re-strategising and streamlining the business it came out the other side.

The closure of the Basingstoke branch comes after Festival Place announced earlier this month that it has cut its opening hours, with shops opening from the later time of 9.30am each morning.

It is not known how many people lost their jobs as a result of the closure of Hawkin’s Bazaar. Festival Place and Hawkin’s Bazaar have both been asked for a comment.