The liberation of shopping is upon us. Growing wealth, urbanisation and leisure options have persuaded property developers to abandon the boring, homogenised clones they have been building for 35 years. And now SA is about to experience the rich diversity of retail communities that have personality, individuality and choice.

There is no clearer sign of this change than über-developer Pat Flanagan's decision to ban chain stores and franchises from his new centre, which opens next year in Sandton's Morningside. Flanagan and Peter Gerard are responsible for some of SA's most boring - yet successful - retail centres, such as Somerset Mall in Somerset West, Lakeside Mall in Benoni and Paarl Mall.

It's not that Flanagan, Gerard and their partner, Gerald Nelson of Grapnel, have had a sudden epiphany. Instead, the message of the market has reached them.

"Our research shows that over half the households in the Morningside centre's primary target market - a five-minute drive away - earn more than R100 000 a month," says Flanagan. "They are discerning. They want quality and service. And they are prepared to pay for it."

Flanagan is scouring Johannesburg for independent, highly individual retailers with skill and flair to satisfy his wealthy consumers. Not only does he reject franchises, but he won't even accept a branch of an excellent local retailer unless its head runs the Morningside store.

An example of the tenant he wants is the greengrocer in the existing Morningside centre he has bought and will demolish. The small shop does a monthly turnover of up to R800 000 in phoned-in home deliveries.

The new centre will have the gamut of traditional personal-service stores such as a butcher, a fish shop, a grocer, delicatessen and top-rate owner-operated restaurants. In recent years these operators have been excluded from shopping malls because the banks that finance them have considered that franchised and standardised retail operations provided safer and more predictable income.

Flanagan says he can do such an out-of-the-ordinary centre because of SA's rapidly rising wealth and what the retail trade calls trading density - the rands/m² of turnover that shops achieve.

"It's also Jo'burg's growing congestion, which means there are more people in an area and they want to shop closer to home," adds Peter Behrmann, who with partner Richard Koseff is putting the finishing touches to Blubird, a modernist retail centre in Birnam, near Melrose Arch. It's named in honour of British interior designer and restaurateur Sir Terence Conran's centre in King's Road, Chelsea, London.

Their approach is far more aesthetic than Flanagan's and they are as enthusiastic about the architecture as the tenant mix. "It's the only retail centre in SA with its own park," says Behrmann. He has accepted responsibility to upgrade the municipal park, integrate it with Blubird and manage it.

"We didn't need to do research," quips Behrmann, whose family originally developed Hyde Park Corner. "We just listened to my wife."

Like Flanagan, he is negotiating with potential tenants to get the perfect delicatessen, a fish shop, coffee shops, restaurants, a high-end children's shop, fashions and the usual food and service outlets. But he does have familiar anchor tenants in Dis-Chem and Woolworths Food Store.

The swing to independent retailers and individual choice is worldwide. And since this is how shopping started out, it's hardly a new idea.

Britain's Design Council says the elements of the new retail include surprise, individual opinion, choice, continual change and the passion that comes from owner-operators (see "Five key elements of the new retail"). These breed genuine service and customer recognition. It's what British brand expert Ralph Ardil calls "experience design".

Ironically, the Design Council doesn't include the pursuit of architectural beauty that seems to go hand-in-hand with the new trend - and which Behrmann thinks is important.

Behrmann and Flanagan are not the first SA developers to dedicate a centre to reviving retail individualism. Both admire Oaklands Shopping Centre in Glenhove Road, Johannesburg, for the quality and individuality of its tenant mix - an Italian butcher, a deli-diner, a top-rate greengrocer, a gift shop and more.

The Cape Quarter, a micro-centre at the bottom of De Waterkant in Cape Town, was probably the first urban version of what the Jo'burg developers are trying to achieve.

Only slightly bigger is Ara Manuelian and Noelle Bolton's Upper Deck in Plettenberg Bay. Architecturally impressive, it is a fine example to date of the new trend, with hand-picked shops.

A few, like Min Boisragon's turquoise clothing boutique, Bolton's art gallery and a goldsmith, could nestle happily among the 150 beautiful little shops that line the Rue d'Antibes in Cannes on the French Riviera, nirvana for the wealthy who seek good taste rather than brands. In fact, Boisragon supplies clothing to stores in a similar street in St Tropez and spends the northern summer there.

Rue d'Antibes epitomises choice and individuality, with each shop offering a narrow, specialised selection of merchandise: men's casual shirts, for instance, or stockings, modernist furnishings and, of course, chocolate shops and delis.

It's trading density that allows this choice, says Wolf Cesman, retail expert and director of listed fund manager Madison. "Cannes has a wealthy permanent population and a constant flow of wealthy tourists and visitors to the endless exhibitions and festivals," he says. "It's this constant shopper traffic that keeps Rue d'Antibes thriving, despite its distance from the big cities."

Could the trend be starting in SA?

Shops in Kalk Bay on the Cape Peninsula have become much more interesting; the standard of merchandising and choice has improved markedly in recent years. Unique, high-quality, owner-operated shops such as the India Jane boutique and Anpa Jewellery could fit comfortably into major shopping centres.

There's also wineland town Franschhoek's shopping street - and even Clarens, in the Free State, has turned itself into a shopping event for its weekend visitors from Jo'burg.

But Cesman is sceptical. "I can't see them or Plettenberg Bay getting the traffic," he says. "They're seasonal and they don't have the critical mass yet to attract enough turnover so that they can afford to close over the winter or during the week."

Manuelian agrees that despite its wealthy property owners, Plettenberg Bay is seasonal and has some way to go. But he is buying up next-door properties and aims to get his development big enough to become a destination. "Many shops on Rue d'Antibes and in St Tropez close for the winter," he adds. "There's no reason we can't - eventually."

Flanagan and Behrmann's centres, with their permanent and growing shopper population, have a better prognosis. The question for Behrmann's smaller centre is whether it can sustain turnover. For Flanagan, it's whether his centre will have the flair.