THE way we do it may have changed drastically, but shopping remains one of the nation’s favourite hobbies.

The pictures here are mostly of the days when a trip to the shops was a fixture on a family’s weekly calendar.

Bournemouth has had a shopping centre since Victorian times.

The first of today’s big department stores opened in 1871, when Frederick Bright sold needlework and wool at the Arcade. Bright’s of Bournemouth expanded into neighbouring shops and was later bought by Dingles, eventually becoming a House of Fraser.

In 1881, the draper John Elmes Beale decided to set up his own shop. His Fancy Fair was to become Beales, which would eventually be the flagship in a chain of stores.

Mr Beale liked to add some magic to the shopping experience. His Father Christmas may have been the first in an English department store, and in 1912 he had Santa wave to the crowds from a plane.

Bobby & Co opened in Bournemouth Square in May 1915 and was extended over the years. It became Debenhams in 1972, in a ceremony presided over by disc jockey Terry Wogan.

In the 1960s, American shopping venues influenced British shopping. In October 1968, the Hampshire Centre – a huge retail park on one level – opened at Castle Lane West. The biggest shop there was Woolco, a giant version of Woolworths covering almost 2.5 acres.

Poole was busy planning its own US-influenced shopping centre.

While it had plenty of high street retailers, the town’s leaders had long wanted a big indoor centre, and the first plans were drawn up in 1958.

The Arndale Centre finally opened in July 1969, with tenants including Beales, Sainsbury’s and Boots.

It was not long before extensions were talked about. After a public inquiry, work on a second phase of the entre began in the 1980s, and the extended mall – renamed the Dolphin Centre – opened in 1988.

In the 1990s, out-of-town retail sites became the big threat to the high street, offering free parking and, often, larger stores. Supermarkets also preferred sites on the edges of towns, where their stores could offer many product lines that had been the domain of traditional retailers.

The replacement for the Hampshire Centre, Castlepoint, opened in 2003. A huge construction project, it had Marks and Spencer as its anchor store, alongside Asda, Sainsbury’s, B&Q, Next, TK Maxx, Virgin Megastore and more.

The development was controversial, with critics fearing it would kill the town centre.

But within a few years, all kinds of bricks-and-mortar retailers would face a new threat – the rise of the internet retailers, whose products you could browse without setting foot outdoors.