Hackney metal – another vitreous enamel sign is missing in Hoxton

Yesterday, wandering down Hoxton Street and, as I approached its southern end, I stopped to sigh at the old timber merchant's shop where, approx two years ago an enamel sign was still in place. Here is my pic from 2008 when it looked bright and shiny:

Sad to see it gone but the this allows us to see a hand-painted sign for the same company that had been covered for many decades. I took a quick snap and turned to look at the pair of signs high up on the other side of the street – oh gawd – the top one's gone:

The view used to look like this (Google streetview 2022):

I wondered why someone would remove the top panel that said CABINET but leave the lower one BENCHES. Surely the top one was harder to access? Was this stolen to order for someone called Cabinet?! Perhaps it had something to do with the House of Commons?!

Concerned about this, it brought to mind the missing telephone signs and I remembered that there is another enamel sign in Hackney, so I hopped on a bus and headed to Homerton to check a corker that sits almost at eye-level. Well, I am glad to report that it's still there:

It's actually looking better than ever, the Odgen's Guinea-Gold tobacco ad now more visible, the layers of paints having further eroded. It's also easier to see how the sign was repurposed – the word FURNITURE can be seen through the middle and AMH 2868 (Amhurst phone code for part Hackney – more about these codes here)

Here's how it looked in 2008:

Thinking about the missing CABINETS sign, having now checked my old photos and this pic by Maggie Jones, it's clear that there was a nasty and very rusty crack across it. I therefore deduce that due to its poor condition, this section has been removed for H&S reasons. That, or the erosion was so bad that it fell apart? I've also discovered that it's been missing since at least January 2025.

Any further info welcome, whether in the comments or via email: jane@janeslondon.com

Calthorpe Terrace – ghosts of bygone shops in Gray's Inn Road

When I travel along Grays Inn Road on a No17 bus I like to admire this west-facing terrace between Calthorpe Street and Wren Street. 

Screen grab from Google Streetview here

Ever other shop along here shows hints of a bygone era, specifically numbers 240, 244 and 248 which, judging by the embellishments and metalwork on the upper floors, looks to be 1830s-ish. 

Reading left to right, north to south, let's start with number 248, C. Antoniou, tailor:

Pic taken from the upper deck of the bus. I do have better photos but this illustrates my point.   

This shop, with its hand-painted signs on the wooden fascia and on the window glass, has looked like this for as long as I can recall. But I cannot ascertain when Mr. Antoniou started offering his tailoring services here (perhaps I should simply go in and ask them or phone that number!) but I can see no tailors listed here before WW2. A hairdresser by the name of William Fowler was here in 1910 and there is nothing listed at all for this address in 1939 by which time Rosen & Rosen tailors, who were next door  at No.246, in 1910, have given way to a print supply shop.

Two doors along, today's hair salon window advertises two brands of Wills's cigarettes, revealed during renovations in 2020. 

The Wills's company was one of the largest tobacco manufacturers in the country. 

This shop has been a tobacconist since at least 1882 when James White's name would have been over the door. Gold Flake first appeared on the shelves in 1901 and I suggest this advertisement probably dates from the 1910s during Hebert Stoddart's era, although I expect Mrs Rubina Smith was still offering the same brands in 1939.

Note also the impressive columns here showing that this was originally the doorway to the shop, today slatered in layers of grey paint (it was white pre-2020 – what is it with the over-use of grey paint these days?!)  Other decades-old signs have also been discovered and retained in the last few years – there's another Wills's sign in Hornsey Rise and the St.Bruno ads in St Paul's Rd.

Staying with smoking and also revealed in 2020... Fourways convenience store at No.240 displays a 1970s-era Player's No.6 cigarettes sign above the shop, showing that the proprietors were RL & M Griffiths:

Back in 1882 this was a baker shop owned by Henry Harvey Bearns. By 1910 it had become a tobacconist, at that time run by Mrs Sarah Fair. In the late 1930s Walter Stewart was selling here. It's interesting how two tobacconists could survive in such close proximity to each other and I'm wondering if they offered different brands. 

There used to similar shop sign to this at 65 Highbury Grove revealed in the period 2009-12, but they painted over it rather than covering it with a board (duh!) and I think I recall another No.6 fascia in Chatsworth Road, Hackney, again, gone.

Incidentally, it's unusual to see that the Calthorpe Arms is not at the Calthorpe Street corner as is usual in cases like this where a pub has the same name as the terrace, originally called Calthorpe Terrace when there were fewer properties along this road. 

Seeing these old signs reminds me of one of the first posts I ever wrote on here about the reveal of an electrical components store near the junction with Clerkenwell Road, back in 2008. More recently, I wrote about this tiled shop at the Kings Cross end of the street.

Observations in Leadhall Market – Harry Potter, an optician, the 2i's cafe and a tobacco shop

Last Sunday 28th July I went to Leadenhall Market to have a mooch and around Judy's Vintage Fair, a which occasionally uses this marvellous space as a selling space for bric-a-brac, furniture, clothes and more.  

Usually, on a weekend, the only people you see here are large groups Harry Potter fans on a guided tour hearing how a shop here is the inspiration for, or a location used in one of the movies (hands up that I haven't a clue about all this, having never read any of the books and I fell asleep during the first movie). As I headed out of the market via Bull's Head Passage I noticed that the name on that shop has changed. It most definitely was not called 2i's the last time I was there. 

Some girls were taking snaps and I asked if this was the name used in the book/film. They said yes. I suggested that this shop has recently been renamed to echo the book, which is interesting because 2i's was the name of a popular café in Old Compton Street, Soho, back in the 1950s through to the 70s. See here. 

I went on to enlighten them that Platform 9 and 3/4 at Kings Cross Station as a portal in the HP book(s) also has connections with London's history – it was there that Boudicca was said to have died after fighting her last battle. I don't think they really understood what I was on about.

Ah but no. I think they misunderstood me, as it turns out that 2i's is an opticians. I dunno, perhaps it's also a Harry Potter reference. I am losing the will to live here!

Further along this narrow street, at No.4, is one of my favourite little details in the market and it's this mosaic doorway threshold which is reflected in the mirror to the side and the glass within the door:

This was Baylin's Tobacco Stores, here from the 1920s. The shop is listed in the 1939 directly but I am unaware if the business continued after WW2. Do let me know if you have any further info.

I crossed over Gracechurch Street and went for a wander around the streets around Cornhill. I'll leave it there for now. 

Old shops in St Pauls Road, Highbury and Islington

I am often to be seen walking from Holloway to Canonbury and back, and this means I use the stretch of St Paul's Rd between the two terraces of shops at the western end which still displays some hints of a bygone age or two. The shops on the right hand side adjacent to the Hen and Chickens pub are clearly older and I will return to them another day, but it's north/left side I'm going to talk about here. It starts with a single shop, No.306a, an large add-on to No.306 which is the first of six paired premises. The shops at street level have angled entrances each side of a door that leads to residential accommodation above. The door numbers are beautifully incised into the street-facing fabric of the building in a clear sans serif letterform at each side of the arches with a flower motif above them. 

First, let's look at No.296, today a barber/hairdresser. Above the shop door there two small signs in the glass advertising Ogden's St. Bruno, a tobacco product that is still available today:

In the 1930s this was a tobacconist shop managed by the wonderfully-named Samuel Brilliant. On the subject of names, at No.298 in the 1910s, there was a confectionery shop run by the perfectly-named Miss Eliza Sweetland. I wonder if she was led into this line of work by nominative determinism?!

Two doors along at No.290 is Sawyer & Gray. As far as I can make out this café and homewares shop (no wifi or laptops, hurrah!) took its name from a name that was uncovered about ten years ago. Indeed, today's S&G was established in 2012. But the Sawyer and Gray of 1939 was a confectionery shop (Miss Sweetland no longer in evidence). It's really nice to see old signage revitalised like this.  

And now to a location past just the bus stop and the cobbled access to the rear. At No.276 today you'll find Firezza Pizzeria. Thick layers of green paint are currently being removed to reveal shiny ultramarine blue tiles. And this suggests it was once a laundry:

A quick look at the old Kelly's directories confirms my hunch. This was indeed a Western's Laundry shop. This blue-tiled exterior being the usual style for Western's and for Sunlight Soap – see more here. Customers' sheets and shirts were collected by vans at the rear via that cobbled side access and then taken to the large facility in Drayton Park which I waffle about on YouTube here(!).  The 1915 directory tells me that this site was previously Isendure Laundry Ltd, an independendent local business that looks to have been subsumed into the Western's umbrella by the 1930s. 

I really hope if they manage to clean off all the green paint and retain the blue tiles, not just for their specific historic value but for logic's sake. I mean, what is the point of painting tiles?! Tiles are washed by rain, or easily wiped. 

Next door to the old laundry, at a site recently vacated by St Paul, there was a dairy/grocery store, no doubt also making good use of that cobbled side access. Throughout bygone centuries, Islington was well-renowned for the quality of its milk – that's a story you've probably heard me tell many times if you've been on my walking tours. 

In 1915 the dairy at No.274 was run by a woman called Mrs David Davies. At some time in the 1920s it had become part of United Dairies, a company famous for pioneering pasteurised milk. 

As you can see by my dodgy pics, taken through the window, the shop interior still retains much of its interwar United Dairies tiled walls -clean white wth geometric stripes in two tones of green.  The exterior still retains the panelled sections in the window glass, but the minty-green tiles and air vents at low level have been covered (or replaced?) by wooden panels. This view from 2008 shows those elements still in place when it was a chemist's shop. The archive pic above right shows a UD shop in New Eltham, dated 1933, and this gives us a sense of how this St Paul's Rd store would have originally appeared. How lovely.

Reveal of old Wills's tobacconist sign in Hornsey Road, N19

Earlier this year, as I was exiting the Post Office at Hornsey Road, I spotted a lovely old shop fascia across the road at No.526, advertising Wills's Gold Flake.

I crossed the street to take a closer look. It's in fantastic condition, so I wondered if it was an old sign that has simply been protected by subsequent layers or a modern pastiche. I took some snaps with the idea to do a bit of sleuthing.

Passing again a few weeks later, the door was open and I saw a fella working inside. He came out to chat to me and told me that he/they had found the sign under the modern one here whilst pulling apart the layers of adaptions during renovations and they fully intend to keep the sign. How lovely. We talked about the tobacco brand and how lovely the sign was but I completely forgot to ask his mname or enquire what kind of shop this will be. I will update this when I do know.

So who/what was A&R?  This could be the name of the people at this location, or a chain/franchise. The old street directories show that this was a greengrocer's shop in the early part of the C20th, run by Daniel Arthur Colby until 1914. The shop was ten empty for some time during WWI because nothing is listed for the period 1915-19 and I have no refernece beyond that. But I suspect the shop became a tobacconist in the mid-1920s. I can confirm, however, that by 1939 it is the business Mr. Herbert John Ranson who could quite possibly be the 'R' of A&R.

It's great to see this area of N19 finally evolving. As someone who has lived near here for over 30 years I have seen the shops become neglected in this island twixt Archway, Crouch End, Finsbury Park and Holloway. Hence there are quite a few interesting old bits of signage to be found herea and it's great to see so many new finds being preserved. For instance, across the road from this Wills's sign there is the old Hancock/Plumb butcher's shop that I have written about here. Further down the hill, south of Hanley Road, there is this old grocer's sign advertising tea at the rear as well as many more hints of the past here.

A cotton-picking conundrum in Goswell Road

There is a lovely temple-esque tiled façade on a building at 338-346 Goswell Road, a stone's throw from the Angel junction in Islington. On it are four roundels depicting, from left to right, a worker in a cotton field, a sailing ship, a steam ship and a steam train.

These two pics show the building in 2015 when the metal panels between the windows were painted white

 

 

In 2015 the paint on the window panels was removed to appear as a bronze colour, taking them back to how I suspect they would have appeared when the building was first constructed. Then, in 2019, a lick of black paint was applied.

In the last few years there has been serious debate concerning the depictions of historic figures associated with the slave trade. This has lead to the subsequent removal of statues and memorials across the country. Here in Islington, questions were also raised about this Goswell Road building and whether the roundel showing a black worker in a cotton field was suitable in today's climate.

In November 2020 scaffolding was erected and, during another renovation process, the roundel depicting the cotton fields was over-painted as solid blue. However, if you look closely, indeed from the other side of the road, you can easily still make out the raised lines.

Whilst I do understand the important decisions we should make as to who is commemorated on our streets, nobody has as yet come up with a decent explanation as to why this cotton-picking roundel was put here in the first instance; who or what does it accurately relates to? And I think that's important. If mistakes have been made then we should learn from them. I, for one, would like to see a small plaque at street level, explaining why the blue paint is there so that people can learn about the past and how we should improve ourselves going forward. 

So who built 338-346 Goswell Road? And for whom? Where were the cotton fields? Over the past six years or so I've occasionally tried to look into this and I have a few ideas (see below). Back in 2016, an enquiry on the subject was made to Islington Archaeology and History Society and Michael Reading gave this explanation which seems to have become the cut-and-paste explanation for everywhere else I've seen it referenced:

[edited] These used to be five separate properties ... a variety of business and trades, except for no 346 which was occupied for the whole period as the Brethren Meeting House. From around 1930 to 1933, there were no entries ... The 1933 directory shows that nos 338-346 were occupied by the International Tobacco Company Ltd and Peter Jackson (Tobacco Manufacturers) Ltd. The 1935 directory has the same entry, but 1939 shows that these premises were now occupied by Post Office Stores Dept (Goswell Road Dept)... I would venture the black worker signifies tobacco farming. The two images of ships, one by sail and the other by steam, signify the export of tobacco around the world over many years and, finally, the image of a steam train the delivery of finished tobacco products. 

Having checked the available directories and maps myself, this all rings true as regards who was there at those dates. However, this often-repeated explanation of the roundels has always confounded me being as the depiction here is clearly of cotton fields rather than a tobacco plantation.

A few years ago I found something about this site being the premises of the Cooperative Wholesale Society but I cannot now find where I sourced that – I probably lost that reference in what I refer to as "The Great AppleMac Crash of 2018" when a large chunk of my un-archived research was deleted when the mother board died – grr!  But, if my memory serves me well and this is indeed a CWS construction, I'd suggest that this beautifully-designed façade is a product of the architects working under consistently-innovative Leonard Grey Ekins, head of the CWS's London-based architects, and the gap in the records could suggest that the building was constructed in the early 1930s, which visually looks to be about right. Then, when CWS vacated the site the tobacco company moved in for a while prior to the buildng becoming the Post Office Stores. 

This would explain the reference to cotton farming and the transport of that commodity because Robert Owen, the founder of the CWS, was a social reformer and philanthropist who had started as an importer of cotton. If Robert Owen is the key to the roundels, and I rather hope so, then I very much doubt that he was employing what we'd call 'slaves'. As an advocate of workers' rights and good working conditions, he would have more likely paid his workers a decent wage and offered on-site housing of some kind.

I had an idea that perhaps the building simply depicts some motifs relevant to the area's history. Indeed there is another link to cotton here – British History Online makes reference to John Hall, a City cotton merchant having factory premises adjacent to here in the late 18th century and this also ties in rather well with the images in the four roundels. John Hall is quite a common name, and I found this, which I think is probably the same man and makes for interesting reading. But, if that is indeed what's being shown here, it still doesn't explain who constructed the building and for whom, so I'm clinging on to my Robert Owen idea and I will update here if I find out more.

Oh, and another thing... I am wondering if these ceramic roundels were created by the wonderfully-gifted Gilbert Bayes as they really do look like his style. Which reminds me, I really must organise an online talk about him. To much to do, too little time... 

338-346 Goswell Road, September 2021

Jane's Advent Calendar – 6th December

Dingley Road, London EC1
Ten fags for sixpence!!
This sign must have been very vibrant 70 years ago.
At the bottom right the signwriter has left his mark: "HARRIS the Sign King"! 

Black Cat Cigarettes were made nearby at The Carerras factory on Mornington Crescent where Craven 'A' cigarettes were also manufactured. These too featured the company's iconic black cat logo.

Gone but not forgotten – G. Smith & Sons, tobacconist and purveyor of snuff

The first of a new series remembering shops and businesses I have known or used myself that have closed down or been demolished in the last few years.

Today I'm rembering a shop in Charing Cross Road. It sat within a long line of antiquarian bookshops, that used to run from Cambridge Circus down to Leicester Square Station.  

G.F Smith & Sons at No.74, was a beautiful old tobacconist's shop with a lovely old mirrored frontage and hand-painted gilt lettering showing they were purveyors of fine cigars and smoking paraphernalia. The shop was established in 1879 and used to be able to claim that it was one of the oldest/longest-trading shops in the Soho area. It was also the meeting place for the The London Snuff Club

I took these pics in 2008 when the shop was a garish orange (it was soonafter repainted royal blue – you can just make out the scaffolding in the mirror).

But, sadly, the shop closed in 2012 or 2013. I can't seem to find a definitive date or what exactly caused the shop's demise but I suspect the revised smoking laws of 2006 had a huge effect on sales – see above for their adaption of My Way that was in the shops' window in August 2008 – the pink highlights are mine (grr!). And I suspect that the humidor at the rear of the shop fell foul of the regulations against indoor smoking within work premises. Some products and reference can be found on Google here.

As you can see by this screenshot, from Google Streetview (July 2015), the shop can be seen with original woodwork painted a soft beige colour, but I wonder what became of Smith's lovely hand-painted glass, the tobacco stock and and all the advertising ephemera?

Charing Cross Road used to be lined with bookshops of all kinds and has been the inspiration for novels and films etc. The larger shops were at the northern end (Foyles, Waterstones, Blackwells etc) and smaller independents specialising in certain fields especially, art, maps, second-hand and rare antique books could be found south of Cambridge Circus.
At the time of writing, this specific section of the road mentioned above has only about three bookshops remaining, the others having been replaced with cafés and coffee houses, souvenir and clothes shops; crushed under the wheels of high rent and homogenisation. It's called progress.
More antiquarian shops can be found a few minutes' walk away along St Giles Court and St Martin's Court, (both further down Charing Cross on the left just after Leicester Square station) where you can still while away the hours amongst books, prints, maps, coins, stamps, medals and more.

Hmmm... thinks... Smith the stationer, Smith the umbrella maker, Smith & Nephew the chemists and Smith the tobacconist and snuff seller... any more?