The Hanky Heiress

Setting out your stall

2012-02-04T12:13:00.000-08:00

Part of the doorway to the market hall in Falaise, Normandy. Could there be a more stylish way to attract customers to buy fish?

Advert for Dubonnet in Rennes, Brittany

2011-10-21T07:31:00.000-07:00

Unless its by Banksy or you are on the Bogside, street wall decoration is not much in evidence. Once gloriously vivid adverts for Dubonnet, Noilly Prat and others were the most common type of advertising in France, now just a faded ghostly few remain.....

One nose, too many hankies?

2011-05-06T10:52:00.000-07:00

The answer is to make them into a bedspread and resort to Kleenex!

2011-04-18T00:40:00.000-07:00

Wouldn't it be lovely on a Saturday to take a trip back in time to buy some new tyres for the Velocette?

Just to have a poke about these premises and see what else was on offer would be a joy. Or back a decade or two when the street and shop signs were less invasive? Photoshop is an option, but I was promised time travel as a young person along with all those diagonal zips we should have been wearing by the 21st century!

Remember Libya?

2011-04-08T04:12:00.000-07:00

Probably few of those fleeing Libya at the moment stop to buy a silk hanky! It's a strange idea that even in time of war and unrest, soldiers frequent the tourist shops for mementoes. Here's a World War II survivor to prove it.
Stunning red silk with palm trees, brought carefully back from Tobruk! Through the desert, on the troop ship..........
http://www.etsy.com/listing/71729085/world-war-ii-silk-hanky-souvenir-from

Shop of the Month!

2011-04-05T06:45:00.000-07:00

This shop window really makes you feel like the urchin with nose pressed up against the glass. No sweets here but the window somehow suggests that you might find that long dreamt of something you didn't know existed but always wanted.

On the A49 in rural Shropshire, it serves as bait to a vintage car and truck restoration business.

Who needs Farrow and Ball?

2011-03-31T06:37:00.000-07:00

Who needs Farrow and Ball when there are such lovely original colour combinations as this? This particular stretch of high street is in Dodington, Whitchurch, Shropshire. It has been in decline for quite some time. Currently there is a rather beautiful display of old bottles in its window and indications that it might be up for development. It is listed so it will be interesting to see what transpires. Watch this space!

Flag Waving

2011-03-28T09:58:00.000-07:00

We all know the Union Jack but only the Boy Scouts amongst us will know that flown upside down it is a signal of distress.

It is not very obvious - if it is attached to the flagpole on the left, the broad white of the St Andrew's flag should be uppermost. It would be quite easy to miss the emergency or to fly it upside down inadvertently. I did once spot it upside down outside the BBC in Portland Place and toyed briefly with the idea of offering my assistance.
More flag waving opportunities coming soon.
http://www.etsy.com/listing/70965568/silk-union-jack-handkerchief

The Lost High Street

2011-03-27T03:22:00.000-07:00

Someone else with an eye for an enticing shop window was the artist Eric Ravilious (1903 - 1942). In 1938, he published "The High St", a childrens' book of shops illustrated by 24 lithographic plates with accompanying text by J. M. Richards.

Whilst it was not a limited edition, the initial print run was only 2000. The stored lithographic plates were destroyed in the London Blitz and the book is now a sought after rarity.

Last year saw the publication of "The Story of the High Street" which features Ravilious' illustrations with essays by Alan Powers and James Russel.

The Corner Shop - an endangered species

2011-03-25T04:55:00.000-07:00

On the same subject - An exhibition a few years ago at the Museum of London looked at the endangered species that is the independent retailer. It featured photographs by John Londei who documented the decline of London's small retailers over a 15 year period from 1972.
The exhibition has long gone as have most of the shops, but you can still read the book. JohnLondei,"Shutting up Shop".
http://www.history.org.uk/resources/general_resource_1495_23.html
Another photographic record of what we are losing. This book by Bill Evans and Andrew Lawson looks at the design, style and enterprise of our declining local shops.

A View from the Shop Window

2011-03-25T03:47:00.000-07:00

Prop your bicycle outside this little shop with its handsome sign and window full of knitting wools, cloth and Fairisle cardigans. Admire those knitting patterns through the orange cellophane and go inside. A bell tinkles to announce your presence.
The interior reveals surprising cavernous depths. Here you can buy any item of haberdashery in any quantity you desire and not a blister pack in sight.

Shame it's all gone. A few shops like this remain to be written about as curios in style magazines. Department stores rarely have haberdashery departments. Today's chic specialist shops tend to be exclusive and expensive. Mercer's ( a most appropriate name for a haberdashery) and their ilk were a joy for everyone and were everywhere.

Now we have online shopping where you can buy anything whenever you want. It is wonderful too but lacks charm. However I am certain that my commercially minded forebears who owned this shop would have been charmed by another idea. While they slept, tucked up in feather beds in small town England, an unknown someone at the other side of the world was spending money in their shop!
Times change.......
See what has happened to Mercer's shop at http://www.etsy.com/shop/thehankyheiress