Swift & Company Ltd

Swift & Company Ltd, Braggs Lane, Bristol BS2, 2013 • Stunning little tiled relic of a 1920s American meat packing and refrigeration company – more info here.

Café Central

Café Central, Quay Street, Bristol BS1, 2011, 2013, 2018 • Green-slate-tiled cafe at the base of a brutalist Bristol tower block. It later closed down, and the entire complex was […]

Popular Cafe

Popular Cafe, 85 Lever Street, Borough of Islington, London EC1, 2013 • Once popular, here closed down and up for sale. It was soon back in business as before (repainted, […]

Riddicks, Racks

Riddicks (and Racks), 22 Fowler Street, South Shields, South Tyneside NE33, 2013 • Grand local shoe shop founded in 1893, closed in 2014 – just one of several imposing premises in […]

Cheap Fashion

Cheap Fashion, 60 West Street, Bristol BS2, 2013 • Unequivocal if unglamorous branding. By 2017 it had become a minimart.

Adana

Adana, 162 Grays Inn Road, Borough of Camden, London WC1, 2001 (top two images) & 2013. Beautiful art deco glass sign for Adana, a make of printer. It was retained […]

Jesus Kingdom City

Jesus Kingdom City, Cannon Street, Bristol BS1, 2013 • Ex-church school whose plaque reveals a Theseus’s Paradox of a history: “St James’ School. Instituted benevolent School 1790. Sunday school 1801. Reconstructed 1913. […]

The Porthole

The Porthole, 11 New Quay, Duke Street, North Shields, 2013 • Striking listed real ale pub, once called The Golden Fleece. The venue later closed for good was turned into an architects’ office (article […]

City Music

City Music, Arch 15, Queensway Arches, Livery Street, Birmingham B3, 2013 • Blue Monday featuring nice, albeit 1980s (ish) windows.

Amazon Hair

Amazon Hair, 92 Fowler Street, South Shields, South Tyneside, 2013 • A hair-cutter who’s cut out their window. Brilliant! It’s still there but now painted brown and white. Hope the eponymous online book-selling […]

Nameless green Thai shop

Nameless green Thai shop, 129 Lower Marsh, Waterloo, Borough of Lambeth, London SE1, 2013, 2010, 2016 • A miscellany of painterly disguises have graced this anonymous  storage unit for the Chinese and Thai restaurants on […]

Ex Singer & Singer

Ex Singer & Singer, Fairfax House, Fairfax Place, Dartmouth, Devon, 2013 • Now for some notable nameless shops. The integrated clock in this grand empty unit suggests it may once have […]

W.G. Pillar & Co.

W.G. Pillar & Co., 1 Lower Street, Dartmouth, Devon, 2013 • Like a souvenir shop newly minted from the 1950s – but still there 2015. Note stop sign incorporated into […]

Dartmouth Boating Centre

Dartmouth Boating Centre, 6S Embankment, Dartmouth, Devon, 2013 • Classic old-school ‘flying clothes’ display and almost-but-not-quite Profil font. The letters continued falling off, and by 2015 it was called Artmouth Boating […]

Grants

Grants, 32 Earlsdon Sreet, Coventry, Warwickshire, 2013 • Minimalistic plastic elegance for this 1960s-style hairdressing facade, still there in 2015.

Granny’s Kitchen

Granny’s Kitchen, 38 Westoe Road, South Shields, 2013 • Shiny black plastic for Granny. What a pity the shutters were down on the day I passed by, it’s all curtained […]

Tasty Café

Tasty Café, 72 St John Street, Borough of Islington, London EC1, 2013 • Surely the greatest generic name of them all. Features somewhat unenthusiastically on Classic Cafes, while Food Urchin describes […]

G. & K. Sanders Fish Merchant

G. & K. Sanders Fish Merchant, 39 High Street, Budleigh Salterton, Devon, 2013 • Old tiled fish on a premises that’s been a fishmongers for 70 years. In 2015 G. & K. Sanders made […]

The Robert Sinclair Tobacco Coy Ltd

The Robert Sinclair Tobacco Coy Ltd, Blenheim House, 145 – 147 Westgate Road, Newcastle, 2013 • Est 1836 and once a major firm, Sinclair’s was noted for blends such as […]

Nursery Thyme, Rabbit

Nursery Thyme, Rabbit, 2 Bridge Street, Sunderland, 2013 • Unusual herby wordplay for a kids’ shop. Note sign for Rabbit (the upside-down R right of the centre window), an early mobile network that […]

Yorkshire Bank (Middlesbrough)

Yorkshire Bank (Middlesbrough), 303-7 Linthorpe Road, Middlesbrough, 2013 • There’s nice steel detailing on this, which looks early 1960s. Yorkshire Bank is still going, though owned by National Australia Bank, who […]

Alans Naturally

Alans Naturally, 13 South Street, Hull, 2013 • Old-school loose goods purveyor next door to yesterday’s Alan’s Fruiterers, and presumably the same Alan, albeit without apostrophe. Both shops are still there – […]

Alan’s Fruiterers

Alan’s Fruiterers, 9 South Street, Hull, 2013 • Immense and striking faux fruit machine frontage in Hull, famed (sort of) for its now-artsy fruit market district.

Chelsea Funeral Directors

Chelsea Funeral Directors, 91 Rochester Row, City of Westminster, London SW1, 2013 • I hesitate to call an undertaker’s cute, but this one is.

Personal Jesus

Personal Jesus sign, outside Shoreditch Grind, 213 Old Street, Borough of Islington, London EC1, 2013 • Sign outside trendy coffee shop Shorditch Grind at London’s grotty mini tech hub, Old Street Roundabout.

Minerva Hotel

Minerva Hotel, 10 Nelson Street Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Handsome waterfront hostelry boasting ‘the smallest pub room in Britain’. These deco doorcases are a later addition to the essentially 1850s […]

North Eastern Rubber Co Ltd

North Eastern Rubber Co Ltd, 35-37 Clive Street, North Shields, North Tyneside, 2013 • Profil font lives on in light industry…

LJ’s Beach Bar

LJ’s Beach Bar, Brooklands, Jaywick Sands, Clacton-on-Sea, Essex, 2013 • That’s barbed wire on top. Part of Jaywick Sands, apparently one of Britain’s most deprived areas, albeit with a vast […]

Pinkney Engineering

Pinkney Engineering, Fairbridge House, Ferry Street, Middlesbrough, 2013 • Attractive rivetted ghost sign on what is now a Prince’s Trust site.

Elizabeths Restaurant

Elizabeths Restaurant, 30 Bridge Street, Sunderland, 2013 • Apostrophe-free diner that appears as traditional inside as out. That looks like the remnants of a shiny Brilliant-style Vitrolite facade under the […]

Leisureland Motors, Albatross

Leisureland Motors, Albatross, Easington Street, Sunderland, 2013 • Imposing ruin that looks like it may have been a stables once upon a time. It’s part of an industrial estate that backs onto […]

Cooper’s Motor Mart

Cooper’s Motor Mart, Coopers Studios, 14-18 Westgate Road, Newcastle, 2013 • Ghost sign on trendy studios. The1897 building is a rare example of a multi-story horse and cart repository – here’s a history here.

Hill Cleaner’s

Hill Cleaner’s, 565 Green Lanes, Borough of Haringey, London N8, 2013 • Unmissable sign with an esoteric use of apostrophe. It’s not noticeably on a hill, so maybe that’s someone’s surname.

Avenue Garage

Avenue Garage, next to 147b Earlsdon Avenue North (side in Westwood Road), Coventry, 2013 • Another West Midlands garage with period typography (and fuel pumps). Flickr shows it recently, about to become […]

A.J. Mountstephen Late Truscott

A.J. Mountstephen Late Truscott, County House, New Street, Sidmouth, Devon, 2013 • That’s quite a mouthful of a monicker. Nice that they’ve kept this old sign (possibly dating from the founding […]

H.F. & G.W. Smith (Breese Little)

H.F. & G.W. Smith (Breese Little), 30d Great Sutton Street, Clerkenwell, Borough of Islington, London EC1, 2013 • Trendy gallery Breese Little appropriating a previous owner’s more prosaic title.

Masham Hotel

Masham Hotel, Linthorpe Road, Middlesbrough, 2013 • Once one of the town’s most popular pubs, this listed building became a failed shoe shop, then in 2013 was turned into a small […]

The 3 Crowns

The 3 Crowns, 8 East Road, Borough of Hackney, London N1, 2013 • Nicely-tiled Shoreditch pub which appears to have been rescued by hipsters in mid-destruction. There’s a picture of how […]

Bridge Hotel

Bridge Hotel, Castle Garth, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 2013 • Forbidding but fantastic pub built into Newcastle’s old town walls and perched high above the river Tyne, bracketed by two of the city’s spectacular bridges. […]

F.P. Turner & Sons (Five Star Nails)

F.P. Turner & Sons (Five Star Nails), 31 Victoria Road, Surbiton, Surrey, 2014 • An old sign kept on from a jeweller’s, established 1825 (though not at this premises, where they’d […]

Radway

Radway cinema, Radway Place, Sidmouth, Devon, 2013 • Modestly restrained deco cinema in the non-multi-screen bastion of Sidmouth. It opened in 1928 as a theatre, but has been showing films since the […]

Nasons

Nasons, 47 High Street, Canterbury, Kent, 2013 • More slab serif lettering on another old independent department store.

Fancy Goods

Fancy Goods, 3-11 The Cut, Borough of Southwark, London SE1, 2013 • Earlier incarnation of a fairly gruesome ex-Costcutter, in transition to becoming a Tesco Express.

Ian Allen

Ian Allen, 45-46 Lower Marsh, Borough of Lambeth, London SE1, 2013 • “Futuristic” 1970s-style round-cornered windows distinguishing a railway enthusiasts’ book and model shop situated behind Waterloo station.

Coventry Evening Telegraph

Coventry Evening Telegraph, 157 Corporation Street and Chapel Street, Coventry, Warwickshire, 2013 • Regional newspapers, where they survive, are downsizing or agglomerating, and moving on from their 20th century purpose-built HQs. […]

Tee’s Diner

Tee’s Diner, Port Clarence Road, Stockton-on-Tees, Middlesbrough, 2013 • Derelict diner lent drama by Middlesbrough’s magnificent transporter bridge, which looms above it.  

D.R. Warehouse Ltd

D.R. Warehouse Ltd, Crowngate House, 60-64 Great Hampton Street, Birmingham, 2013 • One of many magnificent Jewellery Quarter buildings, a grade II listed ex-factory by Dunn, Dallas & Lloyd circa 1912. Currently […]

Chicken Cottage (Cardiff)

Chicken Cottage, 108 St Mary Street, Cardiff, Wales, 2012 • Large old marble shop surround at the base of a tall skinny building, now enhanced by having a Chicken Cottage unceremoniously […]

McKay Sound and Music

McKay Sound and Music, 100 Westgate Road, Newcastle upon Tyne, 2013 • Classic muso shop channelling the 1970s in Geordieland.

Sylvia’s, Prime English Rabbits

Sylvia’s, Prime English Rabbits, 12 Westoe Road, South Shields, South Tyneside, 2013 • Unusual ghost sign offering ‘fresh fish daily eggs prime English rabbits’. What more could you want?

Supertech

Supertech, 80 Fowler Street, South Shields, South Tyneside, 2013 • Wow, batteries for everything! Loving the old-style computer font.

Thomsons TV

Thomsons TV, 7 King Street, South Shields, South Tyneside, 2013 • Nice acrylic sign for this much-admired  family business, founded 1930. Closed 2013 to “avoid the ignominy of administration”, as shopping habits […]

Joplings

Joplings, John Street, Sunderland, 2013 • Established in 1804 and rebuilt many times over its two centuries on this site, this long-lived department store closed for good in 2010. Known as […]

Lady Godiva News

Lady Godiva News Devlins, 26 Broadgate, Coventry, West Midlands, 2013 • The equally weird twin of yesterday’s Peeping Tom newsagent; they’re situated either side of Coventry’s “famous” Lady Godiva clock, hence […]

Front Page News

Front Page News, Odeon Building, 33 Jordan Well, Coventry, West Midlands, 2013 • Lebara seem to have colonised every paper shop in the universe, but this must be the grandest. (2014 […]

Yorkshire Penny Bank (Caffe Nero)

Yorkshire Penny Bank (Caffe Nero), 37-40 Savile Street, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Established in 1860, Yorkshire Penny Bank changed its name to Yorkshire Bank in 1959, so it’s still around […]

B. Cooke & Son Ltd.

B. Cooke & Son Ltd.. 58-59 Market Place, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Traditional maritime business established in 1863 by Bernard Cooke, and still specialising in making nautical charts and optical […]

Cooplands

Cooplands, Trinity House, 71 Paragon Street, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • This is a branch of the bakery that bought Skeltons, featured yesterday. Apparently the big yellow tiled panel once held a […]

Skeltons Bakery

Skeltons Bakery, 11-15 Trinity House Lane, Kingston upon Hull, 2005 • Founded 1931, this 43-branch bakery went into administration in 2007 – there are some photos from its heyday here. It was bought by […]

Rank Hovis Clarence Mill

Rank Hovis Clarence Mill, Clarence Street, Hull, 2013 • And this is the reason I went to Hull – to catch this monolith before it gets knocked down, which is due […]

Maizecor

Maizecor, 141 Wincolmlee, Hull, 2013 • A maize milling company inhabits this imposing complex, whose immense walls are studded with wrought iron bearing plate rosettes (more about those here). The historic […]

W. & J. Oliver. (Stead & Smith Engineering)

W. & J. Oliver. (Stead & Smith Engineering), 153 Wincolmlee, […]

Post Office (Hull)

Post Office (Hull), 63 Market Street, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Fancy facade meets postal utilitarianism in Hull’s handsome Old Town; you can just imagine well-to-do seafaring types frequenting the premises […]

Mercure Hull Royal Hotel

Mercure Hull Royal Hotel, Paragon Station, 170 Ferensway, Hull, 2013 • Built in 1849 and recently refurbished, this is at the start of Hull’s Philip Larkin trail. It’s described in his […]

Kingston Tavern

Kingston Tavern, 76 Paragon Street, Hull, 2013 • Delicate tiled ghost sign (look at that intricate ‘O’) on the side of a closed-down city centre hostelry.

G.W. Horners

G.W. Horners, 21 Anlaby Road, Hull, 2013 • Pub in an imposing ex-fleapit, The Regent, which was built in 1910 (the towers were added later) and owned by the same family […]

Gibson Bishop & Co Ltd.

Gibson Bishop & Co Ltd., 73 Humber Street, Hull, 2013 • Nice 1950s detailing on this unreconstructed warehouse in Hull’s old fruit market, now being used as a creative quarter.

Edwin Davis

Ex-Edwin Davis department store, Bond Street, Hull, 2013 • When I came across this I guessed it was a derelict 1930s telecoms or waterworks building. In fact it’s a post-war rebuild […]

Ideal

Ideal, 14 Midland Road, Hull, 2013 • Next to the falling-down Albert Hall, an old printing works that currently offers motorcycle training. I love the tiny black arched windows at the […]

Thearne

Thearne, 15 South Street, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Not all the old shops in Hull are run down, as this superbly-signed example shows.

The Tool Box

The Tool Box, ghost sign above 3 Church Street, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Faded wooden ghost sign on a boarded up shop. Not all of Hull is boarded up – […]

Rich Rags, Well Suited

Rich Rags & Well Suited, 41 & 43 Alnaby Road, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Aptly named duo with old-school signage on the raggle-taggle architectural wonderland of Anlaby Road.

Queen’s Garden News

Queen’s Garden News, 10a Alfred Gelder Street, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Alfred Gelder Street – named after Hull’s most famous architect – launches in style with this liner-like black deco building, […]

Paragon Arcade

Paragon Arcade, Paragon Street, Hull, 2013 (top) and 2005 • Cute 1891 Gothic Revival arcade by Alfred Gelder. On the lower right of the very blurry 2005 shot you can see […]

Paragon Heel Bar

Paragon Heel Bar, 175 Ferensway, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Classic old heel and key bar named grandly after nearby Paragon Street, which in turn may have been named after an […]

Chichi

Chichi, 1 Witham, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Defunct nightclub with ridiculously incongruous name in the former National Provincial Bank, which was swallowed up by National Westminster in 1970. It says […]

Cecil (Mecca, Diva’s)

Cecil (Mecca, Diva’s), Cecil House, 1 Anlaby Road, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Still on the downbeat 1960s vibe, the clean-lined and rather fine (apart from all the tacky contemporary signage) Cecil […]

Ex-Co-op

Ex-Co-op, 32-38 Jameson Street, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Built 1957-63 to designs by the central Co-operative Architect’s Dept under G.S. Hay in Manchester, this is the other half of yesterday’s […]

Co-op Mosaic (BHS)

Co-op Mosaic (BHS), 32-38 Jameson Street, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Immense 1963 “three ships” mural by Alan Boyson, on what was then a super-duper new Co-Op building. There’s a huge […]

Bargain Suites

Bargain Suites, 433 Anlaby Road, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Trad sign writing on a crumbling Victorian terrace opposite Hull’s KC Stadium. Since demolished.

Baker Street Garage, Mark C. Brown & Son Ltd

Baker Street Garage, Mark C. Brown & Son Ltd, 22-24, […]

Albert Hall (The Fair & Square Club)

Albert Hall (The Fair & Square Club), 12 Midland Road, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • Practically opposite yesterday’s stunning Tower, another fun palace in far worse condition – a Victorian music […]

Tower

Tower (Tokyo Hull), 52 Anlaby Road, Kingston upon Hull, 2013 • A rather grubby topless lady keeps vigil over this magnificent 1914 cinema designed by H Percival Binks, which has been […]

Boots (Pret A Manger)

Boots (Pret A Manger), 7 Parade, Canterbury, Kent 2013 • Yet another parade of boots – this time, evidence of an earlier occupant of this ancient-looking building.

The Shakespeare (Victory Amusements)

The Shakespeare (Victory Amusements), 34 Linthorpe Road, Middlesbrough, 2013 • Another theatrical boozer; but unlike yesterday’s Garrick, poor old Bill’s given way to a less rewarding form of entertainment. Still, the […]

Garrick’s Head

Garrick’s Head, 50 Saville Street, North Shields, North Tyneside, 2013 • Beautiful 1899 pub, but the local council doesn’t seem to like its clientelele very much, according to this report of […]

Victory Cafe

Victory Cafe, 54 Eversholt Street, Euston, Borough of Camden, London NW1, 2013 & 2002 • Patriotic Pepsi cafe happily little changed since I first photographed it in 2002 (bottom).

The Grill

The Grill, Ponton Road, Nine Elms, Borough of Wandsworth, London SW8, 2013 • It may look like an industrial wasteland, but one day the new American embassy will rise behind this […]

Pickering & Mayell Ltd Reliance Works

Pickering & Mayell Ltd Reliance Works, 41-42 Caroline Street, Jewellery Quarter, Birmingham, West Midlands, 2013 • Founded in 1913, this jewellery packaging firm merged with1941-founded local rival Talbots and moved to […]

The Upper Crust Bakery

The Upper Crust Bakery, 4 Woolbrook Road, Sidmouth, Devon, 2013 • Nicely old-fashioned bakery from a nicely old-fashioned seaside town.

Moira’s

Moira’s, 123 Upper Spon Street, Coventry, West Midlands, 2013 • As featured yesterday, more of Coventry’s conserved Black Swan Terrace – underneath these green tiles lies a medieval building, which until 1903 […]

London Laundry

London Laundry, 120 Upper Spon Street, Coventry, West Midlands, 2013 • Part of Black Swan Terrace, a row of historic cottages that was derelict in the 1990s, and now restored to […]

Dodo

Dodo, FormConcepts, 34-5 New Bridge Street, Exeter, Devon, 2013 • Looks dead as the proverbial, despite the imposing doorway.

Coast News

Coast News, 9 East Parade, Whitley Bay, North Tyneside, 2013 • Wonder if it’s just serendipity that the old sign matches up with the new(ish) one?

Simmons Dining Rooms

Simmons Dining Rooms, 32 Caledonian Road, Borough of Islington, London N1, 2002, 2010, 2013 (top to bottom) • By 2010 there was a trendy cafe behind this facade – I preferred the saggy […]

Shoefayre

Shoefayre, 129-131 Borough High Street, Borough of Southwark, London SE1, 2013 • Was hidden by decaying scaffolding for over a decade until being revealed again in a street “smartening” for […]