PS Prosonics 2000 Ltd
PS Prosonics 2000 Ltd, 48 Essex Road, Borough of Islington, London N1, 2002 • A tech shop probably named when the millennium seemed futuristic, to judge by the phone logo. […]
Worthing & District TV
Worthing & District TV, 147 Tarring Road, Worthing, West Sussex, 2003 • Seaside signwriting with grocer’s apostrophe. The 1959-founded TV shop became Simpson Electrical, and Setyres is still there.
Nearly New Electrics
Nearly New Electrics, 97 Albert Road, Southsea, City of Portsmouth, 2016 • Colourful car key purveyor – one of many charming old-fashioned shopfronts on this stretch of road.
Sunfruit (Videotech)
Sunfruit, The Centre, Walton-on-Thames, Surrey, 2002 • Sunny, yet grim. Not-entirely-convincing rebrand from videos to fruit that was part of a bleak, now-demolished 1960s mall, The Centre, which I think was replaced […]
Southern TV Services
Southern TV Services, 60 Albert Road, Southsea, City of Portsmouth, 2016 • Sunnily-signpainted TV shop, which like yesterday’s gem I first spotted via the Instagram feed of Steve Wilde (known as @SteveWild on both Instagram […]
D.C. Auto Electrics
D.C. Auto Electrics, 429 Hornsey Road, Borough of Islington, London N19, 2010 • Grand pillars, graphic colour scheme, and a well-signposted post box. Still there, too.
Cyber Café
Cyber Café, Unit 1, New Broadway, Tarring Road, Worthing, West Sussex, 1999 • Hand-painted digital type meets 1960s mosaic on this sad closed down internet cafe. By 2015 the unit housed Attic Solutions, […]
Coe Electrical
Coe Electrical, 132 High Street, Lowestoft, Suffolk, 2007 • Looks like the plug was pulled decades ago on this old-style electrical shop. By 2015 it was unrecognisable as Sew Fabric.
Fenhams
Fenhams, 119 and 11c Grainger Market, Newcastle upon Tyne, 2005 • Beautiful 1960s sign for this electonics stall – not sure if it’s there any more.
Olympic Internet Cafe
Olympic Internet Cafe, 24 West Ham Lane, Borough of Newham, London E15, 2006 • Not the most exciting shopfront, but a nice hand-painted sign with old-style phone. And just look at […]
Victory Telecom The Phone Shop
Victory Telecom The Phone Shop, 1 Union Street, Ryde, Isle of Wight, 2002 • Remains of a painted confectionery / tobaccos sign on anonymous premises that my researches suggest is Victory Telecom The […]
Hare Krishna Matchless Gifts
Hare Krishna Matchless Gifts, 102 Caledonian Road, Kings Cross, Borough of Islington, London N1, 2010 • How cheerful! Still there but with a slightly less psychedelic logo.
Southern Video
Southern Video, 41 High Street, Herne Bay, Kent, 2004 • Red Profil on pink fascia, what a colourful shop. Last spotted in 2009 with blue Profil on yellow.
Beder Telecom
Beder Telecom, 207 Streatham High Road, Borough of Lambeth, London SW16, 2002 • Beder than a Lycamobile shopfront, anyway, despite the wired phone. Been replaced by a pub, unusually.
Barry S Rivers Radio Television
Barry S Rivers Radio Television, 57 Cinque Ports Street, Rye, East Sussex, 2015 • RYE 3179 says the phone number, in my fave old shop font – Profil, aka Decorated 035. There […]
Aladdin’s Cave
Aladdin’s Cave, 194 Middlewood Road, Sheffield, South Yorkshire, 2010 • Plucky use of mixed visual metaphors. Despite the magical name, Colonel Sanders is a reflection, he’s not actually in the shop.
Toys, Whitechapel Audio Time Ltd
Toys, Whitechapel Audio Time Ltd, 69 Whitechapel High Street, Borough of Tower Hamlets, London E1, 2003 • A fine Toys sign, but Audio Time ran out of time. It’s now AB […]
Microcola Computers, House Sign & Decorative Painter
Microcola Computers, House Sign & Decorative Painter, 27a&b The Belvedere, […]
Look-In, Aylesbury ex-Odeon
Look-In, Aylesbury ex-Odeon, 48 and 44 Cambridge Street, Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, 2010 • The TV shop shares a name with a popular 1970s kids’ TV mag, and apparently closed down 2005-ish. That’s Aylesbury’s ex-Odeon […]
Mobile 2K
Mobile 2K, 60a Bridge Street, Bolton, Lancashire, 2010 • The name probably seemed like a good idea in 2000. By 2014 it was an empty unit.
Nimbus Lighting
Nimbus Lighting, 144 High Sfreet, Rochester, Kent, 2015 • Discotastic logo.
Repairwise
Repairwise, 322 High Street, Rochester, Kent, 2015 • I always enjoy a bunker-like facade.
Spemco Manufacturing Ltd (Intra)
Spemco Manufacturing Ltd (Intra), 337-341 High Street, Rochester, Kent, 2015 • Defunct electrical products company behind a zigzaggy deco frontage. Intra is an arts venue and studio complex that now occupies the premises.
Rightpower Ltd
Rightpower Ltd, Trafalgar Lane, Brighton, East Sussex, 2004 • Note tiny, beautifully lettered instruction to slide the door. By 2015 the windows were still the same, but the painted signs had gone.
Miller Morgan Electric Co Ltd
Miller Morgan Electric Co Ltd, 20 Regent Place, Jewellery Quarter, Birmingham, 2005 • Decoratively decaying disappeared engineer in same building as yesterday’s Thomas Newey, all smart offices now.
T.A. Boxall & Co Ltd
T.A. Boxall & Co Ltd, 20 Balcombe Road, Horley, Surrey, 2002 • Retro signage for an engineering business established in 1935, according to their website. It’s still there but with a modernised facade.
AES Electrics
AES Electrics, 54 Nutfield Road, Merstham, Surrey, 2002 • You don’t see second-hand TVs like that any more. Later housed the more 21st century SusyRadio.com.
Martins Refrigeration
Martins Refrigeration, 19 Fortess Road, Borough of Camden, London NW5, 2012 • A close-up of Chris Ruocco’s scary-looking neighbour. That looks like a Gustav Metzger artwork in the widow, but I […]
Off Licence Internet
Off Licence Internet, 47 Fortess Road, Borough of Camden, London NW5, 2012 • An oddly minimalist shop window, no less bleak with its cafe set up out front (below). Still […]
Abba Electronics
Abba Electronics, 236 Kentish Town Road, Borough of Camden, London NW5, 2012 • Now I’m going to spend a few weeks featuring London postcodes I’ve not published before (though there are […]
Broadway Electronics
Broadway Electronics, 32 Broadway Market, Borough of Hackney, London E8, 2003 • I photographed this long before Broadway Market’s shutters got the Eine treatment. In this post-videotape era it’s been reborn as Buggies & Bikes, […]
Mobile Shop N Go
Mobile Shop N Go, 215 Mile End Road, Borough of Tower Hamlets, London E1, 2015 • Shop N Gone, more like – “Development site with consent”, says the sign.
Bobe Communication Centre
Bobe Communication Centre, 374 Caledonian Road, Borough of Islington, London N1, 2002 • You may think this is just another boring old international call shop, but one day these will be […]
Eastern Computers
Eastern Computers, Dairy Product Specalist, 370 & 368 Neasden Lane North, Borough of Brent, London NW10, 2014 • Next door to yesterday’s Dairy Product, and equally weary. Together I thought […]
Dyer
Dyer, 32 North Street, Leatherhead, Surrey, 2003 • Photocopy centre and fax bureau – how quickly hi tech becomes quaint. Their website says Dyer was established 1916 and is now run […]
Stones Television & Radio
Stones, circa 22 Atlantic Road, Brixton, Borough of Lambeth, London SW9, 2014 • 1920s-style ghost logo for a Brixton business that’s long, long gone. There’s a great picture history on […]
T.V. Video & Audio Sales & Service
T.V. Video & Audio Sales & Service, 145 Bethnal Green Road, Borough of Tower Hamlets, London E2, 2005 • Another prosaically-named emporium, looking as weary as the hulking TVs stacked inside. Recently became Isambard’s […]
Mercury Discount, Cambridge Heath Appliances
Mercury Discount, Cambridge Heath Appliances, 274-278 Cambridge Heath Road, Borough of Tower Hamlets, London E2, 2002 (top two) & 2006 • Beautiful signwiting, caught on its way out. Now a […]
R-H-Leather
R-H-Leather, 36 Goulston Street, Borough of Tower Hamlets, London E1, 2004 • Slightly less glamorous than yesterday’s clothes shop. Later became Gaba Unique Fashions Ltd, whose unique fashion statement was that it also […]
Time Peace (UK) ltd.
Time Peace (UK) ltd., 43-45 Goulston Street, Borough of Tower Hamlets, London E1, 2004 • Picturesquely bonkers watch outlet with a mis-spelt essay of punning signage and impenetrably boxed entrance. “Please […]
Maestro Records, Mobiles Phone
Maestro Records, Mobiles Phone, 61 Rye Lane, Borough of Southwark, London SE15, 2010 • Poignant collision of old and new tech divided by a fat conductor, in a typically ruinous […]
R & L Radio Ltd, Shoe Factors
R & L Radio Ltd, Shoe Factors, 30, 28 Kingsland Road, Borough of Hackney, London E2, 2002 • An old TV shop which has fallen victim to the well-known graffiti artist […]
Call Saver
Call Saver, 20 Caledonian Road, Borough of Islington, London N1, 2010 • A colourful closure; there’s a great pic of the premises open here.
Richer Sounds (Leeds)
Richer Sounds, 74 New Briggate, Leeds, West Yorkshire, 2014 • Looks like a baddie’s castle, but is in fact a budget hi-fi store in a former public dispensary.
Thornton & Co Ltd
Thornton & Co Ltd, 50-51 Briggate, Leeds, West Yorkshire, 2014 • Next door to M&S is this re-purposed HQ of an India rubber manufacturer. Moral: cast your name in stone if you […]
Computerama
Computerama, 13a Castle Gates, Shrewsbury, Shropshire, 2014 • A few clashing layers of history: defunct tech shop with 1960s facade (note Italian-themed mosaic pillars) in Tudorbethan house which says “1908” […]
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 […]
Cousins Corner, Radio Rentals Ltd
Cousins Corner, Radio Rentals Ltd, Lord Street, Liverpool L1, 2003 • Cousins was a local confectioner employing nearly 3,000 people, whose founder died aged 95 in 2010. Once a Liverpool meeting […]
Cookers ‘N’ Fridges
Cookers ‘N’ Fridges, 2 Northwald Road, Stoke Newington, Borough of Hackney, London N16, 2002 • Surfie graphics meet kitchen appliances – very North Dalston. It’s now called, brilliantly, Sellfridges.
RF Potts
RF Potts, 66-68 Babington Lane, Derby, Derbyshire, 2010 • Not as old-fashioned as its faux-digital font suggests, it even has a website which offers a virtual tour, says they were established in 1933. […]
The Semiconductor Archives
The Semiconductor Archives, 48 Deptford Broadway, Borough of Lewisham, London SE8, 2002 • Forbidding-looking emporium claiming to source obsolete tech components. There’s even something sinister about using the word “facsimile” rather […]
CGS Computers
CGS Computers, 22 Tanner’s Hill, Deptford, Borough of Lewisham, London SE8, 2002 • More unconvincing “computer” type, on premises that later became a Thai massage joint.
Internet Cafe (Chopstix)
Internet Cafe, 163 Charing Cross Road, Borough of Camden, London WC2, 2005 • Somehow the faux-computer font doesn’t manage to make this place look high tech. It was later razed to […]
Samuel Ironmongers Ltd
Samuel Ironmongers Ltd, 418 Edgware Road, City of Westminster, London W2, 2003 • One of my favourite-ever finds, a sad but splendid old hardware shop, once deserving of a double awning and […]
Scratch n’ Dent
Scratch n’ Dent, 211 Tarring Road, Worthing, West Sussex, 2003 • I love the wonky carpet of tiles, and it’s a great name for a shop, though now more poshly rebranded […]
The Music Roll Exchange.
The Music Roll Exchange., ghost sign behind Premier Food & Wine, 29 Clapham High Street, Clapham North, Borough of Lambeth, London SW4, 2002 • Secondhand music rolls, the superannuated CDs of […]
J.W. Pelling
J.W. Pelling, 17 New Broadway, Tarring Road, Worthing, West Sussex, 2003 • A brave survivor from the days when wireless didn’t mean wi-fi and satellite dishes were giant receivers based at Goonhilly […]
Rottingdean Tele-Radio
Rottingdean Tele-Radio, 59-61 Marine Drive, Rottingdean, East Sussex, 2004 • Not a title you’d come up with nowadays. It’s still there, but only the left half, and with a faux rather […]
Surrey Scale Company Limited.
Surrey Scale Company Limited., 2 The Parade, Philanthropic Road, Redhill, Surrey, 2001 • Now Davey’s Wines & Spirits – do you think they still have scale companies in this digital era? […]
Auto Electrical
Auto Electrical, 223 Old Kent Road, Borough of Southwark, London SE17, 2002 • Last glimpse of classic signwriting prior to replacement with jerrybuilt-looking office block.
T.V.s Are “Us”
T.V.s Are “Us”, 54 Streatham Hill, Borough of Lambeth, London SW2, 2001 • Yeah, I’d definitely buy my quality ex-rental TV here. Nice car!
Disc Chord
Disc Chord, 71 High Street, Lowestoft, Suffolk, 2007 • Oh, the sad decline of record stores: by 2008 this had become a charity shop.
Adfa Ventures Limited
Adfa Ventures Limited, 446 New Cross Road, Borough of Lewisham, London SE8, 2002 • Mmmm, their hi-tech sign is really giving me confidence. Now replaced by a solicitor, however.
AM & Son Auto Electrician
AM & Son Auto Electrician, 25 Midland Road, Borough of Camden, London NW1, 2002 • One of of a series of decaying garages subsumed into the vast, posh ramparts of the […]
The Johnson Engineering Co
The Johnson Engineering Co, 319 Kennington Road, Borough of Lambeth, London SE11, 2000 & 2005 (bottom) • There’s no trace of these stunning signs left – it’s now a boring […]
Des & Sons Audio Technology 2001
Des & Sons Audio Technology 2001, 105 Dulwich Road, Herne Hill, Borough of Lambeth, London SE24, 2001 • A look slightly at odds with the futuristic-sounding year. By 2012 it […]
Johnson & Jones Speaker Repair Specialists
Johnson & Jones Speaker Repair Specialists, 11 Balls Pond Road, […]
Shopfront Elegy 