Shops we have lost and that we miss.

Does anyone remember Coopers in Liverpool with its doughnut making machine and same city but West Derby village had a wonder ful grocers called Brooke's where everything was sliced weighed and measured. I miss Woolworths but we have Wilkinsons and Yorkshire trading which seem to fill the gap.

As said before - we will get the Cities we deserve. Day in, day out- chains and small shops, independent cafés and restaurants, boutiques, ironmongers, haberdashers - close - possibly never to return again. Is that what we really want?

We had a Greensmith Downes in St Andrews too. I think I once bought a pair of twill trousers there and thought I was very posh. I wasn't! But I was quite warm which was all to the good.
When I was doing my Dip Ed year in Edinburgh, I used to pop in to Crawford's on North Bridge before I caught the train home to Linlithgow and pick up some crusty rolls for my mum.

I meant Melrose's

There used to be a men's shop called 'The Fifty Shilling Tailors' in Princes Steet, Edinburgh.In the same period there was a specialist coffee retailer on a corner which was called Melsose's corner and was known for the lovely smell of coffee that hung around there especially on frosty mornings

@Annodomini:

Yes! Memories of Edinburgh long ago. I used to think Greensmith Downes was really posh and I bought a pink and white check nylon seersucker blouse there which I had seen in their window. We had many fewer clothes then compared with what we have now and a blouse was a big buy.Thorntons on the corner of Hanover Street. That funny old mock half timbered Parker's Stores that I only ever saw from the top of a tram, near the McEwen Hall thereabouts.

I ahve just retired one of thise shades...in favour of a 40s one bought in a boot sale!
I had a big one that looked like a wasps nest, and found a 6" fluffy wasp to put in the entrance.....

Oh yes! We had those spherical shades which were the last word in contemporary decor at the time.

Didn't we all get those large white paper spherical light shades from Habitat? They came in a flat pack and easily opened up and were so cheap!
Everyone had them. habitat was bang up to date and so trendy at the time. They also sold wonderful sofas.

kitty - Habitat was the epitome of chic to us when we were first married, My idea of heaven was the kitchen department at the South Ken branch. I still have a chicken brick and a hexagonal white vase from there from the early 70's! Youngest DD also started her retail career at Habitat after university 9 years ago., so I have lots of seconds and samples from her time there!!

A town centre with a good range of shoe shops. You used be able to go from Dolcis to Lilly & Skinner, K Shoes, Freeman Hardy Willis, etc, etc, etc.

gracesmum, you have stirred some memories there. We were devoted to PT's in Edinburgh. When we lived in Linlithgow my parents had an account there and in our late teens we were allowed to use it for essentials like stockings. A favourite activity was to go round trying on the fancy hats in the millinery department. What fun! My duffel coat for University (and many years after) came from PT's as did a very chic (and quite short) little black and white checked pinafore dress in the 60s. A shopping trip with Mum usually included lunch in their restaurant.

I went to the Top Rank Suite POGS or the one in Silver Street whose name I have, predictably, forgotten and the Penny Farthing! We knew how to live!

The Army and Navy in Victoria Street, Marshall & Snelgrove, D.H. Evans, Jenners (Oh I know it's still there but it's not the same) And while we're at it, Patrick Thomson's on The Bridges. Elegran and other Scots will know what I mean!

I miss Home and Colonial where you could buy loose everything and dry goods were weighed out into purple thick paper bags. The biscuits were in glass topped boxes and you got served.!

Sorry to be late.

Sook Yes they are batter bits. I feel right cheated you lot had them for 'nowt'.

Kitty

I bet you were a 'chique chick' at the Palais or Grannies nightclub.

On our recent visit to UK we were really upset that Cecil Jacobs photographic had gone belly up. Not because of high rents, but because customers would go and ask for advice in the shop, then walk out and order on line - which to me is totally unfair competition.

Each of those individual 'event' is hardly going to make a difference, but taken 'en masse' the effect is disastrous. As said, we will have the towns our behaviour create.

I miss C & A also Littlewoods, is hard when all main shopping centres seem to have now is Debenhams, B H S Marks and Spencer and the cheapies like H & M and Primark which in my opinion stock rubbish.

o well I still seem to buy an awful lot of stuff!!

I don't know how that can be entirely true, granjura. OK so we can refuse to shop online and we can give our custom to local shops etc., but for those on a low income cheaper goods from out of town supermarkets are a godsend, and a lot of high street shops have been forced to close down because of greedy landlords pricing them out.

I still miss McKays, before they became M&Co. and became more aimed at the younger market. I still have tops I bought from McKays years and years ago, and they still look good!

C&A is very much alive and kicking in Switzerland still

But honestly, we will get the towns, shops and cafés we deserve. It is OUR everyday actions which will determine what happens next.

I'm so pleased that I got a very stylish bedside lamp from Habitat before it disappeared.

I'd forgotten Habitat!

Habitat furnished most of our house when we first got married. We had sagbags and scoop chairs, a dining table and chairs. There was a shop in Nottingham until about 2 years ago that sold all sorts of vintage habitat, including the catalogues.

POGS don't remember a jewellers in Charles Street but I bought a fitted maxi-coat, with a fur collar, from that C&A. I also had some black patent knee high boots from a shoe shop on Granby Street - I was smart!!

Yes, Habitat are in Homebase now. We had one a mile away from my house and I picked up so many bits of kitchenalia and fabric from there over the years. I buy knitting wool online now, although there is a lovely wool and sewing shop in the middle of Didsbury (note to anno - it's just near the corner of School Lane and Wilmslow Road).

I loved Seymour Meads when I was young. My grandmother could sit on a chair and observe whilst they cut her bacon, patted her butter, bagged up raisins and sugar, and cut cheshire or 'cooking' (cheddar) cheese. I would be given a handful of broken biscuits to keep me occupied, whilst they exchanged pleasantries and gossip, then we would walk to the butcher's and the delivery boy would turn up with the groceries when we got back home.

Have Habitat now got a section in Homebase along with Laura Ashley?

Also miss Habitat sometimes because they were edgy and trendy once upon a time and then got pushed out a bit by IKEA. I've never found shopping at that store a pleasant experience, even with free meatballs thrown in. The shop I really miss, which had a very niche following, was BIBA, I'm going to an exhibition down in Brighton early next year with one of my closest friends from way back so we can relive our youthful retail experiences.