Survivor - a photo on Flickriver

Survivor

            Bluston's Gown Shop in Kentish Town Road is thought to be the last example in London of an "arcade" shopfront.  These were an elaboration of the simple entrance lobby, in which the shop's door was set back from the street, thereby increasing the amount of window display space.  Even these are now uncommon.  The arcade front was a development of this idea often, as here, with a free-standing "island" display case.
They became popular in the early years of the 20th century but, by the late 30s, according to Kathryn A. Morrison's English Shops and Shopping, they had begun to fall into disfavour.  When I was a boy they were still numerous and especially popular with drapers.  The reasons for the decline were that the window displays were quite labour-intensive (remember "window dressers"?) and somewhat difficult to light.  The island display cases were not accessible from the shop and had to have their own door.  Also, of course, they were places of seclusion to which courting couples resorted after hours and ...well, goodness gracious!  But mostly it was the desire to maximise retail floorspace that led to the disappearance of the arcade front and its replacement by the uninteresting pavement-edge shopfronts of today.
   

Taken on: January 9, 2009

Tags:

shopfront

arcade shopfront

Bluston's

Bluston's Gown Shop

London

Kentish Town

high street

shop

shopping

retailing

retail trade

store

london shops « less

Groups appears in: • Vanishing Beauty - Please read the group description! • Retro Nostalgic Skooldays more » • United Kingdom Social History to 1989 • London Shops « less

Camera: Fujifilm FinePix S9500, f/3.4, 1/210 sec, 10.8mm, ISO 400 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Fujifilm FinePix S9500
Aperture:	f/3.4
Exposure Time:	0.005 sec (1/210)
Focal Length:	10.8mm
ISO:	400
Exposure Bias:	0 EV
Flash:	Off, Did not fire
Exposure Program:	Program AE
Exposure Mode:	Auto
Metering Mode:	Average
White Balance:	Auto
Saturation:	High
Color Space:	Uncalibrated
Software:	Picasa 3.0
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