Sandle Brothers, Manufacturing Stationers
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Today there is not even one stationer left but, not so long ago, there were a multitude of long-established manufacturing stationers in and around the City of London. Sandle Brothers opened in one small shop in Paternoster Row on November 1st 1893, yet soon expanded and began acquiring other companies (including Dobbs, Kidd & Co, founded in 1793) until they filled the entire street with their premises – and become heroic stationers, presiding over long-lost temples of envelopes, pens and notepads, recorded in this brochure from the Bishopsgate Institute.
The Envelope Factory
Stationery Department – Couriers’ Counter
A Corner of the Notepad & Writing Pad Showroom
Gallery for Pens in the Stationers’ Sundries Department
Account Books etc in the Stationers’ Sundries Department
Japanese Department
Picture Postcard & Fancy Jewellery Department
One of the Packing Departments
Leather & Fancy Goods Department
Books & Games Department
Christmas Card, Birthday Card & Calendar Department
A Corner of the Export Department
Images courtesy Bishopsgate Institute
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I like this.
Such incredible photos, thank you so much. Oh that it was still there ?
That is a very ambitious address! I can almost smell the papery odour. Unfortunately, London doesn’t have many “big shops” left and stationery is used far less in our electronic age. Through dealing with my late parents’ affairs, I have learned that writing a letter evokes a response that otherwise would be impossible to obtain. Organisations make themselves almost unreachable via their impossible online, AI driven chatbots, that consistently don’t know the answer to my question, or via phone lines with queues testing the patience of the proverbial saint. A letter does the job.
This looks like the kind of shop I would have spent a lot of time in. I’m rather fascinated by it having a Japanese department. Thanks GA, another fascinating mind-wander.
I love stationery! I would have been in stationery heaven wandering such places! I can imagine how many purchases I’d have left with!
Simply amazing!
Could the business have survived to today? Was it demolished by the Blitz?
I love all things to do with paper and stationery and I collect little notebooks wherever I go. I live near Basel Papermill Museum and often visit (you can make a sheet of watermarked paper).
My house in Scotland used to be part of an old stationery print works. It has high very ceilings downstairs as there would have been printing machinery. Upstairs much lower ceilings for the typesetters.
I could have spent many a happy hour truffling away in there.