Monthly Archives: September 2010

From Philadelphia, Bill Coleman recommends Kilian Hardware in Chestnut Hill.  He says they will change the battery in your watch, deliver mulch to your backyard, fix your screen door and sell you a replacement kit for your leaky toilet.  This is a man who really recognises and enjoys all that his local store has to offer.  Bill’s story is a reminder that big cities are often a collection of individual communities.  Each community has its local shops and services which local people must use regularly if they don’t want to lose them.  

City centres are amongst the hardest places for traditional ironmongers to survive.  Sadly, George Street in Edinburgh’s city centre lost Gray’s the Ironmongers in February this year, after over 190 years of trading.   I have heard other ironmongers speak almost reverentially of doing their apprenticeship at Gray’s, a shop with longstanding and very knowledgeable staff who will be sorely missed.   Nowadays, George Street’s ‘community’ is a transient one, an endless flurry it sometimes seems, of business people, fashionistas and occasional tourists.  Community ironmongers flourish more easily where there remains a more visible and permanent community; they have an intimate knowledge of their local customers and know what they want and need.  For example, I believe Marchmont Hardware will be as valuable to its local Edinburgh community as Kilian’s is to the Chestnut Hill community in Philadelphia.  And feedback on West End Hardware on Great Western Road, at the heart of Glasgow’s student population, shows that it has a finger on the local pulse.  On the Yelp website, one reviewer writes, ‘Back in my student days, this shop had the window that I would stare at, looking for a new place to stay, usually after I had exhausted the company of my latest flatmates. These days, I actually buy tools to fix things, and do so with trepidation. I prefer coming here to using the big chains – first of all, they have quality stuff and secondly, they are always willing to help. In fact, I think that they enjoy showing me the error of my soft ways. ‘

Sad to report, British Hardware Federation organisers have pulled the plug on the ’supplier showcase’ planned to coincide with their Scottish conference in October.   It seems the number of people signing up to attend the conference is lower than expected.  The expense of a conference might seem a bit of a luxury in the current climate but I can’t help feeling that its sometimes an investment to spend a couple of sociable days with colleagues in the same line of work, especially when times are hard.   Time spent out of the shop is precious but a good conference should be invigorating through the exchange of professional experience and ideas.  And the support of others in the same business, even if it starts as a shared grumble, can lift the spirits.  So I can only encourage them to assemble in this virtual world instead and share some ideas through IntoIronmongers.

I’m particularly disappointed because I had been invited to exhibit photographs as part of the showcase.  I was so looking forward to being part of an assembly of ironmongers and, selfishly, to what I was going to learn.   

By the way, what is the collective term for a group of ironmongers?  A bristle of ironmongers perhaps?  A clanging of ironmongers?  A forge of ironmongers?

Hamish Jack, manager at Farm and Household Stores in Inverness, started his ironmongery career as an apprentice in Elgin, sweeping up and running errands as well as riding a delivery bicycle that sometimes had a drum of paraffin strapped to it.  I’m grateful to Hamish who not only took time to talk but also gave me detailed written notes about his experiences and about the development of wholesale and retail ironmongery in the north of Scotland.  The day before, on the drive down from Thurso, I stopped in Helmsdale to visit AR McLeod & Sons.  It’s a small shop in Dunrobin Street and I was surprised to see a list of Kinks’ recordings for sale posted in the window.   I know I shouldn’t really be surprised by anything I see in an ironmonger’s window – they provide an ever growing range of services and their windows are often plastered with small ads and community events.  But this caught my eye because I’d been listening to the Kinks in the car, thinking that their music has really stood the test of time.  It turns out that around the same time that Hamish was pedalling his precarious bicycle around Elgin, Ian McLeod was working with the Kinks supporting their Scottish tours.   He still helps Ray Davies from time to time but he also runs a great little ironmongers.  See ironmongers?  Full of surprises.

Nina came to the exhibition (which has now closed) telling me about her research into Scottish women painters and decorators of the nineteenth century.  She’d unearthed some female ironmongers too but its up to me to find out more about them, an investigation I’ll start pursuing as autumn turns to winter.  I’ve also learned that I come from three generations of Hammermen in the City of Glasgow and should go to the Trades House to find out more – were/are there Hammerwomen I wonder?  Is this why I’m so comfortable hanging out in ironmongers?  Is it in the genes?  Alongside this rich historical thinking, I’ve been given names of ironmongers shops from Dalbeattie to Anstruther and from Stornoway to Paisley so I must start planning a few trips.  And there’s another exhibition opportunity.  The British Hardware Federation would like the exhibition as part of their Scottish Conference in Edinburgh in October.  Meanwhile, pottering in this welcome sunshine today, I painted the shed using, of course, weather proofed exterior paint and quality brushes bought from a splendid ironmonger!