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PHOTOGRAPHY: MARY EVANS PICTURE LIBRARY; GETTY IMAGES; REX FEATURES; RONALD GRANT ARCHIVE; TOPFOTO

onto them. “It might be said that department

storeshelpedtodemocratiseluxury,”heargues.

Women’s clubs developed during the same

period, as somewhere respectable women could

go for rest, refreshment and to meet their friends

in town. Canny department stores mimicked

their amenities. In 1909, Harrods extolled the

virtues of its “elegant and restful waiting and

retiring rooms for both sexes, writing rooms

with dainty stationery, club room, fitting rooms,

smoking rooms, a post office, theatre ticket

office, railway and steamer ticket and tourist

office, appointment board where one can leave

notes for friends, a circulating library and music

room”. They also offered entertainment with

in-store fashion shows, string quartets and

lavish window displays.

Fictional shopping
Emile Zola, The Ladies’ Paradise
(1883) Modelled after Le Bon
Marché and detailing many of
the store’s innovations.
Of Human Bondage W Somerset
Maugham’s 1915
autobiographical novel features
a spell as a poorly paid shop
worker in a Regent Street store.
It (1927) In this silent movie,
Clara Bow plays a spunky shop
girl who sets her sights on
the handsome and wealthy
boss of the store.
Bond Street Story by Norman
Collins (1959) Follows the hopes
and dreams of post-war workers
in London store ‘Rammell’s’ from
model to manager.
Are You Being Served? The
comedy dealings of the staff of
Grace Brothers kept people
amused throughout the 1970s.
Mannequin (1987). Andrew
McCarthy plays a window
dresser at Prince & Company
who falls for a mannequin.
Forget the dubious premise
and singalong to Starship’s
‘Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now’.

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A DAY AT SELFRIDGES

In 1909, Self r idges opened br ing ing US selling

slick to the UK. Its founder, Harry Gordon

Selfridge, understood the value of both novelty

and publicity and pitched visiting his store as a

pa st ime. From delight s such a s a n ice-crea m

soda fountain to the promise of a “rest cure” in

the ‘Silence Room’, every visitor need was

a nt icipated. “ I wa nt t hem to enjoy t he wa r mt h

and the light, the colours and styles, the feel of

fine fabrics,” Selfridge stated. “That is the basis

of this business.” His philosophy was

underpinned by solid selling, the first in the UK

to site cosmetics by the entrance and to open a

bargain basement. By the 1920s, Selfridges had

expa nded into 19 stores.

Other stores were doing the same. By the

1930s, there were more than 600 department

stores in towns and cities across Britain.

According to the Mass Observation survey,

women preferred them to independent clothes

shops because of the lack of aggressive,

commission-driven assistants. More household

gadgets, meant that the housewife’s leisure time

increased, too, and department stores catered to

that need. Teresa Collenette, co-curator of the

Fashion and Textile Museum’s ‘Night and Day:

1930s Fashion and Photographs’ exhibition

explains: “A housewife could happily spend her

day shopping in tow n before her ch ildren

“Visible price tags and

open displays helped to

democratise luxury”

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