Beale The Store, No More
Ernest Shackleton-One of Arthur Beale’s more famous clients!
Grace’s Guide to British Industry, says that Arthur Beale was established as a rope maker called John Buckingham’s circa 1500. Our Sign says “Established 400 years”
but the sign is 60 years old!
I woke up this morning to the following Instagram post.
The End of Shaftesbury Avenue for Arthur Beale - As many of you may have already heard, after 150 years at 194 Shaftesbury Avenue we are closing the shop. The impact of Covid-19 means the company can no longer warrant paying the rents that a Central London shop demands so we have no choice but to move on to pastures new. The shop has a clearance sale with 20% off everything until 24th June, so do pop in as there is a real treasure trove of stock on offer. We were left in a very precarious state as a result of the pandemic, but luckily for us we have found two enthusiastic new investors to help inject some much-needed capital back into the business! This means we will be continuing to operate online at www.arthurbeale.co.uk, and we hope to have a London presence again some-time in the future. There’s still some life in the old ship yet! See you soon, The Arthur Beale Team
You might think there is nothing particularly sad about a shop closing due to Covid. This wouldn’t be the first. However, this chandlery was special.
Shaftsbury Avenue in London’s West End was built between 1877 and 1886 by the architect George Vulliamy as part of a slum clearance measure, to push impoverished workers out of the city centre.
The Avenue is generally considered the heart of London's West End theatre district, with the Lyric, Apollo, Gielgud and Sondheim theatres clustered together on the west side of the road between Piccadilly Circus and Charing Cross Road. At the intersection of Shaftesbury Avenue and Charing Cross Road there is also the large Palace Theatre. Finally, the north-eastern end of the road has another large theatre, the Shaftesbury Theatre. So, it always felt a little incongruous walking through the theatre district to find amongst these elegant buildings this treasure trove of maritime bits and pieces, many many miles from the open sea.
The history of this little shop is astounding. You can’t really go past their website for the best condensed history
“Grace’s Guide to British Industry, says that Arthur Beale was established as a rope maker called John Buckinghams circa 1500. Our Sign says “Established 400 years” but the sign is 60 years old! We have never moved from our current spot but in those days the Parish of St Giles area was surrounded by fields, possibly growing the flax we used to make our rope. The Church of St Giles in the Fields still stands across the road. John Buckingham not only made rope and twine but sacks and mats too. The town of London gradually encroached on St Giles and the company needed more space to meet the demand so they set up other rope walks in Islington and also on the banks of the Fleet in Kentish Town. In 1864 the Alpine Club of Great Britain being distressed by various climbing rope failures decided to set up a committee to carry out strength tests. Out of all the ropes they tested only three met their standards. All three were made by Buckingham and Sons of Broad Street, St Giles. In 1890 the 15-year-old Arthur Beale joined the company as an office boy. Broad Street was redeveloped and renamed Shaftesbury Avenue. Arthur Beale junior was born in 1899. In 1901 the company became known as Beale and Cloves (late John Buckingham) and soon after just Arthur Beale. The Alpine Club Rope grew in popularity and was used throughout the world. It was ordered for all the early Everest Expeditions as well as by Shackleton for his polar exploits. In fact, we also supplied Shackleton’s Ice Axes and specialist pulleys. Our archives have many letters from famous explorers together with signed order forms from Ernest Shackleton. After the 1st World War Arthur Beale began to concentrate on yachting equipment although it also had a busy rigging shop supplying equipment for the MOD. They had a department which hired out flags and decorations for banquets and ceremonial events. They even put the flag pole on Buckingham Palace and Arthur Beale himself broke the flag for the King's Coronation.
In 1932, Arthur Beale Senior passed away and his son Arthur took over the running of the shop.
In the middle of the last century, the yachting part of the business boomed. Arthur Beale was one of the founder members who set up the original London Boat Show. During the 1960's boating became a popular pastime with many middle-class families and the introduction of economical self-build boats such as the Mirror Dinghy increased participation further. For the last fifty years, the shop was managed by Mr Coleman. He made an excellent job of it until recent times when a failure to adopt new products and practises left the company in decline.
Alasdair Flint, a keen sailor, and his team bought the shop in 2014 and are now looking forward to making it an icon of British yachting and exploration. Alasdair Flint is a keen yachtsman who has owned and maintained a varnished wooden yacht for the last thirty years. During that time he has sailed single handed across the Atlantic and made several Arctic voyages including meeting polar bears in Spitzbergen and more recently climbing the world’s most northerly volcano for which he, and fellow skipper Tim Loftus, were awarded the prestigious Tilman Medal by the Royal Cruising Club.”
So finally, the shop on Shaftesbury Avenue closes and Arthur Beale Ltd moves on line, like so much of our lives has done in recent years. I miss the smell of good chandleries. Melbourne our home port used to have a couple. Not anymore. The choice now is to click through the sanitised pages of a faceless, soulless aggregator, or brave the incompetence and ignorance of the one remaining Australian bricks and mortar chain store. Yes you know the one that I mean!
// By Mark Chew