Brick Lane and Petticoat Lane in the 70s – my memories

When I was a kid in the 70s, my Dad would take my sister and I down to Petticoat Lane and Brick Lane markets and then round to the Houndsditch Warehouse and the surrounding clothes stalls. When I walk along those streets now, I struggle to make out the places in my memories – so much has changed.

The strongest images in my mind are of orthodox Jewish antiques dealers selling old coins on stalls in a grimy cobbled courtyard. I still have two George III 1797 cartwheel pennies that I bought for about ten pence and now sell on ebay for thirty or forty quid. The Jewish presence in the area was still strong with restaurants and bagel shops – bit of a cursory presence these days.

Somewhere near Houndsditch was what looked like a large shed full of clothes racks and what appeared to be the suits of the recently deceased for sale. I was too young to be into retro clothes in the 70s and by the time I was in the 80s, I was going to Kensington Market and Camden instead. The rag trade in the east end was shifting from being a Jewish concern to Bangladeshi workshops and retailers.

On Petticoat Lane you’d run into a bustle of people shuffling past stallholders selling everything from babywear to toothbrushes. And the obligatory East End salesman giving his patter at full volume to credulous shoppers. One guy, I recall, holding up a luridly coloured toothbrush shouting:

Can’t tell ya what brand madam…but there’s ‘wisdom’ in having one!

Oh I thought as a 12 year old – I get it – it’s a toothbrush made by Wisdom (big brand at the time). I bought the toothbrush only to find the brand name stippled out with a hot pin. And the bristles ended up stuck between my teeth in no time. Think my Dad saw this as a lesson I had to learn. Don’t be taken in by smart talk!

Anyway, for all of you aged over 50 – here is the advertising jingle for the Houndsditch warehouse, which you will not be able to get out of your head for the next six months. Used to be played on LBC ad nauseum.

And Petticoat Lane in the 1960s – some of which hadn’t changed when I was a kid in the 70s.