Old WHSmith Logo

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The olld livery is still adorning the delivery bays of Redcar and Tonbridge:

https://twitter.com/Bob_Fischer/status/1273984612776251392/photo/2

That burnt orange colour does clog my pipes, I do confess.

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SMH

Do you have difficulty distinguishing Ws from Ms?

[Neomod]

That burnt orange colour does clog my pipes, I do confess.

That colour scheme is very 1973. Still iconic though.

[Mobbd]

Definitely should, it's great.  They seemed to just go down the route of looking like a shit John Menzies when they took over ownership.

To me, it seemed to be part of a general "updating" of aesthetic culture in Britain, unfortunately tantamount to binning design classics. A little earlier perhaps but think of the Gilbert Scott red telephone boxes being replaced by those dystopian plastic grey ones.

It's like we were embarrassed about the '70s or looking quaint or something and then (imho) zigged when we should have zagged.

I only half-know what I'm talking about here. If anyone can add to this wonky narrative, I'm interested.

The current Smiths logo is especially bad though, isn't it? It's not just the modernising effort that wilts my winkie; it's just how it looks a bit amateurish. Lazy minimalist, not clever minimalist. It doesn't look like it went through much of a process somehow.

They definitely should bring the logo back. I think it's worked really well for the Co-op, who dusted off their 1968 logo a couple of years ago and got, as far as I can tell, nothing but praise for doing so.

It's really lovely, isn't it? I think others are following suit or else there's just something in the water because it's happening internationally too. Burger King: https://www.dezeen.com/2021/01/12/burger-king-rebrand-retro-logo/?li_source=LI&li_medium=bottom_block_1

It's got a very nostalgic feel. Seeing it reminds me of the excitement of going to the WH Smith's in Carlisle (before John Menzies was taken over, which is what we had in my home town). Two floors of all sorts of interesting stuff, from CDs and books to weird little dice.

Yes, same here. It was where you could go and hide when your parents were shopping for less exciting things. Pre-internet, it was an important source of cultural information. All those magazines and media. I remember reading White Dwarf and shit like that for ages, then poring over the CDs and video tapes - for "news" really, to see what was going on.

I don't think we're the only ones to feel nostalgic about Smiths. Charlie Brooker had a 1984 branch recreated for Black Mirror (Bandersnatch, I think) and they did a great job.

That burnt orange colour does clog my pipes, I do confess.

Phwoar! Yeah! That lovely civic 1970s colour.

[Mobbd]

The olld livery is still adorning the delivery bays of Redcar and Tonbridge:

https://twitter.com/Bob_Fischer/status/1273984612776251392/photo/2

Thanks for posting that. That's great. Love a good relic.

I had a Saturday job in a Smiths as a teenager circa 2000. In the staff room cupboard I found ceramic plates and mugs with the cube logo going around the edges as decoration. Really wish I'd scavved them.

[buzby]

To me, it seemed to be part of a general "updating" of aesthetic culture in Britain, unfortunately tantamount to binning design classics. A little earlier perhaps but think of the Gilbert Scott red telephone boxes being replaced by those dystopian plastic grey ones.

The Giles Gilbert Scott-designed Kiosk, No. 6 (or K6) telephone box ended production in 1968, replaced by the rectangular Kiosk, No. 8. There were 60000 K6s installed between 1925 and 1968, and 10000 of these are still in situ (even if a lot of them no longer have phones in them). There were 11000 K8s installed between 1968 and 1983, but less than 100 survive,


From 1983 new installs and attrition replacements used the new KX series phone boxes (the K6 had been out of production for 16 years by that point, so components to repair them no longer existed). The new KX100 used an aluminium frame clad in stainless steel and easily replacable large panes of glass (later plexiglass) that did not need painting and could easily be cleaned and repaired if vandalised.


In 1996 the KX100 was updated to the KX100+ by the addition of a fibreglass domed cap that echoed the dome on the K6.

Some sites have since been converted to also house cash machines, using modified KX100+ kiosks


Any other designs you see aren't BT ones. Mercury installed their own payphone network between 1988 and 1995, when they were sold off to Interphone, who sold off most of their sites to another private payphone operator called New World Payphones, who installed their own MWP1000 kiosks

[Huxleys Babkins]

Thanks for posting that. That's great. Love a good relic.

I had a Saturday job in a Smiths as a teenager circa 2000. In the staff room cupboard I found ceramic plates and mugs with the cube logo going around the edges as decoration. Really wish I'd scavved them.

They sound ace. Partially related, I've always wanted a set of these:



So many happy childhood memories tied up in those plates.

[thenoise]

They've also been able to stay open during the lockdowns on account of selling newspapers, magazines and stamps.  I'm sure the rest of the shop (the "non essential") should probs have been barricaded off like a lot of supermarkets did in lockdown 1, but the one in Bath was fully open.  Assuming they've carried that on all the way through across most or all stores, I expect they've seen a bit of an upturn in general business.

Books and DVDs for old people, greetings cards and school stationery.  Still the best option for stationery in 90% of towns.  Magazines, although sales are way down overall, specialist/niche hobbyist type magazines are still doing well, and Smiths' selection is the best around.  Not to mention their distribution side-hustle, which makes more money than their shop proper (no idea if that is true).

it's weird and archaic, though.  The last of the old school chains still standing.

[Darles Chickens]

My parents' box of Christmas decorations was like a time capsule, featuring stuff like these Woolworths baubles (with the old logo, branded as Winfield).

[Brundle-Fly]

Talking of 1970's orange shop logos that use the company's initials in the design, any fans of Fine Fare here?  Last spotted in the public consciousness in Ghost Stories (2017)



I'm surprised Franz Ferdinand didn't nick this. Or at least Denim for a 1996 CD single sleeve called 'Follyfoot Fame'.Or Fuzzy Felt?  Or maybe just Fine Fayre? The logo even looks like Lawrence in a scarf.

[Mobbd]

They sound ace. Partially related, I've always wanted a set of these:



So many happy childhood memories tied up in those plates.

Ah, that's the business. They're not actually unlike the WHSmith ones I remember. I don't think they had a big central logo like that, but the interlocking logo (almost like a Greek Key) went around the edge of a white plate and the rip of a white cup just like those.

[Mobbd]

it's weird and archaic, though.  The last of the old school chains still standing.

There was a funny Twitter thing a couple of years ago called @WHS_Carpet where people submitted their pics of shabby WHSmith carpets. It was very "desso."

The account still seems to be there (or rather, is back, because it vanished for a while) but it's more general now. I think Smiths might even have asked them to stop it.

It made the national and trade press! https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/may/28/wh-smith-rated-uk-worst-high-street-shop-by-which-readers

https://www.managementtoday.co.uk/dismal-decline-whsmith/food-for-thought/article/1369095

I didn't mean for this to become a desso thread. Let's keep it happy and about design nostalgia!

[studpuppet]

This picture is literally my first memory of a 'trip out of the house'. My brother had eyesight problems, so my mum would take him on six-monthly visits to the eye hospital near Elephant & Castle. I must have been pre-school age because I had to go with them, and to avoid me kicking off my mum used to promise me a Matchbox car and a Wimpy for lunch. So after the appointment we'd go to the (relatively new and still-futuristic looking) shopping centre and do the WHS-Wimpy one-two.

[Neomod]

They sound ace. Partially related, I've always wanted a set of these:



So many happy childhood memories tied up in those plates.

Lovely stuff.

My parents' box of Christmas decorations was like a time capsule, featuring stuff like these Woolworths baubles (with the old logo, branded as Winfield).

My mate had a Winfield amp with classic spring reverb which created Dr Who-esque sound effects every time it was nudged. I'm sure I once received a pair of Winfield trainers at some point too, "They're better than Adidas, they have one extra stripe - Waaaaaaa!"[nb]apologies Limmy[/nb]

[holyzombiejesus]

I had to go through Manchester today for work and HOW THE FUCK IS WHSMITH AN ESSENTIAL RETAILER?

[bgmnts]

I had to go through Manchester today for work and HOW THE FUCK IS WHSMITH AN ESSENTIAL RETAILER?

Dont they have royal mail postage sent through there? Maybe getting by on that.

[holyzombiejesus]

Not the one I went past, no. Fucking horrible shop.

[Mobbd]

I had to go through Manchester today for work and HOW THE FUCK IS WHSMITH AN ESSENTIAL RETAILER?

Gel pens.

[Huxleys Babkins]

Not the one I went past, no. Fucking horrible shop.

https://www.whsmith.co.uk/help/coronavirus-update/hel00025/

No, but they are using the fact they have 200 stores with Post Offices inside as an excuse to keep the whole lot open.

The place is a ghost town at the best of times, so it's hard to feel anger, just pity. I'd feel less safe in an empty field. In 1992.

[Gurke and Hare]

I had to go through Manchester today for work and HOW THE FUCK IS WHSMITH AN ESSENTIAL RETAILER?

Because newsagents are classed as such. And yeah, some of them having post offices in too.

[petril]

My parents' box of Christmas decorations was like a time capsule, featuring stuff like these Woolworths baubles (with the old logo, branded as Winfield).

the fact there's not even an attempt at green dates it so much more than anything else

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Between 1984 and 1988 my Dad worked in Newcastle Upon Tyne, so for most of my holidays the family went up there to see Newcastle, Whitley Bay and various other places nearby.


Returning to school, we were always asked to write down what we had done during our holidays.  And every single time, I would communicate that I had gone to ELDON SQUARE where the whole family had visited JOHN MENZIES, WHSMITH and a long list in capital letters of all the other shops I could remember going to.  The teacher always wrote exclamation marks in the margin at this.  I think she probably felt sorry for me.



For various reasons I'm honestly amazed that nobody thought of testing me for learning difficulties or autism, but I don't know what the emphases on these kinds of things were in the 1980s.  I remember getting very much the "you're stupid, easily distracted and annoying everyone" approach.

[Donnas Cakes]

It's got a very nostalgic feel. Seeing it reminds me of the excitement of going to the WH Smith's in Carlisle (before John Menzies was taken over, which is what we had in my home town). Two floors of all sorts of interesting stuff, from CDs and books to weird little dice.

I second that emotion.
The WH Smith scenes in Bandersnatch were very nostalgic. Many a Saturday typing rude messages into ZX Spectrums.

[Captain Crunch]

It's really hard to get a good picture but the branch in Weston-super-Mare has beautiful artwork:



The middle section reads 'COME AND TAKE CHOICE OF ALL MY LIBRARY / AND SO BEGUILE THY SORROW'.

Grade II listed now.

No branch could possible fill the void in my heart left by memo in Woolwich, stationery heaven now lost.

[Psmith]

I remember they wouldn't stock Private Eye at one time ,but I can't remember why.The Eye called them W H Smug and I would agree with that.

[the science eel]

It's got a very nostalgic feel. Seeing it reminds me of the excitement of going to the WH Smith's in Carlisle (before John Menzies was taken over, which is what we had in my home town). Two floors of all sorts of interesting stuff, from CDs and books to weird little dice.

Workington?

[Norton Canes]

They're the only place in town I can get 2000 AD on Wednesdays so hoping they don't go under any time

[Gurke and Hare]

I remember they wouldn't stock Private Eye at one time ,but I can't remember why.The Eye called them W H Smug and I would agree with that.

Private Eye called someone smug? Blimey.

[canadagoose]

Workington?

Nah, Hawick - but I think The Culture Bunker is from that part of the world (or at least near it)!

[The Culture Bunker]

Nah, Hawick - but I think The Culture Bunker is from that part of the world (or at least near it)!

Indeed, but I'm no jameater from Wukkie - born and raised in Whitehaven (escaped 21 years ago).

Never been to Hawick, but the name always reminds me of hearing the rugby scores on Border Lookaround.