The 90s to 2002
The 90s were an enormous time of change for me, in many ways..
I started work at Liberty Department Store in London as Assistant Maintenance Manager, rising to House Services / Retail Support Manager, with roles that included… Maintenance of General Building Services + Electrical and Mechanical / Cleaning - Porterage / Goods In and Out / Post and Packaging Room / Office Equipment Purchase / Specialist Pre Retail of Perfumery and Jewellery. Then i accepted additional responsibilities for Group Fleet Cars / Corporate Retail Packaging and Stationary (A role that took me to Hong Kong and China as the Buyer). It was a great time with a lot of responsibility, but i was fortunate to have a large experienced team.
I had no previous experience of some of my responsibilities, but was very quick to learn and The Managing Directors backed me well. I must admit the one that surprised me most was to be asked by The Managing Director to be the buyer for Corporate Retail Packaging and Stationary for what was then 20 Stores. But he knew my wife who also worked at Liberty as Manager of Ground and Basement sales floors was an ex buyer for Harvey Nicholls / Fenwick’s and Dickens and Jones…So i was off to Hong Kong China….The Pantone 269C colour reference for the then packaging colour is embedded in my brain forever. I bought for 20 shops and a year later they were closed !
We worked for the Liberty family who still owned the business and were very hands on. We had wonderful if not sometimes very offbeat promotion evenings, which sometimes bordered on being in the party spirit. Cirque du Soleil (1996 1st time in London) Promotion Trapeze Artists in the centre well of the Scarf Hall arguing over a love triangle during their exhibition / Irish Products Promotion (They had a huge Guinness input and the whole ground floor smelt like a brewery next morning). / A Slovenian Evening with The Slovenian “Elvis Presley” and copious amounts of Pear Schnapps and table dancing. / A huge Mongolian felt Yurt installed in the basement, that had customers and staff alike scratching for dear life. Which had to be removed and the area fumigated. / The Afghan Mujahideen carpets exhibition with grenade-Kalshnikov and planes bombing designs on carpets that sold out in 1 day to everyone’s surprise, / Festival of the Dead Mexican exhibition which included a lot of Phallic exhibits that had to be quickly removed from public view… etc..etc..etc. In August 93 we had IRA planting cassette incendiary devices in pockets of garments on hanging rails..one went off and sprinklers kicked in causing a great deal of water damage. On another occaision a shopfitter drilled a 6mm hole in the main sprinkler riser on 3rd floor by accident and set off a 100psi water jet that forced a window open and water jet hit The Palladium back entrance..it took 5 minutes to stop water supply due to pressure in pipes. We used to have a major issue with drug takers shooting up with needles and then just throwing them away at the rear of store in Little Marlborough St ,which was a major hazard for cleaners as well as public. I came up with an idea to use Ultra Violet light tubes on our building there ,as you cannot see your veins in that sort of light ..it became very popular to be used in the area. Last one on this theme was when my Goods In Guys received a delivery of carpet complete with Scorpions, which were very quickly despatched. So many stories like this, so maybe EPISODE 2. The Liberty Family sold out to a property developer MWB in May 2000 and then appointed a new Facilities Team… so my days were numbered and i stayed for a while to help with transition.
During the nineties i also met my wife Caroline at Liberty and married married her in 1994 we purchased one house in 1993 in East Finchley, outgrew it and bought our present home in 1997..both were major works jobs but worth it . it was a full on decade for us both. Some explanations of the pictures below…
HMS Hindustan & Impregnable were the last two old sailing ships of the line and thier timbers were used to construct the Liberty building in Gt Marlborough Street. The Tudor building was exactly the same length as HMS Impregnable
The weather vane on top of the Liberty building was an exact copy of The Mayflower which took the Pilgrims to The New World in 1620.
I have included a few pictures of the old Liberty inside and out, although The Tudor style building is not the original Liberty as it was built in 1924 , the original on Regent Street opened in 1875. I took part in The Liberty Conservation Plan in 1999, which contains a huge history of The Tudor Building from day one of its conception in 1922. I still have a copy and its fascinating reading. All the Fitments / Carvings and Original Furniture were designed and executed in Liberty’s own workshops which existed at that time.
The Hanging Chain Light.. This was an original solid cast iron construction hanging down 4 floors and immensely heavy. The wiring and lamps in it were also of an advanced age. It was one of my jobs as an Electrical Sub contractor, prior to my employment by Liberty, to rewire and fit new lighting in it. Was difficult to say the least..but its still there and working after all this time.
The Liberty Frog… this was a hand carved feature hidden away on the main staircase in the Tudor Building. .It was one of the items that had to be found and marked of by new employees on their Induction sheet, which they were given with certain items/places to go round the building to familiarise themselves. Another was “What earrings is Caroline Davis (Senior manager of Ground Floor and Basement. And soon to be my wife !) wearing today. Her earrings were always spectacular. On the subject of The Frog location..i had to show a few senior directors and managers where it was.
