Fab gear sold here

This old shop caught my attention especially its mosaic threshold. These old doorways usually date from the first half of the 20th century and suggest a certain pride in the establishment they announce - family businesses mostly: shops, hotels. theatres.

In the 30 years I've lived here I've never known this place to be anything but a shabby vendor of old furniture or carpets, and now it's been empty for a long while. It must have seen better days and I wanted to find out about them.

Turns out that back in the 1970s it was a popular and thriving branch of  another shop in Haverfordwest, the county town, where, according to the 1901 census, Thomas Baker the saddler was already established  in the High Street in what was to become Baker's shoe shop.


 It's not hard to imagine that a leatherworker might be inclined to transition from making equine apparel to supplying human footwear, a more genteel occupation that would bring you into contact with a different class of person, perhaps. The provision of clothing would be the obvious next step and the establishment of this branch in another town suggests that the Baker family business was a successful one, the place to go for everything from school to evening wear, and in the 1970s the very latest fashions.

When I posted a request for information on local social media   affectionate and wistful memories of shopping at Baker's  boutique in the Seventies flooded in. 

'Bakers boutique. Gorgeous clothes!'

'I bought an air force blue maxi dress there to wear to a friend's 18th party'

'I still have a dress from there that I had in 1972 for a school disco!

'I still have three things I bought there'

'A really good shoe shop where my mum always took me to get school shoes'

'You could buy Gentle Folk Jeans there so fashionable back in the day'

'God I wish I could still get into things I wore in 1972, although not too sure about the white bell bottoms with gold studded pockets'

'They used to have butterfly murals on the walls on the inside alley behind the windows'

'Rented my first flat there aged 17 years old must been 1972' 


It's not clear what brought it all to an end, maybe the owners retired and there was no one to take over the business. And as the 20th century wore on small town shops lost custom as people gravitated to larger stores further away. 

I'm told that the building is now a private house, however the ground floor premises seem to be unused. Many of the empty shops in town are being refurbished now for new enterprises; I wonder if Baker's will rise phoenix-like from the ashes of its former glory? It doesn't seem very likely: this end of town gets little footfall. But you never know.