The future of retail needs a radical rethink, and fast. High streets need to be multi-purpose, multi-use, reflective of local context and relevant to the way people are now consuming. We believe the future is bright for our town centres, for they are the beating heart of the community. We believe that recent store closures […]

Disposable fashion is an awful concept. By the time you read this the UK will have been under lockdown for roughly one week, and our lives as we know them have been drastically changed. We don’t know how long it will last before these restrictions start to ease off, but it has me wondering whether […]

A blog about how affordable rents helped us get started and how through the markets we curate we are, in a small way, helping start-ups “have a go” by providing low cost opportunities.  I grew up in modest background to the sound of whirring sewing machines and with a mum and a nan who always […]

A bit of our secondhand and circular economy history re-visited in 2015. It was the turn of the 80s and Gerardine (my girlfriend and future wife) and I were new to London from Lancashire. We were having fun – records, clothes, nightclubs – and we just fell into our business all thanks to a market. […]

The story of the creation of the Festival of Thrift which turns 10 years old in 2022  In 2011 Gerardine and I were introduced to a chap called John Orchard. He was part of a group of investors who had taken on the enormous, 2 million square foot, Paton & Baldwin’s knitting yarn factory in […]