Partridges’ art and stationery supplies shop is one of Lavender Hill’s longest standing shops – if not the longest standing. They have been here for sixty years – with the current owner trading for 25 years. Generations of every kind of art paint, pens of all description, craft tools, papers and card of every shade, files and folders – but also polystyrene shapes, wooden figures and shapes, beads and stickers, wool and sewing supplies, glues, plasticines and clays, you name it – this is the one place that is pretty much guaranteed to stock it, no matter how obscure. But that’s all about to come to an end, as they close for good in the middle of July.

It’s been an impressively long run – supplying many a creative school project as well as many a higher end artist. But the last few years have been hard – with rent for the double-sized premises coming in at about £100,000 a year (to landlords Wandsworth Council – who own the freehold of the flats above), and business rates of £26,000 a year, not to mention the cost of staff, insurance, and heating and electricity – where electricity prices for businesses (who aren’t protected by many of the price caps that apply to households) have exploded.

Competition from online sellers who face none of these overheads, and tend not to pay tax either, has been fierce, and we understand that Covid only made things harder as even more of the specialist trade shifted online. Partridges had held its own against Asda almost opposite for decades: while Asda sells some of the stationery basics cheaply, their range was mostly fairly rudimentary and never had the same level of variety.

But rising costs and the pressure of online sales means they have decided to call it a day, with the store’s manager planning to head to a well earned retirement. It’s not the end of the business – their sister store in Tooting will continue to trade, at K&K Stationers & Printers at 94 Mitcham Rd, Tooting SW17 9NG (on the main road south of the station) – pictured below.

But for now, we have a few more days of having a properly stocked local stationery shop before we’re left with the small selection in Rymans, the core range in Asda, or the option of online delivery or heading out to options much further afield like Hobbycraft in Summerstown.

In a way it’s the end of an era, and after all, who doesn’t love a good stationery shop? Of course you can order everything, but there’s still something about having it all in front of you – and with so much stock it always feels full of possibilities.

So as a small tribute to the staff of Partridges, for decades of service to local art projects and everyone who’s wanted specialist stationery, we’ve captured some photos of Partridges in its final days. Sadly we’re unlikely to see a shop like this in Clapham Junction ever again.

This is one of a handful of articles we’ve written about the longest standing retailers of Lavender Hill – you may find our posts on the Hill Launderette, on Donna Margerita restaurant, and on the Corner Stone Bookshop, of interest. At the other end of the longevity scale, we recently posted about the sad case of the China Garden takeaway which lasted just a couple of weeks…