Kendals (Old) Building, Deansgate, Manchester
Very little is known of the history of this building from contemporary sources.
The rebuilding of 1872-3 comprised the block numbered 83-91 Deansgate as shown on the engraving of 1892. Ashlar stone, four storeys, and ten bays – symmetrical nine bay elevation plus quadrant corner bay to St Ann Street, with feature tripartite first- and second-floor pedimented windows framed by Doric and Ionic columns. Before 1910, No 93 Deansgate comprised a three bay three storey offices and shops at the junction of Deansgate with King Street. Occupiers 1886 – solicitor, auctioneer boot warehouse. By 1910 the ground floor was occupied by Kendal Milne. This was subsequently replaced by a new block (One King Street) closely replicating the design of the 1873 building – contractor Robert Carlyle. This new work is easily identified by the pattern of glazing bars. It would appear that the elevation to St Ann Street was also rebuilt about the same time. The corner to King Street reproduces the tripartite window in curved form As shown on the 1892 engraving, the elevation to St Ann Street appears to be part of the frontage of the 1860s, the elevational treatment resembling Walter’s Charlotte House. It is therefore possible that only the Deansgate frontage was demolished in the 1870s to allow for street widening. Kendals operated from both buildings from 1947 until 1981, when the east block was sold, their basements being linked by a pedestrian underpass under Deansgate.
KENDAL MILNE AND COMPANY - THE tendency of the present day is decidedly in favour of the concentration of several branches of trade, more or less akin to each other, under one proprietorship and management. This is especially true of those trades which appertain to household equipment, textiles, and articles of personal apparel or adornment; and a notable instance in point is presented by the widely-known and famous house which forms the subject of the present review. Manchester has no more perfect example of a modern furnishing and textile emporium, representing nearly every department of these trades, than that afforded by the great establishment of Messrs. Kendal, Milne & Co., in Deansgate, with its auxiliary cabinet factory in Garden Lane, its upholstery works in Back Bridge Street, and its important allied drapery warehouse in St. Ann’s and Police Streets. This immense business was founded as far back as the year 1831, by the firm of S. and J. Watts and Company, who carried it on until 1835. It was then taken over by Messrs. Thomas Kendal, James Milne, and Adam Faulkner, trading as Kendal, Milne and Faulkner; and this partnership continued until 1862, when Mr. Faulkner died. The house then assumed its present title. The headquarters of the firm in Deansgate comprise a very handsome and commodious stone building, four storeys high, and arranged throughout upon a plan affording the utmost convenience for all the workings of the great furnishing trade to which it is devoted. Here, there is every facility for the proper conduct of such a business, and the establishment is one which, in its entirety, is not surpassed anywhere in England in its complete exemplification of all branches of household equipment.
The extensive show-rooms on the ground-floor contain a splendid stock of high-class furniture for the hall, library, dining and drawing rooms, office, &c., together with a beautiful selection of furniture in those specially artistic designs which have come so largely into favour in recent years. Besides this there is a wonderful assortment of specialities in bedroom furniture, brass and iron bedsteads, beautifully finished mahogany and birch bedsteads, bed and window draperies, kitchen furniture, bedding of every description, floor-cloths, carpets, curtains, and all manner of furnishing draperies. The same richly-varied and remarkably attractive display is carried out in the fine show-rooms on the first, second, and third floors, each flat affording a further revelation of the firm’s seemingly unlimited resources. The goods in all cases are of splendid quality and finish, though the range in price and style is so large as to meet almost all requirements; and we have never visited an establishment in which greater care is manifested in the arrangement of the stock, with the double object of securing a pleasing effect in the aspect of the entire display, and of making each section of the whole easy of inspection and examination.
Messrs. Kendal, Milne & Co.’s show rooms are a sight worth seeing — a statement fully supported by the fact that they are visited daily by hundreds of persons, who always meet with a courteous reception and the most efficient attendance; and the several departments taken collectively constitute a permanent exhibition of everything that is new, and elegant, and fashionable in house furnishings of every description. In the matter of cabinet furniture and upholstered work, this firm’s productive facilities are unsurpassed, and they are to be credited with a constant endeavour to cultivate an improved public taste by the production and display of a vast variety of goods which are equally remarkable for artistic beauty of design and for special merit in material, workmanship, and finish. Moreover, Messrs. Kendal, Milne & Co. have been singularly successful in reconciling the frequently antagonistic elements of price and quality, and by carefully considering each of these features, and not sacrificing either one to the other, they have accomplished what many other firms have failed to achieve — the production of a really high-class grade of furniture at prices which are, for the most part, within the means of that large body of the public who are too frequently compelled to purchase so-called “cheap,” goods for the sake of a temporary economy, which is really extravagance in the end.
