1) Club Row

As recently as the early eighties  Club Row in Shoreditch was renowned as a Sunday market where pets, including songbirds and puppies, could be bought for next to nothing with no questions asked. The short street, located between Arnold Circus and Bethnal Green Road, is still there but the market was abolished in 1983, the victim of animal welfare legislation.

A photojournalist from Today( Photo World) visiting the place in September 1952 captured the essence of the market, which spilt into the present Sclater Street,  with telling studies of animals, vendors and potential customers. There is even a friendly ‘bobby ‘chatting to some of the customers. The market specialised in song-birds but vendors weren’t just stall-holders. One large emporium, called ‘ The Bird House ‘, presumably open for business during the week, had a shop front plastered over with adverts and cages.  

Here is the journalist’s view of the birds for sale:

‘ Above this ordinary slum the Sunday hymn of bird song rises from cages that are loaded high on barrows, dumped on the pavement, or piled against walls until they look like blocks of flats—each little room by an ounce of twittering, high-strung life. These tenements- in- miniature mostly contain members of the linnet, goldfinch, chaffinch, thrush and skylark families. Beside them the vendors shout, “ Buy, buy, buy. All prime birds with lovely flights.” And with the hope of a sale, they stretch wide the wings of their merchandise for the crowd to see.

There is a marked difference in technique for the sale of dogs. There are, in fact, very few dogs to be seen in the Row. There might be a number of ‘pedigrees’ attached by lengths of string to fanciers who stand chatting in groups, a handful of puppies who yelp to passers-by from crates by the roadside, and a occasional woolly head will pop out and boggle at the world from the pocket of a vendor, but most dogs change hands over business deals in the nearby cafes.

The majority of these deals are introduced by lounging. If you look idle enough and

lean disinterestedly against a wall, a man in a well-worn suit, a cap and a muffler will sidle up to you and whisper hoarsely , “ Want a dawg, Mister?” The accepted reply to this is, “ Maybe”. Then he will say, “ How about a Fox?”. If you really want a Fox-terrier, you pause for a moment then add, “ That might do.” The hoarse voice says, “ See me at the café over the road in arfa mo.”

The café over the road is packed with men who are also in cloth caps and mufflers. They sit chatting, drinking tea and eyeing mysterious packagers n the taales in from of them. The contents of these parcels—which are about the size of biscuit tins and wrapped round with dark cloth—do not remain a mystery for long. The covering induces inside to sing—an old trick known to these fanciers—and from time to time there is a sound peculiar only to a café of this type: the song of a wild bird singing for the sun.

In “arfa no” the owner of the hoarse voice comes in with a “ Fox “ on a lead. If you know anything about pedigrees there is no doubt that the dog is a good one. A few pounds change hands and the deal is soon completed.

As long ago as 1933, a Bill was introduced in Parliament that would prohibit this form of buying and selling. Lord Buckmaster, who proposed the Bill, wanted particularly to prohibit the sale of wild birds. But the Government of that day, if not unaware of this fact remained unmoved by it..” An innocent recreation “would be spoilt they said, and the “ trade in bird seed…seriously affected. “ 

Today, nearly twenty years later, it seems that Parliament is still unable, or perhaps too busy, to choose between the voice of the birds and the voice of the bird-seed vendors.

Fifty years earlier, another journalist visited Club Row and reported his findings to George R. Sims, the editor of Living London (1901). Once again, Sclater Street is identified as ‘ Club Row’ , but having earlier visited Petticoat Lane market, the writer found the animal market very different.

‘ It is Petticoat Lane over again on a much smaller scale; with next to no Jews, hardly any women, less diversity, no side-shows ( unless you count the betting tipster and refreshment stalls right out past the limits of the crowd); no frivolity in short but strict attention to business.

The New London Spy (1966)

‘ Junk is other people’s left-overs, which they never usually wanted in the first place anyway. Junkards collect these left-overs, which they never usually know they wanted until they suddenly see them…’

‘…Everybody gathers a lot of junk. It is the diversity of personal litter that gives a room its ‘lived in’ character. The junk-hunter recognises this phenomenon and plays it . Instead of limiting his choice to beautiful things, he mixes them with objects that are attractive for other reasons. The skill is in the mixing, and the end product is a true expression of personal taste.

The good taste market has long ago been cornered by the antique dealers, the art-craft enthusiasts and the ‘contemporary’ Scandinavian designers. Their prices are as elegant as their goods. Junk is cheap: the problem is not how to afford it, but where to find it.

Modern junk abounds, particularly in the souvenir shop that cluster round the travel termini and the Places of Interest. You may occasionally find bits of new rubbish worth a nicker in your scheme of things. They may mellow with time, and accumulate charm; bit it is the old, démodé stuff that is most worth going after, because it is unfamiliar and has to be hunted for…

Market stalls can be deceptive. There is something about an open- air display that suggests cheapness and bargains. Dealers know this as well as shoppers. When a market has won a rotation among the connoisseurs, the pricier dealers join the bonanza and establish what are in effect branch businesses there.

This had already happened to the Caledonian Market before it was moved to its present pitch besides Tower Bridge Road. It has long been true of the Portobello Road, certainly at its southern end. When a dealer takes a stall in the Caledonian Market , he adds 20% to his prices, and the Portobello Road 40%. ‘

Junk stalls in 2025.

Caledonian and Portobello Road Markets.

It’s not true about the 20% and 40 % price rises. To your Jotter, who has acquired many a bargain at the Caledonian and Portobello Road Markets over the years, the prices are very fair, mainly because few dealers have the overheads that come with running an antique shop, but buyers must beware. The Caledonian, which opened in Bermondsey in 1950, was for many years an infamous     ‘market overt’ , which meant that ‘ hot ‘ goods could be sold there in  good faith between designated hours. This loophole was closed in 1995. After noon many dealers packed up their stalls, possibly for fear of being nabbed by the police, though for obvious reasons this seldom happens. When the New London Spywrote about the Caledonian, it was a very high quality antique market which occupied the whole of the square in Bermondsey village. Then, eighteen years ago everything changed. A towering hotel was plonked right in the middle of the square, taking up valuable space. As a result, many stallholders decided to decamp elsewhere, leaving behind a rump of devoted dealers determined to remain. But it’s not the same in 2025 as it was in its heyday. The number of stalls has diminished and the quality of the stock has declined and if it is visited at all by collectors, these are generally tourists attracted by the reputation it once had, rather than serious lovers of antiques.  

As for the Portobello Road, the smartest dealers have either snazzy shops or only slightly less snazzy indoor cubicles that are often ( like the junk shops in the poorer parts of London ) ‘permanently shut’. But it is true that the junk is concentrated on stalls at the northern end of the Road, particularly Golborne Road, where, as well as decent antiques, there is real junk at very low prices of a quality similar to that to be found in your average village jumble sale. And yes, I do suspect that some of the ‘ here today and gone tomorrow’ traders in Golborne Road do indeed ‘destroy most of what they have not sold at the end of the day.’