Glass and British pharmacy, 1600-1900 : a survey and guide to the Wellcome Collection of British glass / J.K. Crellin and J.R. Scott.

  • Wellcome Institute of the History of Medicine
Date:
1972
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: Glass and British pharmacy, 1600-1900 : a survey and guide to the Wellcome Collection of British glass / J.K. Crellin and J.R. Scott. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    25/96 (page 9)
    30 epo™ a § COOK g, ©) £3 r eee > £5 ‘ ‘ 27, COL ES Jez jy fit ACE, BAR Figure 7: Trade card of John Broad, showing the triptych style window that became popular in the 1840s . to ’50s. was graphically described by Charles Dickens. He noted the new epidemic of change ‘first among linen-drapers and haberdashers’. The symptoms included an ‘inordinate love of plate-glass, and a passion for gas-lights and gilding... [it then] burst out again amongst the chemists; the symptoms were the same, with the addition of a strong desire to stick the Royal Arms over the shop-door, and a great rage for mahogany, varnish and expensive floor-cloth. Then the hosiers were infected, and began to pull down their shop-fronts with frantic recklessness’®?. The change in outward appearance — readily seen from the advertisements of shop fitters, trade cards, and Tallis’ views of London, etc’? — was the introduction of large plafe glass made commercially available by Chance in the 1830s. Commonly the window was divided into three sections only (Fig 7), though sometimes more, each large section calling for bold treatment, which was the reason for the decorative large specie jars and show globes. On the other hand, the larger windows also SFIPETR Pee ee OES ®Y ROAD, ISLINGION, paved the way for general window display to promote impulse buying, so that Charles Knight, in 1843, reinforced Feldmann’s remarks (p3) in stating that: The chemists, or, as they ought more properly to be called, the druggists, have made a notable advance in shop-architecture and arrange- ments. Most London walkers will remember the time when the large red, and green, and yellow bottles, shedding a ghastly light on the passer-by, were the chief indications of the - presence of a druggist’s shop; but now the plate- glass window exhibits a most profuse array of knick-knacks, not only such as pertain to ‘doctors’ stuff’, but lozenges, perfumery, soda- water powders, &c.; while the well-dressed shopmen or ‘assistants’ within — one of the most lowly-paid class of respectable persons in London — ply their avocation of semi-chemists and semi-shopmen®?. Generally, in the 1840s, this development of displaying ‘knick-knacks’ seems to have been restricted to medical and pharmaceutical items.