Arding & Hobbs

Arding & Hobbs is a former department store and Grade II listed building at the junction of Lavender Hill and St John's Road, Battersea, in the London Borough of Wandsworth.^[1]

Arding & Hobbs

Arding & Hobbs was established in 1876. A second store was established on the corner of Falcon Road, Battersea, known as the Falcon Road Drapery Store, but this was sold to former employees Mr. Hunt & Mr. Cole in 1894.^[2] The original building was destroyed by a fire on 20 December 1909.^[3] The present building was constructed in 1910 in an Edwardian Baroque style, and the architect was James Gibson.^[1]

The department store was sold to the John Anstiss Group in 1938, however, John Anstiss was purchased by United Drapery Stores in 1948.^[4] The store was added to the Allders group in the 1970s and continued to operate until Allders went into administration in 2005.^[5] The building was subsequently broken up and sold, with the building split between a branch of Debenhams department store and TK Maxx retail. As of 9 June 2020, the Debenhams section of the building had been permanently closed.

The store and building are featured in a number of films and television programmes including the 1981 action-thriller Nighthawks, where the shop was bombed, and the 1994 Mr. Bean episode "Do-It-Yourself Mr. Bean".^[6] It is very prominent in the video "Life On Your Own" by the band The Human League which is set in a future, apocalyptic London where the lead singer is the only person left alive and lives in the building.