The Bondies Story
If you are bothering to read this bit about us, then grab a cup of coffee and we'll clue you up a little with some history.It all started in 1966. The shop was located on Fylde Street, which was quite built up and much different back then, with busy roads full of traffic and many more local businesses. Today it is a pedestrianised area where UCLAN students, in between lectures, are able to exit the Adelphi Public house post refreshment, and return safely to lectures without the need to look up, a vast improvement for their mortality.
This arduous journey can be seen in the aerial shot of Fylde Street near the end.
Bond and Bywater was the left half of this famous “Adelphi Public House” (sadly no connecting pipe work came into the shop from the Guinness pump in the pub) Today the whole area is practically unrecognisable.
In the early days, Bond and Bywater was an experience of guns, gentleman’s suits and a hint of farming smells on wellies.
In 1966, Cliff Bond and John Bywater, the two names being the shop header, moved into the 42 Fylde street address where Mr John McNair was already carrying on a well established business supplying very high quality gents clothing and suits, and for a period of time after that, both businesses ran together in the tiny floor space available, helping each other out attracting trade with the use of vouchers for each others goods. This proved a good ploy.
Bond and Bywater had started on the road to their future. Little did Uncle Cliff and his fresh faced Nephew John realise that the 42 Fylde Street premises had once been a delicate and genteel ladies corset shop, soon to be filled with burping farting smelly arsed shooters.
Further down Friargate, nearer to Fylde Street circa 1900