Exploring Carnaby Street W1

Brilliant video Rob. I have spent many an hour in that area, usually looking for pubs

Great video. Cheers rob.

I've heard it said that John Snow observed that the Irish navvys who only ever drunk beer in the pub but never water from the pump,never got sick despite everyone else in the area were dropping like flies

Thanks for this, Rob! The Soho area has so much goddamned history that you could spend your entire life researching it.

Excellent vid, like the maps and engravings of the time .

does anybody remember ZORRO RECORDS in the flea marketin early 80s mod revival?

Another great video, Rob. You weren’t in the Red Lion on Kingly Street per chance? Saw the Sam Smiths beer glass and it instantly transported me back to the mid 80s when I met up with college mates there - Sam’s was the cheapest beer in London back then.

As a life long Mod, I really loved the video, Thank you Rob.

Brilliant, Rob! Have subscribed…👍

Thanks Rob. Another beautifully researched Gem giving us far more history and information than you would believe possible… incredible work as always.

I doubt the Carnabetian Army shops there any more. Tough being a Dedicated Follower of Fashion?

I remember the multi coloured rubber flooring, wild crazy shops, all done now, global brands up and down now....

Went to the 69 cup final aged 12, coach dropped us off in Piccadilly for a wander round, couldn't work out why there were so many people on the streets at 5am, different planet to Manchester in them days

Rob, another wonderful video! This Yank knew of Carnaby Street in 1966. My babysitter filled my head with images of music and fashion and sports. She played Rubber Soul for me. I remember my parents having that Time magazine. I longed for everything British and London. So, maybe not remarkable if I'd been a teenager. But in 1966...I was three!

I finally got there as a young adult in the 80s, in the post-punk era, and again in the 90s, a "BritPop" girl. I spent more than I ever had on clothes on the street, Fred Perry's and a Small Faces Ben Sherman shirt. (Being a tall Yank, I bought men's things, as women's were too tiny for me then.) I've been back a few more times (never enough), enjoying the Christmas lights and wandering. Last visit, I did feel a bit like an historian myself, when a few shop clerks and a bartender wanted to hear about the street back when in the 80s and 90s. Wishing you the best, and looking forward to more videos.

Fab, Rob. Fantastically put together.

Bought a lot of my rock chick clothing there in the 80s, and worked at Ruby's in 1988 - a proper dive of a shop with a manager who loved ripping off tourists... Great to hear more about the history of the street especially the much earlier times you don't often hear about. Great video, thanks!

Thanks

In the 1960s, Carnaby Street was also home to a well-known vegetarian restaurant called Cranks. My first girlfriend's parents turned out to be two of its owners!

Your films are always fascinating, Rob. Thanks! -- Jacqueline

Like all the small tidbits you add. Carnaby 1 and 2 being code words and the gentleman who was first to sell "off the rack". I was very young in 1960's but had older siblings. It is very much a part of my childhood. Hello from Oregon US.

Awesome video. I think in the '80's/ 90's I used to go to a nightclub down a side street in Carnaby Street called Gullivers.

Back in 2011 I got a leather wallet from the Levi’s store there. I still use it.

I have frequented the shakspeare's head when I visited London. Good pub..good beer and decent food !

Great video. The thing I remember most was the flea market, which sadly didn't get a mention. Colin Wild was another colourful character. He founded the Carnaby Cavern and then had his own shop in Newburgh St. making clothes for the likes of Marc Bolan. Would be great if you could do something on Kensington Market!

❤

Another great video! When I was thirteen, my parents took my brother and I to London. We were in a shop called DH Martial Arts, on Carnaby Street. A martial artist called Bill 'Superfoot' Wallace was going to be giving some kind of lecture in the shop, but we hadn't heard about it and weren't there for it. He apparently had the fastest kick in the world and had starred in a film opposite Jackie Chan. Anyway, the lecture was about to begin but he had gone down to the Shakespeare pub you spoke about. The shop's Chinese owners were getting impatient and asked if my brother and I could go down to the pub to track him down, but my parents wouldn't let us because we didn't have much time left in London and wanted to go somewhere else.

Excellent production! Really enjoyed the history. Many thanks, Calgary, Canada

Hi Rob. Another fantastic video, these are so well researched! I love all the street name history references. Your channel is brilliant I’m so glad I found you. Thank you for sharing your knowledge and hard work ❤

Sadly living where I was in the sticks in the 60s free love and exotica rather passed me by and I never went to Carnaby Street in its hey day.! But what n incredible story well researched as usual by you! This the last on for today, but I look forward to more tomorrow, though I hope I do not expend the cannon as they all fill and inform my empty life. Cheers!
Rob

I used to buy most of my records in a small shop off the main drag in Carnaby street. You went into a shop that had the appearance of a small shed, but when you went downstairs into the cellar, music heaven. Can't recall what it was called, but i went in most weeks. You could get, english releases, american deletions, (cheaper than the imports) imports from allover and sometimes bootlegs. I used to go in and he would say, "Oh, its you, listen to this, i think you'll like it?" He was always right. 70s and 80s.

I worked in Lady Jane in 67/68, and the new shop Lady Jane Again which was further down Carnaby Street on the other side. The owners used to stage stunts with naked models, very amusing, he was arrested often😂 As sales staff, I got to wear the stock, all very short and see through. 😊 Brilliant times.

Thanks!

Enlightening and enjoyable, thank you.

Completely and hopelessly hooked on your videos. The way you describe Carnaby street got me extremely nostalgic, although I was born way after that time and had never even been there.

Excellent documentary Rob!! I’m sure there is so much work put into your videos from research to editing.

Bought a sealed can of 'London Air' there back in 67. Those were the days.

In the 70s I bought a silver ring from the Great Frog store opposite Lord John's and just up from Granny Takes a Trip.
Then in the 80s I remember visiting an acquaintance George O Dowd when he worked as a shop girl in Street Theater, Newburg Street.
It was short walk from the backstreet where the K.West sign hung, the sign and nearby phone box being on the cover of Ziggy Stardust.

thank you Rob! I remember visiting Carnaby Street in the mid 1990s where there were a lot of markets down underground where all sorts of souvenirs and clothes could be found. Bootleg records too, similar to the now long gone Kensington market. I used to shop a lot in these areas as a teenager. Now it seems too bland and only aimed at rich people. Great video and history, and I thank you again for your research :) I really enjoy watching your videos, keep up the good work

Everything looks so much nicer in the 60is, and everyone looks happier and more relaxed. I wish I could live in the 60ies for just a week and walk down the streets of London including Carnaby street.

I was a bit late to the party for Carnaby St, showing up in the late 90s, but I had grown up in the punk scene in Canada in the 80s, so had a built-in fascination with the street having heard about it, for example, in the Jam song you mentioned. At the north end, there was (is?) a Pret, and I would ride in to work every day from Golborne Rd w2 (I lived above Rough Trade offices, another punk rock institution), and call in at 'Carnaby'n'Marly', and sip my coffee in the crisp autumn morning air, and just imagine what the street was like 10 years, 20years, 30years ago...there were still a few boutique shops and none of the retail giants had moved in yet, so you could still sense the last vestiges of it's fashion/style history

Spent lots of time in Soho in the late 80s and 90s. Always ended up haunting Liberty's fabric hall at the end of the street, having a pint or 10 at the Crown and Two Chairmen on Dean Street, survived the bombing at the Admiral, and always ended the good nights at Ronnie Scott's via the Pillars of Hercules. Sang at Ronnie's several times. I miss that vibe. It's like most great London enclaves, far too commercial for my taste now. Sad.

Legend ❤👍👍👍👍

My mum was a teenager/young woman in the 60s. She told me how Carnaby Street was all the rage back then. I think she was very much into the mod scene.

i got my wedding shoes form a shop on carnaby street love this place

Brilliant Rob. I didn’t know much about Carnaby Street other than that it was the height if fashion to buy things there in the 60s, when I was a child 😊❤

I loved carnaby street in the 80s with all the tacky shops lol. Much more character than now. I hadn’t been there in years and decided to take my wife up there. Obviously I was explaining how I remembered it. She being from Finland was excited about how I explained it. We arrived and I was so let down by the whole place. No one having a laugh in the shops no tat being sold. Just over rated over priced crap ‘boutiques ’. No the place I had loved or remembered, the control had gone from being on 11 down to -1. Don’t like the place at all.