On the 18th of November I attended the opening of the Heritage Gallery in the House of Fraser store in Glasgow, on behalf of Archive Services. This event marked the beginning of a number of celebrations to mark the 160th Anniversary of the department store, which was founded in 1849, when partners Hugh Fraser and James Arthur opened a small drapery shop on the corner of Argyle Street/Buchanan Street, Glasgow.
The evening was a success with many people coming along to celebrate the history of this prominent Glasgow store. Archives Services holds the House of Fraser archive and some of the records and artefacts were on display at the Heritage Gallery last night, including a cash register, photographs showing views of the interior and exterior of the store over the years, a Wylie and Lochhead catalogue and a banking agreement from 1933 between Hugh Fraser and the Royal Bank of Scotland.
Over the past three years staff at Archive Services have been recataloguing the House of Fraser archive as part of an AHRC funded project. This project has seen the use of new techniques for archival arrangement and description to recatalogue the House of Fraser Archive and make it available to a wider audience. The House of Fraser collection is a valuable source for anyone interested in learning more about the company itself or Scottish business history from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The new online catalogue is currently undergoing user-testing and will be launched later.
Categories: Archive Services (GUAS)
Tags: 160, AHRC, anniversary, archive, business, cataloguing, fraser, history, house, House of Fraser;, project, scottish, shop, techniques
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