'A few survivors': Images of small businesses a unique archive of a city's disappearing history
Maria's Continental Hairstylist, Gilbert Rd, Preston, pictured in 2020. Photo: David Wadelton

'A few survivors': Images of Melbourne's disappearing small businesses captured in new book

Artist David Wadelton began photographing the small businesses of Melbourne’s suburb of Northcote in the mid-1970s when he was at art school. Nearly 40 years later, sorting through and scanning his black-and-white photos, thinking about what the suburban Melbourne streetscape was like in those days, he “realised there were a few survivors, but not many”.

The high streets were no longer peppered with small, family-run tailors, butchers and milk bars. But there were some outliers.

So, he started documenting what was left of those businesses before they, too, disappeared. He shared the images (old and new) on social media, eventually compiling a selection of them into his latest book Small Business.

In sharing the images, he found that people connected with them, recognising the shops they’d visited or walked or driven past for so many years.

“We’re interested in this shared history, the often unique history of our local areas,” he said.

Blight's Shoe Repairs, Glen Huntly Rd Elsternwick 2019
Jane Blight's grandfather established Blight's Shoe Repairs in Elsternwick in 1932, pictured here in 2019. Photo: David Wadelton

The book captures the small, family-run businesses of Melbourne’s inner suburbs – with a couple of NSW exceptions – that feel like relics of a time long past.

Alongside Melbourne institutions such as Pellegrini’s Espresso Bar, Hopetoun Tea Rooms, and Stalactites are the hole-in-the-wall cobblers, garages, and barbers, among others. Most of them, Mr Wadelton said, were established in the 1960s and ’70s by post-war European migrants.

Kosovo TV & Radio Repairs, Scotchmer St, Fitzroy North, 2019
Kosovo TV & Radio Repairs on Scotchmer Street, Fitzroy North, was established in 1956, the same year television came to Australia. It was closed for about 10 years before the family sold the building in 2019, the same year this photo was taken. Photo: David Wadelton

About a third of the businesses featured have closed entirely since he started the project in about 2009.

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With some, he wishes he could go back and take more or better images, but it’s too late – they no longer exist.

Golden Tower Restaurant, Swanston Street 2010
The Golden Tower Restaurant on Swanston Street was the last of the American-style diners in Melbourne's CBD. Photographed in 2010. Photo: David Wadelton

One of those is the Golden Tower American-style diner. “It used to be this little American-style diner; they were all over the place,” he said. “I would’ve loved to have gone back … When I took it, I didn’t know it was going to be in the book.”

Most of the closures aren’t because of last year’s lockdown, Mr Wadelton said, but because that generation of shopkeepers and small business owners was getting older and retiring.

“Sometimes they get ill, the shops close and just stay closed like little time machines,” he said.

“There is a feeling of pathos as you look through the images.”

Sila Espresso, Brunswick Street Fitzroy 2017
Sila Espresso, Brunswick Street, Fitzroy, was established in 1959 by Pasquale Zampogna, now run by his son Dominic. Photographed here in 2017. Photo: David Wadelton

Relics of another time

“It takes a special breed to set up a small business, and I do notice it’s less likely to happen these days,” Mr Wadelton said. “This generation was able to buy the buildings in inner suburbs relatively cheaply. Now businesses come and go, can’t seem to stick.”

This also reflected a change in the way people shop, Mr Wadelton said.

“These small businesses are relics of something … They’re part of the fabric of our local communities,” he said. “Strip shopping and family businesses have been decimated by these shopping plazas.”

Frank's Hairdressings, High Street Northcote 2017
Frank's Hairdressings on High Street, Northcote, photographed in 2017. Photo: David Wadelton

Plus, much of what the businesses specialised in are becoming obsolete: shoe repairs, TV and VCR repairs, newsagencies.

“People don’t buy physical magazines and books … they don’t go to a local butcher,” Mr Wadelton said.

While he asked permission to take all the photographs, he didn’t know they would one day end up in a book. He knows some business owners have had customers take them a copy.

One common reaction from the traders when he asked to photograph their businesses was surprise. “One guy couldn’t understand why I wanted to take a photo of his garage, but he said, ‘go for your life, knock yourself out’ … mostly they’re just content and proud to be there.”

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