Home / Coverage areas / Paul Street
A Showroom That Sold A Whole Room At Once
Locksmith Paul Street: The Building That Named Its Own Customers' Cities
A Victorian furniture firm here claimed to pioneer selling complete rooms rather than single pieces, then painted the names of its overseas markets in gold across its own windows. Dial 020 8534 4949 to reach someone genuinely familiar with this corner of Shoreditch.
- 24/7 Callouts
- Converted Warehouses & Offices
- Commercial & Residential
- Paul Street Coverage
Covering Paul Street in the heart of Shoreditch. Open in Google Maps
Why Paul Street Is Different
A firm that sold a whole room, not just a chair
Even today, at the corner of Paul Street and Worship Street, stands a Grade II listed building that once did something genuinely new in this part of London. So, built around 1860, probably for the furniture firm Moore and Hunton, it began as a fairly conventional showroom-warehouse. The original premises were far larger than what survives today, stretching back into a yard filled with timber sheds, saw pits and workshops holding more than two dozen makers' benches. In other words, this was a working furniture factory with a shopfront attached, not simply a shop.
Even so, everything changed in 1887. Hunton had died a few years earlier, and under new management the building underwent a significant remodelling. Rather than display individual pieces the way most furniture warehouses did, the firm rearranged its showrooms into complete, furnished rooms, down to books left out on tables as though someone had just set them down. A trade journal of the time credited Moore and Hunton as pioneers of the approach in the East End, borrowing a trick that West End emporiums had already made fashionable further west.
Windows That Named Their Own Customers
Meanwhile, that same 1887 remodelling added something more unusual still. Across the first-floor windows, the firm had the names of various overseas cities painted in gold lettering, a direct advertisement, according to contemporary trade press, of the centres of its colonial business. So anyone walking past could read, in gilt paint, exactly how far this one Shoreditch building's trade actually reached.
Despite that innovation, the firm itself didn't last much past the century's end. By 1899 it had gone, and the building was carved up into smaller lettings. Instead, over the following decades it held offices with mahogany doors and teak partitions, a branch of Home and Colonial Stores, a radio warehouse, and an upholstery factory, before the northern half was cleared entirely in the 1960s for later office development. What remains today has been refurbished again, its ground floor now a bar rather than a showroom. The gilt lettering is long gone, but the building itself is still here, still doing something different from what it was originally built for.
Need something sorted now? Lockout help for a shut door, a repair booking for one that's just tired, our night line at any hour.
What Paul Street Businesses & Residents Call About
What this corner of Shoreditch brings us
Converted Showroom & Warehouse Units
What used to be furniture buildings now hold a genuinely varied mix of modern occupants. We build security around that layered past rather than treating every unit the same.
Book aheadGround-Floor Bars & Venues
A door that fails mid-evening is a genuine problem for venues trading late into the night. Reliable repair work here isn't optional.
Same-day priorityOffices Above Street Level
Ground-floor trade and upper-floor offices share plenty of buildings on this street. We plan around that split rather than fitting hardware as though it were one unit.
Book aheadFlats Among The Commercial Stock
A handful of residential entrances sit tucked among the offices and bars here. Each one is assessed individually, not grouped in with the units nearby.
Book aheadBroken Or Snapped Keys
A snapped key doesn't always come free easily from the older locks on converted buildings here. This page sets out the careful process we follow.
Call nowLate-Night Lockouts
Well past when most commercial streets have quietened down, this one keeps genuinely late hours. Our response stays the same no matter the time.
Call nowTwo things aren't ours to take on: making spare keys, and setting up access cards or intercoms. A managing agent's own contacts handle those instead.
Locked Out On Paul Street
An ordinary working day, then a different kind of evening
Fairly typical office and commercial traffic defines this stretch by day, much like the streets around it.
By night, it's swept into Shoreditch's wider pull of bars and venues, staying genuinely lively well past when most postcodes have settled.
Neither pattern changes our approach. Soft techniques get a full run before a drill is ever brought out.
Fixing a snapped key looks nothing like fixing a lost one. For the specifics on either, see broken keys or lost keys, whichever fits your situation.
Around Paul Street
What this corner connects to
The main road this street runs off.
The wider Shoreditch postcode.
The full EC2 overview, all six postcodes.
North of here, past Worship Street.
The Barbican and London Wall, south-west.
South-east, towards the station.
What We Do
Services across Paul Street
Advertising In Stone And Gilt
What a building says about itself, if you know where to look
Most advertising fades or gets painted over within a generation. This building's boldest claim, those gold-lettered city names, is long gone, yet the structure that carried it is still standing, still finding new uses.
Historic England's own listing covers 2-4 Paul Street's full history in detail. Wikipedia's entry on Shoreditch itself sets the wider district in context.
A building's old boasts carry no weight with us. We assess a lock purely on what's genuinely fitted and working today.
If you can't tell what your own lock needs, explain how it's acting up and we'll be honest about what we think.
The Process
Booking a locksmith Paul Street callout
- Reach outTell us the address, which unit, and roughly what's happened.
- Sorting accessAny sign-off a building needs gets arranged ahead of time.
- An on-site lookNothing's quoted until the door has genuinely been examined.
- Proof it worksWe confirm both lock and door before calling the job done.
Access & Traffic
Getting to you around Paul Street
This street sits just off Great Eastern Street and Worship Street, both of which carry steady traffic through the working day. Loading restrictions apply throughout.
Both Old Street and Shoreditch High Street stations are nearby, making the walk in a solid alternative to congested roads.
Fairly ordinary conditions mark weekday daytime hours here, picking up sharply by evening once the surrounding bars fill. Our planning accounts for both.
Why People Call Us
What Paul Street tenants and residents rely on us for
- We check what's actually there. Even so, a building's old use doesn't tell us what's fitted today.
- We don't skip to force. Gentler methods get a proper try before a drill does.
- We work the hours this street keeps. Even so, evening trade here is routine, not an exception.
- Homes get full attention too. A residential job gets exactly what a commercial one does.
- We state our scope upfront. Spare keys and access-system programming fall to other trades.
- No gaps in our availability. A dead-quiet morning or a packed night, we're there regardless.
Nearby
Areas around Paul Street
Common Questions
A Showroom That Changed How Furniture Was Sold
Did a real firm genuinely pioneer a new sales approach here?
Yes, Moore and Hunton, who claimed to be first in the East End to display furniture as fully furnished rooms.
What did that actually look like in practice?
Complete room sets, down to books left out on tables, copying a technique borrowed from West End emporiums.
When did this particular approach take hold at the building?
During a significant remodelling in 1887, carried out under new management after the firm's founder died.
A Building That Advertised Its Own Reach
Did the building really display the names of foreign cities?
Yes, painted in gold letters across the first-floor windows, added during that same 1887 remodelling.
What were those city names actually advertising?
The firm's own colonial trade connections, according to a trade journal report from the time.
Is the building still standing today?
Yes, though much reduced from its original size, with the ground floor now a bar.
Arranging A Visit Here
Which stretch does this page actually cover?
Paul Street itself, in the heart of Shoreditch's old furniture-trade district.
Is there a mix of older and newer buildings on this street?
Both, genuinely, and we assess every building individually rather than by type.
What about a lockout when the street's genuinely busy?
We can, though finishing on foot often works out faster once this part of Shoreditch gets lively.
Do you cover weekends on a street like this one?
It is, all week long, no matter what's going on outside.
Is residential work something you take on here too?
Residential callouts happen too, though commercial work makes up most of what we handle here.
My building has specific entry requirements — is that a problem?
Describe them to us ahead of time and we'll shape the visit around that.
A building once named its customers in gold paint. We'd rather just make sure your lock does its job quietly.
Bar, office, shop or flat on Paul Street — let us know what's wrong and we'll sort the right engineer.