It’s reported that Partridge’s former premises on Bond Street, the purpose-built building known since inception as the Palace of the Arts, will be, it appears, for quite a bit longer. Mercifully, the building has been leased to Halcyon Gallery, well established in Bond Street and known for contemporary, albeit not cutting edge, fine art.
Mercifully, I say again, as, given the way most commercial streets in the West End have gone, one presumed that Partridge’s old space would be taken over by a fashion retailer. On hard times, too, and suffering with high, high overheads, the economic blip that sent art and antiques dealers reeling has caught up with the lower end of the luxury goods market, whose internet marketable material makes them eager to shed the actual in favor of the virtual storefront. The gods of art and antiques retailing must be recovering economic hegemony, at long last.