One of Stockton’s oldest family firms is celebrating 130 years in the antiques and furniture business.
Four generations of cabinet makers have shivered in the still-unheated shop on Bishopton Lane that was built by Arthur Arrowsmith in 1885.
And current owner Mark Arrowsmith is hoping his 16-year-old son Jack will see the business through to a fifth generation.
Mark’s dad Frank, 69, is now retired from the firm but still treasures the wood plane pictured on the old photograph of his grandfather Arthur.
And he has a few tales to tell from the business through the years.
Like the time his dad Frank Sr made a grandfather clock which he used as payment for the funeral of a family member.
Frank Sr, like all the Arrowsmiths, had an eye for a bargain and once lent his handcart to a friend to carry a chest of drawers up Durham Road - haggling with him all the way to sell him the piece of furniture.
Frank was unsuccessful, but when years later his son was asked to value the same chest of drawers he also tried to buy them - again to no avail!
A faded and yellowed Gazette report recounts how the late Dowager Lady Londonderry was among Arthur’s distinguished customers.
The report recounts: “She was not afraid of a little dust, and would sit upon a box and talk while he worked. Referring to her visits (Arthur) recalls how particular she was in showing him how to put labels upon her packing crates.”
The most recounted tale among the Arrowsmiths is how Arthur gave new life to a set of six Chippendale chairs and sold them on - only to regret the low price and then make a desperate attempt to buy them back.
Said his grandson Frank: “It was a real humdinger - the one that got away. He made a mistake, we’ve all done that at some point.”
During the Second World War the family firm had all its delivery trucks requisitioned for the war effort. Unable to get them back after the war Frank Sr was forced to buy army surplus trucks to turn back into delivery vans.
Spanish mahogany, oak, walnut, maple, elm, ash and pine have all been lovingly worked, reworked and restored over the last 130 years in the workshop above the shop.
The arts of bespoke furniture crafting, restoration and french polishing have been passed down through the four generations.
But Mark, 51, also spent a four-year unpaid apprenticeship in Alnwick.
“My son Jack comes in and helps out,” he said. “We’re hoping he’s going to come into the business.”
And despite the recent recession, business is doing well at M Arrowsmith Ltd, said Mark.
“People come from all over, sometimes I wonder how they found us. It’s often through recommendations, just people talking.
“We send stuff to London, Bristol, we even sold a set of Chippendale draws to someone in Switzerland. We’re very well known in the trade.
“But because we diversify with restoring furniture and building kitchens that’s what’s kept us going during the downturn.”
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