Click photo to start a slideshow.
Photos courtesy of Dr Gerald Tidy.
This Victorian chemist shop, which spent many years in Hitchin Museum, came under the ownership and protection of Hitchin Historical Society when the Hertfordshire Medical and Pharmaceutical Museum Trust was wound up a few years ago and we took over the assets.
When the old museum closed, the shop was to be dismantled and re-erected in the new museum in Hitchin Town Hall. First the main shelves, drug run and counter were removed from the old museum to the new one, but then it became clear the whole chemist shop was not to be assembled in the new museum.
At this point the Hunter family, who run Hitchin Lavender at Cadwell Farm, Ickleford, offered to house and display the shop with its remaining fittings and contents at their premises as an added visitor attraction. This was very appropriate because Perks and Llewellyn were not only pharmacists, they also distilled lavender.
So, with display items still in situ, the fittings were photographed before the bottles etc were packed up and the photographs were copied to flash drives for our Society and the Hunter family. The fittings were then dismantled with the kind assistance of Alan Fleck and Ray Matcham, and on 20th April 2016 were removed from the old museum and re-erected at Hitchin Lavender courtesy of the Hunter family.
There will be no charge for viewing the new Perks and Llewellyn display at Hitchin Lavender, and it will be ready in the next few weeks.