Handymans Supermarket

These kind of old school shops are pretty neat. Sure it’s not gonig to be able to compete with the likes of B&Q on stock or price but it’s the personal shopping experience from these kinds of shops that make the difference.
Knowledgable staff that can help with any home DIY calamity add to the very manly experience of tool shopping make this a good shop for sourcing bits and bobs from. Surely they must have heard it all in this shop from making treehouses and complex tasks to the probably more common polyfilla and beige paint to make sure students get to keep their accommodation deposits. This shop is a bit of a relic, but good for it.

Tramway stables, cow sheds, motor bus proprietors, telephone call office, picturedrome, cinema, knitwear factory and DIY store– never has a building had such a varied history as the one that is now the Handyman’s Supermarket. It’s worth visiting if only to catch a whiff of sawdust, also known as the international smell representing things getting done, manfully.
This is a store that looks at glossy bungler-​havens like B&Q before shaking its head and smiling with a faint air of pity. The place is so comfortable in its mettle that it doesn’t need to tidy up. Tools and bits of wood are strewn across the bare floorboards and you half expect the back corner to be occupied by a burly blacksmith belting a horse-​shoe into shape.
That’s not to say it’s arrogant. The staff here are superlatively helpful and will listen with eager patience as you waffle on about what angle of doorstop you need or what kind of hammer you require to wrench nails out of a botched picture frame. Then they shall find the item within arm’s reach, making you feel like an utter cretin. Also, they cut keys.

Oh this is more like it. A real manly shop amidst the students and namby pamby bohemians of Smithdown. A place a man can get any hardware and, tool stuff he needs to, chop things and, drill stuff.
I went in purely to have a look around for a review and see what is what. I have very little need to often shop in these places, even when working for tv drama art departments I tend to just have a bash at hammering something with anything heavy and blunt or just use gaffer tape — usually solves any problem.
So I went in. Yep, screws, drills, hinges. Until I was asked ‘need any help?’ And obviously not wanting to look a complete pleb by giving the usual ‘just looking’ — because I am in a specialist, hardware shop and must have reason for being there — I ended up leaving with a tube of polyfilla and and a bag of nails. Damn this male pride.