I was working for NSW Napper Stinton Woolley, a medium sized, modern ad agency located in their own new, 5 or 6 floor building in Great Chapel St in Soho - a sort of half street between Dean St and Wardour St and off Oxford St roughly half way between Tottenham Court Road and Oxford Circus. As far as I know it is still there as I have seen it over the years, seems that NSW faded from the scene sometime in the seventies (maybe merged) and I think the building became a government office of some kind. Whenever I am in London I try to visit the Star cafe which was right next to the office and where I had countless meals and coffees over the 4 years I worked in NSW Soho, the owner Pop passed the cafe over to Mario his son and it has featured as a place to eat in London guides I have seen online. When I spoke to Mario a few years ago he recalled clearly the days of NSW.
Names from my time there - Mick Braham the account director I first worked for, Rodney Harris whose job I took over when he moved to media/research, Ken Astrop and Barry Threadgold 2 creative guys, Mrs Ross traffic, Mack Latto a creative director, Mrs Jay reception, Mike Salter my boss when I left - I'll probably add names later but its getting to be a bit of a laundry list.
As I said I was at NSW for nearly 4 years and it was over time to move on, not the easiest of tasks even in those days with advertising getting more and more the trendy thing to do -- even at my first agency Crawfords we had a Lord and a Hon member of Princess Margarets set working briefly in the production department.
Greetings! I have just come across your post, as I was Googling Napper Stinton Woolley in the hope of finding out if the agency still existed. My mother, Jean Taylor, worked there in the 1950s. She would have been in her mid/late 20s at the time. I wonder if you remember her?
ReplyDeletelovely to hear from you, what job did jean do at nsw name is not immediately familiar . If you want to send a head and shoulders from that period I may recognise her. It was a very happy place to work in my experience
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Hi Jerry ~ Apologies for not replying to you sooner. My partner has been in hospital and it's driven everything else out of my mind for the last few weeks! He's getting better now, so life is returning to normal. I'll send you an email with a pic of Jean a bit later today. She was born in 1930. I think she began at nsw as a secretary, then rose up in the ranks. She married my father in 1956, which is when she would have left. I remember her speaking of Mrs Jay and (I think) Mrs Ross. She clearly had so many happy memories of that time in her life. I wish now that I could have asked her more about those days. It must have been such an interesting time to be working in London ~ especially for a vivacious young woman who had grown up in New Malden during the Blitz, and who would not have had an easy childhood. My email is tondosangana@yahoo.com by the way. Till later, Fiona
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