• Welcome to this forum . We are a worldwide group with a common interest in Birmingham and its history. While here, please follow a few simple rules. We ask that you respect other members, thank those who have helped you and please keep your contributions on-topic with the thread.

    We do hope you enjoy your visit. BHF Admin Team

Pattisons restaurant and shops

Betty Hopper

master brummie
Does anyone remember Pattisons in Corporation Street ?? They used to periodically have artistes performing there.
I think Semprini the pianist played there and so did Stefan Grappeli.
At the back of the building there was a narrow street and I think it was where the Birmingham Mail had some
Premises. I think the Gazette was in Corporation Street. Not sure of any of this, just came to me this afternoon.
Betty
 
Hi Betty: I remember Pattisons Restaurant. It was on the corner of Corporation and Fore Street. I went to school at Lawrence's College across the road so
looked out at it a lot. I can't say I ever went inside and perhaps someone else will know about the entertainment they used to have. In later years it became a Steiner Hair Salon and other businesses have rented the space over the years. It is a hairdressing salon today I believe. Fore Street is called City Arcade now. Birmingham Gazette Building are at 168 Corporation Street. The old Birmingham Mail offices were on New Street opposite where Waterstones is now.
 
Last edited:
Don't know about the artistes performing there, but I remember my sister used to love their iced buns! If I remember Pattisons was on the corner of a narrow little street where there was a snooker hall that all the boys went to which was on the first floor of the building, maybe behind Yates Wine Bar or W.H.Smith in those days. That narrow street now contains the City Plaza
 
Hi Betty - Here is a forum photo of Pattisons dated 1960.
oldmohawk
index.php

It is in this post https://birminghamhistory.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=35337&p=441449#post441449
 
Last edited:
hi betty
do you have a picture of what i think it was in the burlington arcade as my mother told me he story of pattison and hughes whom had i think it was there first restuarant there and it was her grand father whom bought there restuarant from there in the thirtys off mr pattison and the waitress services used to dress like old joe lyons staff with the head dress and same type of pinafore made of clinnin they used to wear way back in the thirtys
have a nice day best wishes astonian;;
 
The thing I remember about Pattison's was in the 60's when we would all pile into the upstairs restaurant for a plate of chips covered in a horrible sickly looking green curry sauce. It looked terrible but it was good eating.
 
Thank you for all your memories. My Mom worked there for many years and when she came home she used
to tell us about whoever the artiste had been that day.So, quite a happy memory for me.
Jennyann, What a coincidence that it was once a Steiner Salon because Yvette, my daughter worked for
Steiner.
Astonian sorry I did not have a photograph of it but..... that wonderful oldMohawk has posted one!!!!
Thank you so much for that I am going to try and print it off but I am not very good at that sort of thing.
Betty.
 
I once recorded a memory I had of Pattisons during the war years. It was quite a regular venue for my mother on visits to the city centre. It's probably 1942 or 1943 and I'm 6 or 7......

.....Then it is into Pattison's where my mother is due to meet an old office friend of hers, Mrs. Hewitt, an older lady with whom she had worked at the Law Courts at the other end of Corporation Street in 1918 when an earlier war had been raging. There they had both typed for an up-and-coming young Birmingham barrister, Norman Birkett, of whom great things had been expected which would later be achieved in full. The three of us are seated at a small round table in the cafe, the ladies nattering. I sit transfixed with boredom, trying not to look at a brimming ashtray in the middle of the table, its pile of butt ends still showing traces of the lipstick or saliva of total strangers and being added to every ten minutes or so by my mother and her friend. It is an image and a feeling of disgust which I shall retain all my life and will ensure that whatever I die of, it will not be smoking-related. I munch my slice of sponge cake, a dry affair with a smear of red, fruitless jam inside it - the finding of any trace of a genuine strawberry on such occasions would be a miracle - and sip my cup of tea. The cup is cracked, like many others. My mother notices it. "Drink from near the handle, dear, and avoid the crack", she whispers to me. It is a familiar refrain......

Chris
 
Hello Chris,
Sorry you had such a miserable time at Pattisons, But, even so it is still
a bit of history.
It was a very graphic description of the incident and I could just picture
you sitting there.{ at least it stopped you from ever smoking !.
Betty.
 
Hadn’t realised Pattisons once had so many shops, and in Birmingham suburbs too. The (poor) photo is of the Pattisons shop and restaurant on the corner of Fore Street and Corporation Street. (Source: British Newspaper Archive). A better view is in post #4. The building is still there today. Viv.
 

Attachments

  • A9C5BD42-E41A-45EC-A325-ED2645DA2A95.jpeg
    A9C5BD42-E41A-45EC-A325-ED2645DA2A95.jpeg
    411 KB · Views: 28
Back
Top