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A Survey Of (Smells) Memories Of The West Street In Sheffield

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Hello everyone, I am a student from the University of Sheffield.

I've recently been doing a survey on West Street and wanted to get some information through everyone on this forum.
The survey is mainly about your memories of West Street (especially related to smells, for example: for me, I think of a few kebab shops there when I mention West Street because I always smell the kebab when I pass by there in the evening.)
You are very welcome to share your memories, it will be very helpful for my research.
Some very old memories of West Street are very welcome, with an approximate date please(Like: 1960s).
Thanks so much for your help.😄

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I can recall from the 1960,s the smell of beer and fags.We used to visit all the pubs....up one side and back down the other on a friday and saturday night!

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4 hours ago, dsweetman said:

I can recall from the 1960,s the smell of beer and fags.We used to visit all the pubs....up one side and back down the other on a friday and saturday night!

There was only the Mail Coach on that side.

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I used to go to Notre dame, just off West St in the early 70's. My memory smell is of the glue from the shoe shop I walked past every day after school. We used to buy our seggs to put on the bottom of our shoes to keep them from wearing out quickly. The nuns were not impressed! 

Further down West St on a side road my grandad ran a building site and I would pop in and see him. So my other smell is concrete, plaster, sand etc.

In my later years it was all about the smell of alcohol as I queued for the crazy daisy and the limit.

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In the sixties I worked in a cutlery firm on Portobello just opposite St George’s church, the area from here reaching down to Wellington Street roughly a square half mile-which was filled with many cutlery firms that produced first class cutlery and hollowware  all of which produced many smells, I could smell the burning of steel from knife blades being ground, the smell of polishing compounds, the silver plating and chrome plating plants I could never forget, antlers from deer and other animals from Indian when they were worked on had its own odour some of which had to be dyed which was a pungent smell but one you’ve worked in a cutlery firm you never forget the smell, small engineering firms and steel stockists using soluble oil to produce their goods, the oil had an odour that hung on the air, sadly the cutlery square mile has gone swept away for car parks and flats, no food smells thank god but one fantastic smell albeit a bit away from West Street was the smell of roasting coffee beans from Pollards on Charles Street, even that incredible smell has been lost.

 

 

Edited by lazarus

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Has to be the smell of roasting coffee at Pollards.

 

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The other smell is the smell of phenolic disinfectant from the Royal Hospital.

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On 27/04/2021 at 16:01, gaz 786 said:

Lady's Bridge the smell from brewery was horrible we thought it was weetabix being made lol but it was hops from wards brewery 👍

Wards brewery was on Ecclesall Road, I think the brewery on Lady’s Bridge was Whitbreads.

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The smell of mother of pearl on west street, used for cutlery handles. 1950s 60s.

Edited by Fiat500

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In the mid 60s I worked at associated engineering on West Street,its now called the thrift store on Google maps,the smells I remember are from the basement workshop,we used tricoethylene degreaser,for cleaning bus pistons for STD,which was heated to boiling point,and the smell made your eyes water,also the smells of bacon and sausage from Joe's cafe on portobello, I used to collect the breakfast  order,my favourite was a bacon and tomato dip breadcake.

Edited by stevenorfolk

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