Chelsea Drug Store

Opened in 1968, The Chelsea Drugstore was a sleek modern glass-and-aluminium-fronted building on the northwest corner of Royal Avenue and the Kings Road, in west London.

Modelled on Le Drugstore on Boulevard St Germain in Paris, the Chelsea Drugstore was arranged over three floors and on most days remained open for up to 16 hours. Inside customers would find bars, a chemist, newsstands, record stores and other concessions.

A popular service was the 'flying squad' delivery option run by the store. Those who used this service would have their purchases delivered by hand by young ladies adorned in purple catsuits arriving on flashy motorcycles.

The store is notably mentioned in The Rolling Stones song You Can't Always Get What You Want as well as it being a film location in Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange. The store became a wine bar and then a McDonald's. Both pub and retail shops below were open until the late 1980s.

Comments

Name: Alison Gardner/Duke now Mawby
Comment: Message for Alistair Allen, we worked together in Harlequin Records in the Chelsea Drug Store Kings road in the 1970s, I often think of you and Paul. I loved those days when we worked together, it would be great to hear from you and catch up.
Please email the site and they will pass it on.
(2021)

Comment: I bought Falconer's Arm by Robbie Basho there one night in 1970 or thereabouts.

Name: Alison Mawby née Gardner
Comment: Message for Alistair Allen - we worked together in the Chelsea Drug Store in the 1970s, I often think of you and Paul. I loved those days when we worked together, it would be great to hear from you.
(2021)

Name: Robib
Comment: I worked in the record department there around 1970 and loved every minute. I was able to play music throughout the store, and I was there when they filmed A Clockwork Orange. The band Hawkwind used to come into the bar fairly regularly, and Tom Jones came in with his wife to eat in the restaurant. Jane Birkin came in and bought several copies of Je T'aime for her friends. Wonderful memories I still treasure now at age 76 years young.
(2023)

Dave Harwood

13 Sep 2024 at 04:22

I found this piece in the 'Chelsea News & General Advertiser' dated 7th May 1971: “THE £250,000 stainless steel controversial Chelsea Drug Store in King's Road closed down on Saturday night, just three years after it was built. It will re-open at the end of the summer, probably as a discotheque. Charringtons Ltd. (the management) however, insist that the drug store - the tin palace to locals - has been closed for purely financial reasons, which have nothing to do with the residents' campaigns waged against it in the past, notably by the Royal Avenue Residents Association.”