The fish and chip shop, the dry cleaner, and the estate agents: what Putney has lost this spring

Inside Fresh Fish and Chips on Upper Richmond Road, the blackboard menu is still chalked up. The counter is still in place. A ladder leans against the wall and an old office chair sits among the remnants of a shop that served East Putney for close to fifty years. It closed in mid-March. A sign in the window still reads “Closed for Annual Holidays.”

It is one of at least six businesses to close, be evicted, or disappear from Putney and East Putney’s commercial streets in recent months. They include two independent estate agents with a combined history of more than seventy years, a dry cleaner removed by High Court enforcement officers, an Indian restaurant and a mobile phone shop. Not all of them closed for the same reasons, and not all of them left behind the same thing. But they all left behind an empty window.

In March, we documented four new businesses fitting out on the same stretch of Putney High Street. This is the other side of that ledger.

The fifty-year farewell

Fresh Fish and Chips, at 124 Upper Richmond Road, had been part of the furniture in East Putney for as long as most residents can remember. One community member who shared the news of its closure said it had been there before he moved to the area nearly fifty years ago. Another called it his “Thursday night treat on my home from work for years.” A third described the owners simply: “Such lovely people.”

The windows are now whitewashed. The interior is being cleared. Nobody has confirmed why it closed, and without hearing from the owners we cannot say whether the closure is permanent. But the scene inside suggests a business that is not coming back.

The door that never reopened

At Upper Richmond Road and Keswick Broadway, a few minutes’ walk away, a possession notice is still fixed to the window. It is dated 6 January 2025. The notice, issued by Wilson and Roe, trading as Cerberus HCE Limited, states that High Court enforcement officers entered the premises and caused the claimant to have possession of it. Enquiries were directed to Andrew Wilson and Co as agents for the claimant.

The unit had operated as a dry cleaner for years, trading under several names including Du Cane Dry Cleaners and S&S Dry Cleaners, all sharing the same phone number. It is now fifteen months since the eviction. The unit is still empty. The notice is still in the window.

The independents absorbed

Further along Upper Richmond Road, the purple frontage of Lauristons is fading. The estate agency, which had been in Putney since 1994, has closed. Its website now redirects to another firm. Trustpilot lists the branch as closed. There are no active listings.

Over the road from what was Lauristons, Chestertons has taken over the Allan Fuller name. Allan Fuller had traded independently in Putney since 1983 before the acquisition. The branch now operates as “Chestertons in association with Allan Fuller.” The old Chestertons office two doors down has closed, with a notice in the window directing clients to the new combined premises.

Between the two absorbed shopfronts, James Anderson, the remaining independent estate agent on the parade, is still trading.

The combined history of Lauristons and Allan Fuller on these streets stretches back more than seventy years. Both names have now gone, in different ways: one absorbed, one simply closed.

The corporate exits

On Putney High Street itself, the Three mobile store has shut. Pink hoarding in the window directs customers to the nearest Vodafone at 94a High Street, on the other side of the road. The closure follows the merger of Three and Vodafone, completed in May 2025. All Three-branded stores are closing as their leases expire.

Nearby, Kaalika Palace at 281 Putney Bridge Road has closed. The Indian restaurant’s windows are dark. The date and reason for its closure are not known.

What they leave behind

Six closures over roughly fifteen months, from a fish and chip shop that may have been on its site for half a century to a mobile phone store emptied by a corporate merger. They do not all tell the same story. A family business closing after decades is not the same as a chain consolidating its estate, and a High Court eviction that leaves a unit empty for over a year is something else again.

What they share is the result. More empty shopfronts on streets where confidence is already fragile, at a time when rising energy costs and economic uncertainty are making it harder, not easier, for new businesses to take the risk of filling them.