History

Walter James Daniel, the founder of W.J. Daniel & Co. Ltd rented his first shop 96 Uxbridge Road Ealing in 1901 at a cost of £50.00 a year selling drapery and fashions, he lived with his family above the shop.

Unfortunately business was very slow so Walter was unable to pay the rent, he went to the landlord to give the keys back, the landlord refused to take the keys and told him to persevere, he did, they worked very hard keeping the shop open from early morning until 9 at night.

Walter and his wife had four children Florence, Charles, Mabel, and Douglas, all the family worked in the shop.

Charles left school at 15 and had many happy years of apprenticeships with Derry and Toms, Bearmans, Selbys and Gorringes before at his father’s request returning to the family business. In 1918 Charles purchased a shop in Windsor for his sister Mabel to run, he paid £150.00 a year rent for 120 Peascod Street, he also bought a shop for his brother Douglas to run in Newbury.

Charles married Irene; they had two sons Michael and Peter.

Over the years more shops were acquired freehold by the family, some were sold to enlarge the existing Ealing and Windsor stores.

Today Daniel is trading from a large department store in Windsor and two smaller stores in Ealing and Chiswick. With the passage of time the front façade of the Daniel store in Windsor was in need of modernisation and redevelopment. To facilitate this and still maintain an entrance on Peascod Street the works were planned in two phases.

Future

We are currently undergoing phase one of our modernisation due to be completed in spring 2010. Two shops were purchased last year by Daniel (previously Halifax and O2 outlets) adjacent to the Gap clothing store, these have been demolished to produce one larger stand alone unit comprising basement, ground and first floors (circa 12,000 sq feet of combined trading space) with a link to the existing Daniel store on all three levels.

Phase 2 of the redevelopment will provide an impressive new glazed entrance from Peascod Street with much improved ceiling heights on all floors giving Daniel new larger retail space, we anticipate a programme of 24 months for this phase and are busy working on the design development of the internal space.