Harrods Store in Buenos Aires

Harrods Buenos Aires, at the posh end of Florida, deserves special mention

After the Colón opera house refurbishment, there is Harrods to come. That could give added strength to recall the date marking 200 years as a nation. Not a patch on the first century, of course, but we must accept that times and purses are different. However, the announcement in April that a Swiss corporation had bought Harrods Buenos Aires is comforting. A special piece of Buenos Aires is to be recovered.

The sale or transfer or whatever was followed by a flood of recollections (especially heard on the radio) by people of different decades who recalled going to Harrods at Christmas or for a haircut or, as children, playing on the grand stairs leading to the first floor.

Harrods Buenos Aires, at the posh end of Florida, deserves special mention even when an apparent ruin, so now more so is its story worth retelling.

Harrods London, the one on Brompton Road, in Knightsbridge, was under the leadership of the Burbridges for half a century. Sir Richard Burbidge joined the company in 1891 as general manager and became managing director the following year. His son, Woodman Burbridge, who inherited the baronetcy and became general manager in 1901, joined the firm in 1893. He was the driving force behind the Buenos Aires branch. A notice in The Harrodian Gazette, the staff newsletter, in its May 2, 1913, issue announced that Mr. and Mrs. Woodman Burbridge were travelling to Buenos Aires to start the new branch. An export department article in the same edition reported that: “At present the great magnet which is attracting the world’s commercial needle is South America…” and forecast that, “at no far distant date Harrods will enjoy the benefits of their own transport service to Buenos Aires.”

That bold statement crashed soon after with the First World War. But, in 1913, Woodman Burbridge was busy with BA and it is amazing just how rapidly the store was designed and built.

The same staff publication reported in its April 3, 1914, issue that, “On the 31st of March the new store at Buenos Aires was successfully opened, crowds of the best families in the city attending, many of whom personally congratulated Mr. Foucher and Mr. Le Sueur on having inaugurated the finest commercial house in the Argentine Republic.

“The building was erected in record time for Buenos Aires by working a staff night and day, and has caused some excitement in the town besides giving the public in the Argentine a very good impression of Harrods’ organizing powers.

“The order was placed by Mr. Woodman Burbridge for all the ironwork, cement, bricks, etc. before he left Buenos Aires in August last, or it would not have been possible to erect the building in so short a time, as all the ironwork, cement, bricks, windows, woodwork, and so on, came from England or the US. The excavations alone took two months, working night and day, and the building covers nearly an acre of floor space.”

In London, the boardroom had already acquired its own celebratory decoration for the A.G.M., “A novel idea of Mr. Roe’s for the reception room was a Pièce Monte in sugar of our new stores at Buenos Aires (how it will look when the building is completed), which was very cleverly executed by the Chef of the Restaurant who is quite a clever artist in this kind of work. We give here the menu and call attention to Bordure Amélie and Bombe Georgienne – two special dishes invented for the occasion and which were very much appreciated.”

The September 1914 edition of the magazine, under the heading “Buenos Aires Intelligence”, reported what was called the second inauguration. “The second section of Harrods Buenos Aires, consisting of
the second and third floors, will be opened to the buying public on the 12th of this month. Included in the new section is the tastefully decorated Restaurant and Tea Room, and as the same will rank with the finest of its kind in the Republic, it is sure to win the appreciation of the Patrons of the House.”

Harrods Buenos Aires was affiliated with The South American Stores (Gath & Chaves), which were on Florida at the corner of Cangallo (now Perón). Tragedy was only a short time away.

A board decision some years later made the Buenos Aires store the only one allowed to carry the company name. Although the London store tried to reverse that decision on more than one occasion, English courts granted the use of the name to the Argentine owners. Ownership and management were a matter of squabbles for years, and especially after 1947 when rows and splits were the order of the day.

It would be good to have Harrods back and functioning if only so that Buenos Aires can recover a part of its heritage and nostalgia. It would be a tribute to this bicentenary.
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SOURCE:
“Harrods could be a bicentenary landmark”
National News
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
By Andrew Graham-Yooll
Buenos Aires Herald
http://www.buenosairesherald.com
http://www.buenosairesherald.com/BreakingNews/View/34543