Picquet House

This rather Colonial picture looking to the west shows Picquet House the low building with colonnades and the Union flag at each corner.
To the left is the statue of Prince Albert with a Guernsey Bus waiting for passengers.
The the right of the rather beautiful palm tree is the entrance to a street called "Fountain Street"
Fountain Street runs between the old Guernsey Market and a row of old shops which Guernsey people will remember as Gabriel's because Ben Gabriel, the founder, owned 10 (most) of these shops.

Ben Gabriel's empire lasted for 61 years until he died and the business finally closed in December 2007. They were a rather old fashioned row of shops which sold just about everything in the garment line but not a "fashion" business hence, kids would hate to be seen in town with a Gabriels bag...you had to quickly stick it inside a more fashionable one. I think we all remember Gabriel's with some fondness however.

Amusing story
This morning I went up fountain Street to see a workman busy in one of the old Gabriel's shops, as you will see from this LINK, the windows are papered over with newspaper, the SUN as it happens. The builder gentleman told me that his lads had papered over the windows previously, but had used only copies of page3. They were apparently made to replace with less "noticeable" pages Tout de suite!

For local artist Rob Sweeny's impression of what one of the shops used to look like check this LINK
8-)