Archive feature from 2008: Davenports Magic Shop
Everyone was saddened to read Davenports’ recent tweet announcing the closure of its magic shop in London’s Charing Cross Underground Arcade after 36 years. I was lucky enough to be sent there once to meet Bill and Roy Davenport, and, to mark its final day – 30 January 2020 – we thought we’d post the feature I wrote about the shop and the family who have run the business since 1898.
By Liz Arratoon
Whether you’re looking for cups and balls or a £1,600 substitution trunk, Davenports magic shop in London is an atmospherically lit, red-lined treasure trove of tricks, books, DVDs and ghastly things such as severed hands and fake blood. Started by mail order in 1898 by Lewis Davenport, it is the oldest family-run magic business in the world. Today it is managed by his great-grandsons, Bill and Roy, although their mother, Betty, who has been working in the shop for 60 years – since she was 14 – still goes in every day.
It is a flourishing concern, and Bill points out that their bestseller is one of the smaller items from a vast range of 1,600. “Generally speaking, it’s packs of playing cards. Most come in from America but there are dozens of different types of cards and card tricks. We go through an awful lot of them.”
But how did it all begin? An early poster describes Lewis as a ‘bewilderist’. Roy explains: “He was a self-taught manipulator. He’d make cards, billiard balls, thimbles or coins appear from thin air. He’d started off as a juggler but bought a magic book and got into magic. His father had died when he was eight. So by day he was an apprentice barrel-maker but did shows in the evening to support his family, and met other magicians who needed tricks.” Lewis made improvements or added a novel twist to standard tricks, started selling them to his friends and began to build up his business. He was a star of his time and his name helped the shop to do well.
Working in Germany during the thirties, he recognised that war was imminent and had a brainwave. Roy continues: “He was massively ambitious and stole a lead on all the other magic dealers. Germany was the China of the day, mass-producing stock. He was wholesaling all round the country and bought up items literally by the million, and filled the store. He supplied other dealers throughout the war. That has stood us in good stead ever since.”
But the fact that the business survived owes a great deal to Betty. In 1962, Lewis and his son, George, died within 12 months of each other, leaving everything to her. Roy says: “Magic has always been a male-dominated bastion, and a lot of people assumed she’d sell, but she kept it going. She carried the London shop alone until 1979. It was an extraordinary effort.”
In 1984, Davenports moved to its present subterranean hideaway in the arcade at Charing Cross Underground. As Roy explains: “From 1961 we were opposite the British Museum. You’d have coachloads of children deposited at the museum, who all ran over and spent their 50p on stink bombs. It sounds great but the magician at the back who wanted to spend £100 couldn’t get to the counter or discuss things openly. The advantage now is that we’re dead centre in London but we’re out of the way. Magicians find us and they’ve got complete privacy.”
One of Davenports’ new ventures, its magic school, began because they found a lot of people were unsure where to start, and it attracts a cross-section of students. Bill says: “It’s really successful. We’re trying to explain the basics of card magic and non-card magic, manipulation, and give them some idea of how to progress. We’re making it as interactive as possible so people can learn a move or routine in the class and get instant feedback about how it looks. People want to learn techniques but we do try to encourage stagecraft, misdirection and some idea of the audience.”
For those who cannot get to London, Bill has a couple of suggestions: “Normally, we tend to recommend things based on the person’s experience, their individual needs and budget. For youngsters, a Svengali deck is very good. Often trick decks can only do one thing but this one’s great because it has a huge variety. It’s not too expensive and you can get up and running with it.” He adds: “The Miracle Ring is another trick I love. You have a little metal ring and you throw the ring at the shoelace and they link together. Anyone can do it.”
He recommends Spellbinding Boxes for more experienced practitioners. “You have a coin that can be signed and put under a handkerchief. It disappears, and then you have a small brass box. The spectator opens the box, inside there’s another smaller box, so you go through about five and in the innermost box is the person’s signed coin. It’s good for beginners to intermediates but can also be done in a professional environment.“
And Bill mentions Rainbow Cascade, a card trick that Davenports has sole rights to, which “takes a bit more practice”. He explains its intriguing effect: “You show some cards, which change from being face up to face down, face down to face up as you count them from hand to hand, and for the kicker at the end you turn them over and they’ve got these glittery prismatic backs, completely different to anything you’ve seen before.“
As for the future of Davenports, Bill’s 12-year-old son, Alex, is already inventing his own tricks. “We don’t pressurise him but he’s come up with some very clever things.”
His great-great-grandfather would be proud.
Davenports is looking for a new central London venue for its shop, but until then it has more than 1,400 items available to buy online here.
Pictures of Betty and Bill Davenport taken in 2008 by Stephanie Methven
Twitter: @davenportsmagic
Follow @TheWidowStanton on Twitter
© Liz Arratoon
This feature first appeared in The Stage
