Abbeydale Road

Back in the swing of Tuesdays with Autumn term starting 2 weeks ago, after a lovely first summer school holiday, went for a stroll this morning up Abbeydale Road with littlest (Not so little anymore at 20 months, our cheerful cheeky chappy).
With a couple of errands including picking up a tin of Purbeck stone from Farrow & Ball and putting a cheque into the bank, headed out directly after school drop off. With 20mins before the bank opened, decided to get a bit of exercise and walk up Abbeydale road. With the sun breaking through and blue skies emerging from the cloud and rain, I decided to have a little go with a photo project a la Chica (my good friend, and serious blogger).

Abbeydale road has been on the pipeline as the new Ecclesall road for as long as I can remember in the 13 years of living in Sheffield, with Bragazzis being the central place to head to for the best coffee in town, standing alone.

Then along came a little independent bakers with great sour dough loafs and amazing croissants, next door but one. Forge Bake House have expanded since into a bigger premises, with their own cafe and bake school, bringing interest further up the road.

Within the last year or so, Mr Pickles have opened. Such a great enterprise bringing Yorkshire produce to Abbeydale Road. It is now my preferred place to shop for our meat. They have a great working attitude opening every day into the evening which makes it more readily accessible and giving supermarkets a bit of competition.  We feel like valued customers there, when at Christmas the nice owner gave us a canvas shopping bag as a token of appreciation of our custom. This summer, when our cheeky eldest asked him for his apron (as well as the usual gourmet scotch egg), he popped round the back and got one out for us to borrow on the agreement that eldest would wear it to do some cooking, and return it,of course, next time we popped in.

Another shop and well established is the great cook ware store, owned by a couple of foodies, The Gifted Cook, formerly Abbots Cookshop.  I always enjoy going in for a browse with the owners on hand offering a coffee and cooking advice for whatever item you’re considering.

These are my favourite Abbeydale road places but there are more..

Amici Bici, is a lovely Italian Bicycle themed cafe, seemed the place to be when the Grand Tour came to us last year.

Mac & May is a stylish little place, great for a little browse with stylish reclaimed furniture/homewares.

This morning I saw this florist again, The Flower Garden Florist, having noticed it popping up not long ago.

..And I’m a huge fan of Swallows and Damsons. It used to be the just the Little Flower Shop which provided us with our bouquets on our wedding day 7 years ago. The new owners have taken the world by storm though with their beautiful Instagram images.

(I’m not doing it justice with my little photo here).

And otherwise plenty more to explore..

Rude Shipyard is one place in particular, I’ve not managed to visit yet. I’ve always found the name inviting.  It always looks interesting with it’s notices for book evenings and other community events. Our friend used to bake for them before she and her family moved back to Germany. When I started off initially as a locum Consultant in Chesterfield 4 years ago, in my first clinic I met a patient who was doing well with his mental health.  He told me of his days spent heading over to Sheffield by public transport, in particular to visit  and hang out at the Rude Shipyard.

 
Abbeydale road has had bit of evolution over recent years and pulled in the artisan. With a bit of Council re-branding going on, it is now the central spine of the Antiques Quarter mixing in interestingly with the established Middle Eastern community and businesses. Overall it is a favourite place.