A PIECE of Cowley Road’s past is being honoured as building work gets underway on a new bar.
A replica sign for Ravenscroft and Fraser Watchmakers has been installed above number 72, which has in recent years been a hairdressers but was the home of the former business until 1958.
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Arbequina tapas restaurant, based next door, recently received planning permission to extend into the empty shop to create a ‘separate, but linked’ bar.
72 Cowley Road, right, when it was a hairdressers. Picture Google Maps from July 2014
The restaurant's own frontage features the original chemist sign uncovered during renovation works.
Rufus Thurston, who runs the business with head chef Ben Whyles, said: "We wanted to something sympathetic to that and it uses the name and a font accurate to the period."
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Business directory listings place the watchmakers as occupying the building in 1920 until 1958.
The bar, set to be named Ravenscroft and Fraser, is expected to open in mid April.
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