Ultimate Guide to Chester and Cheshire

From fast fashion to creating a shopping
destination: we talk to Reclaimed
World’s Jeff Pearce about salvage,
leather trousers – and why retirement
isn’t for everyone.
Reclaimed
World
Most people approach
retirement with a sense of
glee. No more early starts.
No more listening to Boris
in accounts droning on
about profitability with all
the charm of an oil tanker
bearing down on a rubber
dinghy. And, most important
of all, no more work.
But Jeff Pearce isn’t most
people. The former fashion
retailer discovered that
retirement was a little bit,
well, dull – though that’s
hardly surprising for a man
whose career has spanned
everything from market
trading to stunt riding at
Pinewood Studios. “I thought
I’d peaked,” he says of
his decision to retire, “but
then a plot of land came
up and I thought I’d open a
reclamation yard on it, just
as a hobby business.”
That land was a threeacre
site near Tarporley,
and Jeff’s idea for a hobby
quickly became Reclaimed
World, a reclamation yard
that sells everything from
bricks and red telephone
boxes to armchairs and
vases – and attracts
shoppers from as far away
as Devon. “Holidaymakers
ask if we can deliver and of
course I say yes. In fact, I’ve
not long got off the phone to
someone asking if they can
bring coach tours, and I said
yes to that as well,” he says.
Saying yes to things, taking
a punt, selling bricks to
Cheshire: it’s all par for the
course for a man whose
life could be described as
colourful. He left school at
14, after a childhood spent in
Liverpool’s post-war slums.
His ability to sell saw him
rise from market stallholder
to heading a fashion
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