Glass Onion: from a Barnsley coal shed to Sheffield's award-winning vintage store

Every great business needs an origin story, and Glass Onion's is hard to beat. It started in 2005 with founder John selling vintage clothing out of his grandma's coal shed in Barnsley. Market stalls, festival pop-ups and ten warehouse moves followed, yet the company has stayed just a stone's throw from where it all began.

Today Glass Onion describes itself as the UK's leading vintage clothing company. Its South Yorkshire headquarters processes up to 20,000kg of second-hand clothing every week, sourced from textile recycling plants across Europe and the USA. Every piece was thrown away and destined for landfill, and the team grades, launders, reworks and tickets thousands of items each day.

Since 2016, an in-house remade factory has been turning damaged clothes and off-cuts into new, wearable pieces, producing up to 10,000 remade items a month. Glass Onion also supplies vintage in wholesale quantities to high street brands, vintage stores and production companies.

For shoppers, the heart of the operation is the flagship store at 65 Division Street, in the middle of one of Sheffield's best-loved independent shopping streets. The shop has been voted Sheffield's 'Best Indie Retailer' and 'Best Vintage Store' by the people of Sheffield at the Exposed Awards in 2022, 2023, 2024 and again in 2026.

That success has helped the business spread its wings, with stores now open on Bridlesmith Gate in Nottingham and over two floors on Lands Lane in Leeds. Even so, the company is clear that its Sheffield flagship reflects its roots.

It is also a sizeable local employer. What started with two people has grown into a team of more than 45, and the company says its people are the heart of everything it does. Its events programme has included Y2K After Hours, a premium partywear and designer edit.

Division Street itself recently came second in a national ranking of the UK's top hotspots for independent shops, and Glass Onion is a big part of its appeal. The Sheffield store is open seven days a week, and the online shop, events and wholesale details are on the Glass Onion website.