The M&S Collection
About the Archive
To celebrate the 100th birthday of Marks & Spencer in 1984, the Company took the opportunity to look back with pride at its long history. We decided to collect together the many historical items from all over the Company and create the M&S Company Archive.
Since then, the archive team has worked to collect, catalogue and make available for use, all kinds of records of Marks & Spencer’s past.
Today the archive contains more than 70,000 items from the last 128 years, and we welcome new additions to our collection.
The collection includes:
- Documents, reports, letters, speeches, employee magazines, annual reports and advertising leaflets
- Photographs, films and oral history recordings
- Clothing, food packaging and merchandise from the days of the Penny Bazaar to the present
More details on our collection and what it holds
Open PDFResearch and resources
The Reading Room is available for anyone who wants to do more in-depth research using material from our archive collections. You will find more information about how to use the Reading Room here.
Using the Reading Room Reading Room opening hours
A Short History of M&S Bibliography
Contact the archivists
- Location
- M&S Company Archive
- Michael Marks Building
- University of Leeds
- LS2 9JT (sat nav LS2 9LZ)
- Opening Hours
- Monday - Saturday: 10:00am - 5:00pm
- Sunday: Closed
- Bank Holidays: Closed
- companyarchive@marks-and-spencer.com
- (0)208 7182800
Further resources
Make a donation
A 1920s tea set recently donated to the collection
We are always delighted to receive your donations
How to donate
Have you got any M&S treasures tucked away? We welcome donations that help to enhance the M&S archive collection. See our Collection Policy for more information. Please contact us to talk about a possible donation.
Collection Development PolicyOur Catalogue
Discover what's in the archive
Our online catalogue lets you find descriptions and images of thousands of items in our collection. Use the catalogue to organise your visit to the Reading Room by choosing what you want to see, or just browse highlights in our Themes section.
Collection Overview