It all started when McLaren and a school friend opened a stall at the back of a boutique called Paradise Garage on King's road. They sold items that had been collected by McLaren over the previous year including rock & roll vinyls, magazines, clothes and 1950s memorabilia.
The shop became theirs in 1971, they renamed it Let It Rock and started selling second-hand clothes and new Teddy Boy clothes that had been designed by McLaren's school teacher girlfriend Vivienne Westwood. They sold tailored drape jackets, skin-tight trousers, and thick-soled brothel creepers (a type of shoe worn by the Teddy Boys in the 50s which originated following World War II where soldiers based in the North African deserts wore suede boots with hard-wearing crepe soles. Many ex-soldiers were seen wearing the same shoes in nightspots in London which became known as Brothel Creepers).
The Let It Rock shop soon has its name covered in the London Evening Standard.
The shop underwent two further face-lifts, in 1973 when its name changed to Too Fast To Live, Too Young To Die reflecting the change towards a 60s rocker fashion, and in 1974 it was re-branded to the name SEX.
SEX sold fetish and bondage gear as well as original fashion styles that would later become punk. At the time, SEX was the only shop of its kind when British punk rock developed.
Early customers were the members of the Sex Pistols, Adam Ant and Siouxie Sioux.
The designs of the store portrayed the social and sexual taboos of the 60s by selling t-shirts with images of the Cambridge Rapist's face hood, semi-naked cowboys, pornographic texts, and fashion designs such as clear plastic-pocketed jeans, zippered tops and the Anarchy shirt (shirts that were bleached and dyed with silk Karl Marx ( the German revolutionary socialist who developed the socio-political theory of Marxism) patches and anarchist slogans).
The shop underwent another change in December 1976 by renaming itself Seditionaries where the fashion designs were licensed by Vivienne Westwood to another boutique on King's Road called Boy.
In the late 80s, it re-opened again under the name World's End where the building was designed by McLaren and Westwood. Here McLaren and Westwood launched the first of a series of collections at the beginning of 1981. World's End is still open and remains part of Vivienne Westwood's global fashion empire.
Visit Worlds End shop at 430 King's Road, Chelsea, London.
http://www.worldsendshop.co.uk/