THE faded and rather grubby little advertising bill on the wall probably said it all. It was to promote a performance of Ruddigore by Great Witley Operatic Society at Worcester’s Swan Theatre in 1981. Admission £1.80.

While motor factors and the building trade might decorate their storerooms with the latest calendar of Sun Stunners or Megan Fox in a hard hat and not much else, Alwyn Gloves went for comic opera. It was their end of the market.

Sadly, the state of the handbill reflected the state of Worcester’s glove trade, which was once all conquering. Along with fine china and a certain piquant sauce, the city was once a byword for the manufacture of stylish gloves.

Firms like Fownes, Dent Allcroft and Milore employed many hundreds of people. Even in the 1950s, there were a dozen members of the local glove manufacturers association.

Today, if things went to a vote, only one hand would be raised and that would belong to Les Winfield, who set up Alwyn Gloves in the mid-60s and has run it with an ever decreasing workforce eversince.

Still operating from an old village school at Crown East – “full of period charm”, an estate agent might say... “rather ramshackle”

would be a more honest description – Alwyn is now Worcester’s last remaining glove company.

It has survived by cutting its cloth to suit its business and some canny decisions by Les, who at the age of 91 still drives once a fortnight down into Oxfordshire to take material to outworkers. He has to. There is no one else, apart from Brian Fincher, who runs the one-man factory and arrives at work on his pushbike.

Seeing the way the world was going, Les has kept his ship afloat by concentrating on the top end of the market and other niche areas.

One of which, remarkably, is the munitions and space research industries, to whom he supplies tight fitting leather gloves that do not contaminate vital component parts.

He said: “They tried bare hands, fabric gloves and rubber gloves, but nothing is as good as leather.”

However, there was a sign of the times at the recent royal nuptials.

When Prince Andrew married Sarah Ferguson in 1986, Alwyn was commissioned to make a pair of uniform gloves for the wedding.

No such call came from Prince William. Although the company has a whole list of VIP customers, including the groom’s grandfather Prince Philip, who loves his firm’s carriage driving gloves.

Brian Fincher recalls the tale of spending ages on the phone talking to a very well spoken chap from Buckingham Palace about the Duke’s gloves.

He said: “He seemed very knowledgeable and it only gradually dawned on me I was speaking to the duke himself and not a footman. The gloves were to be size nine and the leather was from his own deer.”

Lady Thatcher and Sir Cliff Richard are among other famous names to order from Alwyn and the company also supplies gloves for the aldermen of the City of London, who sit during court sessions at the Old Bailey Despite the Dickensian appearance of the little factory – Bob Cratchit wouldn’t look out of place at one of the desks, if he could find room among the clutter – it does have a nod towards modern technology, at least as far as the internet is concerned.

On the day I called an order had just arrived from New Zealand through its website for a pair of silk lined day gloves in emerald leather.

On the other hand some of its equipment is more than 100 years old and would be difficult, if not quite impossible, to replace.

Astutely, Les Winfield bought up pieces and tools from other British glove manufacturers when they closed down but they won’t last forever. At one time, even as recently as the 1980s, 18 people crammed themselves into the old school rooms and Les even had a secretary and a PA.

Now there is just him and Brian and the ghosts of times past. The small army of 80 outworkers, all women who sew the gloves together in their own homes, has been reduced to half a dozen.

Les said: “One lady started with us when she was a young girl and now she’s a grandmother.”

It’s the quality, obviously not the quantity, of Alwyn Gloves that keeps ithe company alive. Classic styles, perfectly finished are made from the finest skins from Arabia, Nigeria and Abyssinia – as Les refers to modern day Ethiopia.

“Cut an elegant dash” says the company’s advertising slogan in 1950s parlance with images of Noel Coward or royal banquets, ball gowns and cigarette holders.

Ladies evening dress gloves that extend above the elbow, men’s formal gloves in soft white leather or driving gloves for car or horse and carriage; pure silk lined, wool lined, fleece lined, crochet backed or with red fourchettes (between the fingers). They all come from behind a battered old wooden door just outside Worcester.

The city’s glove industry still lives, just.

Mike Pryce