This article was originally published in April 2001.

Left-handers are no longer burned at the stake, but they are still persecuted every day of their lives by the design of tools that most people take for granted. At a special shop in London, Christine Booth seeks out some kitchen implements that make everything all right for lefties.

Most of us don’t think twice when we fancy beans on toast. We simply slip a slice or two of bread in the toaster, reach for the tin opener and open a tin of beans. Hey presto! What could be easier? But, for the one in ten of us who are left-handed, the simple act of opening a tin can be a source of endless frustration, not to mention cut fingers and spilt beans. 

If you’re left-handed and don’t want to spill the beans, help is at (your left) hand. Anything Left Handed is a family-run business, owned for the last 15 years by Lauren and Keith Milsom and, before that, by Keith’s father (all of them left-handed). For over 30 years it’s been providing advice and products to make life less ‘topsy-turvy’ for ‘Southpaws’. Tucked away in the heart of London’s Soho, this tiny little shop, with its Dickensian windows, is chock-full of amazing implements, from gardening tools to stationery items. As a right-hander entering the shop, the first thing you notice is the door handle: it’s the ‘wrong way round’. Once inside, it’s an Aladdin’s Cave for left-handers. For me, a right-hander, it’s like looking at life through a mirror, which makes you realise what life must be like for left-handers. 

The shop is managed by Lance and Samantha, who work alternate weeks. Lance is a real character: a friendly, enthusiastic and sensitive chap, he takes great pride both in the visual appeal of the shop and in helping his customers. One of his greatest joys is to see the scales fall from the eyes of parents of left-handed children when they come in to the shop, try out all its goodies and, in a few minutes, a child they thought was clumsy and awkward is transformed into an elegant human being – simply by using the right (or should that be ‘left’?) tools. 

The biggest single problem faced by left-handers is handwriting, at least in societies where writing from left to right is the norm. This is because the hand naturally tracks over what it has just written, smearing the ink. As well as stocking left-handed fountain pens, Lance – a left-hander himself, of course – takes considerable time and care to show left-handed shelfpeople how to write neatly and comfortably. 

Yet, handwriting apart, for most left-handers, the kitchen is where the biggest challenge lies. Standard tin-openers, kitchen scissors and vegetable peelers are all designed for right-handers. For left-handers, tin-openers work backwards, scissors are uncomfortable, and vegetable peelers are impossible, unless you push the peeler away, rather than towards you. A left-handed peeler has the blade on the opposite side, making peeling easier. 

Similarly, a left-handed bread knife has its serrations on the right-hand side of the blade, enabling left-handers to cut neat slices of bread instead of wedges. Another highly popular item is the left-handed pastry fork, blade on the opposite side. According to Lance, “You wouldn’t believe how many butch men rush straight in, making a bee-line for the pastry forks, saying, ‘I can’t stand it any longer! I’m having one of these!’” 

The shop also stocks anti-clockwise corkscrews, milk pans with left-handed pouring lips, left-handed ladles, pastry slicers (with the cutting edge on the right-hand side) and a large selection of knives for serious southpaw cooks, as well as many other useful items. One of these is the ambidextrous herb mill, with a removable grating bit in the middle, so that the handle can be turned on the right or left hand side: handy for right-handers and left-handers sharing a kitchen. 

According to the Milsoms, many left-handers have been ‘getting by’ for years with right-handed things, never realising that what they had assumed was their own natural clumsiness was in fact due to using ‘back-to-front’ tools. 

I decided to find out for myself. My left-handed friend John has been managing all his life without the help of these southpaw-friendly gadgets. He’s a professional oboist and has been playing the oboe ‘right-handedly’ for over 30 years. (There’s no such thing as a left-handed oboe.) Initially sceptical, he agreed to try a selection of kitchen tools. He arrived for the Eat test equipped with a bottle of wine, so out came the left-handed corkscrew. Although it was the most basic, simple type (£2.95), his reaction was immediate and enthusiastic: “It’s much easier! I’m not turning the bottle! I usually have to turn the bottle.” 

Next, he tried the scissors (“Much more accurate cutting.”); the peeler (“Fantastic! Absolutely brilliant. Usually, I have to peel away from me. The act of pulling instead of pushing is much, much better. Mashed potato was a thing of the past until now. I’m fed up of potatoes in their jackets.”); and, finally, the bread knife (“Look at that”, he said, as he cut perfectly neat, thin slices, “It’s much better. It’s the end of thick toast misery.”) 

Test over, he summed up his feelings: “I’m very impressed. It’s a revelation. I never considered I was labouring under a disadvantage. It makes things better in ways I hadn’t imagined.” 

For more information about Anything Left Handed, check out their website at: www.anythingleft-handed.co.uk

Text: Christine Booth / Photo: Alex Macdonald