1990 | >Re-PHOTO

Marsh Wall and South Quay – 1990

Marsh Wall and South Quay: – The London Docklands Development Corporation (LDDC) had been set up in 1981 and by 1990 when I made these pictures a great deal of work had been done and was continuing at a huge rate.

It’s work was highly controversial at the time, largely because it took power away from local councils and developed the area largely around the needs of business rather than people. Although it eventually brought in many new jobs (though displacing some older jobs) and provided a considerable amount of housing in the area, many thought that there should have been far more social housing and better treatment of the existing residents in the area.

*Marsh Wall, Mastmaker Rd, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-43*

The Docklands Light Railway was one of the LDDC’s most successful interventions in the Isle of Dogs and first opened in 1987, running from both Tower Gateway on the edge of the City and Stratford to a station in Cubitt Town, Island Gardens. At first it was derided as a ‘Toytown Train’, but the system ended the transport isolation of the Isle of Dogs, previously accessible by slow bus routes from Poplar and a foot tunnel from Greenwich – and in later years has been much extended.

Few of the jobs in the new offices were for residents of the area, and the early employment opportunities for them are perhaps represented by the sign for ‘Ernes Snack Bar’ under the Give Way sign.

*DLR, Marsh Wall, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-46*

More offices photographed from underneath the DLR viaduct.

*Marsh Wall, South Quay, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-34*

There are now a large number of sculptures in the area around Canary Wharf but back in 1990 they were few and far between. I don’t think this piece lasted very long at this location, but I’ve failed to find what happened to it.

90-4j-36-Edit — *The Waterfront, pub, 187, Marsh Wall, South Quay, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-36*

The Waterfront – at top left – was a Fullers pub at 187 Marsh Wall-South Quay Plaza. I think it became or was replaced at that address by Astons Champagne & Wine Bar as the area moved more upmarket. This closed in 2015.

*South Dock, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-21*

There were still odd bits of the old docks around such as this, which I think may have been in the Millwall Cutting.

*South Dock, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-22*

The Lothbury Building with offices from 6,000-71,000 SQ FT advertised at 191 Marsh Wall, overlooking South Dock. It became the main headquarters for the LDDC in 1990.

*South Quay, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-23*

Some architectural building in a style common in the early days of the LDDC. Many of the buildings in this area have been replaced since 1990 making it difficult to find the exact locations of my pictures. The IRA bombing in 1996 prompted some changes but few of the buildings would in any case have lasted. They have been replaced by taller blocks with greater floor space and more modern services.

*South Dock, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-24*

Building work on the north side of South Dock.

*South Dock, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-12*

And the same buildings seen from a little further east past a ship moored on the south bank of South Dock.

More from the Isle of Dogs in 1990 later.

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A Film Disaster – and the Isle of Dogs – 1990

A Film Disaster: From Hampstead I went on to Colindale where I took only a couple of pictures – not on line – and then on to Kingsbury. But the next time I developed a batch of film – fortunately only 4 films from a new 100 ft roll – I found there was a disaster. Every image was covered with speckled white spots and quite impossible to print.

I contacted the film manufacturer with a sample and while they accepted no liability, the did replace the roll with a new one, which I suppose was better than nothing. But the damage was so bad it was impossible to make acceptable darkroom prints from the negatives, and I kept them in my files with the message ‘DAMAGED FILM – REFERENCE ONLY’. And a month or so later went back to Kingsbury to retake those incredible 1930s houses by Ernest Trobridge again.

After scanning these damaged negatives it became possible -though very time-consuming – to digitally retouch most of these negatives, and I have done so with a handful of them. But I’ll come back to them later along with the replacement images I took in May.

Isle of Dogs – 1990

Isle of Dogs: The pictures I took a few days later on the Isle of Dogs were also on the faulty film, but again after scanning them I was able to painstakingly digitally retouch a few of them. You can still see a little unevenness in some areas of some of the pictures, most noticeably in some of the skies. These were retouched several years ago and I could do a better job now, certainly if I was prepared to use AI tools.

*West India Docks, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4i-55*

This view was I think from a DLR West India platform. It gives some idea of the building work taking place in the area at the time.

Heron Quays, DLR, Station, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4i-21 — *DLR, Station, Canary Wharf, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4i-21*

I think this was the first Canary Wharf DLR station – replaced by the rather larger one now there which opened in November 1991.

*West India Dock Entrance, Westferry Rd, River Thames, Millwall, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-64*

At left is the distinctive 20-storey residential block Cascades by Rex Wilkinson of CZWG. Across the River Thames in Rotherhithe is Lawrence Wharf, completed by the Danish developer ISLEF between 1986 and 1988 on the former Vitak Timber Imports timber yard and sawmill which closed in 1987

*West India Dock Entrance, Westferry Rd, River Thames, Millwall, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-66*

An aggregate works supplying sand and gravel, still much in demand with the immense amount of building works in the area.

John Lemanton & Son Ltd, Regents Wharf, Westferry Rd, Millwall, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-52 — *John Lenanton & Son Ltd, Regents Wharf, Westferry Rd, Millwall, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-52*

One of the oldest businesses on the Isle of Dogs founded by timber merchant John Lenanton at Batson’s Wharf close by and it soon expanded to Regents Wharf. It was still trading in 1990. While for many years most of the timber came in to the yard by water to the wharf, including by barge from the Surrey Docks, in its later years most came by lorry from Tilbury Docks.

*John Lemanton & Son Ltd, Regents Wharf, Westferry Rd, Millwall, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-53*

The company closed soon after I made these pictures and its buildings were demolished and replaced by a rather dreary apartment complex.

*Westferry Rd, Millwall, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-55*

The two shops at the right of the picture are still there but the rest of the buildings have been demolished and replaced and are now part of the exclusive, gated Ocean Wharf development between Westferry Road and the River Thames completed around 2000.

*Westferry Rd, Millwall, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-56*

More derelict former industrial premises in this section of Westferry Road – the windows at right are on the left of the previous picture

*Shops, 46-54, Westferry Rd, Millwall, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-4j-41*

There is still a row of shops here on Westferry Road and three of the original buildings remain along with some more modern infill, although the businesses in the are different. There is no longer a New Friends Chinese Takeaway or Golden Fish Bar. New Friends is a reminder that Limehouse, London’s first Chinatown is just up the road.

The Golden Fishbar at 46 Westferry Road was apparently a central location for the successful 1986 Channel 4 drama series Prospects about two young East End lads, Jimmy ‘Pincy’ Pince and Billy ‘Bill’ Pearson, played by Gary Olsen and Brian Bovell, trying to make a living on the Isle of Dogs. The shop is now Docklands Fried Chicken, a branch of Docklands Grill House.

More from the Isle of Dogs in a later post.

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Hampstead, Old And Modern – 1990

Continuing my walk in Hampstead on Sunday 9th April 1990. The previous post was More Hampstead – 1990 and ended at The Mount.

*Holly Mount, Holly Hill, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4g-63*

Hampstead is a hilly part of North London and Hollybush Steps up beside the house at the start of The Mount lead to another street with ‘mount’ in is name, Holly Mount which leads on to Holly Hill.

My picture is from the corner where Holly Mount meets Holly Hill, looking back down Holly Mount and on the left is the Holly Bush pub, with beyond that Hollybush House, with Hollybush Steps just out of sight around the corner. There is an awful lot of ‘Holly’ in that last sentence and this area of hillside was in earlier times covered with holly bushes.

But apparently the area was until the mid-nineteenth century known as Cloth Hill as its abundant springs made it a good place for washing clothes including laundries serving the Royal Household in Whitehall. Perhaps they hung their washing to dry on the holly bushes. But when the area was further developed and gentrified in the early Victorian era they chose to remember the holly rather than dirty washing. Ian Visits web site has a detailed illustrated article on the alley and Holly Mount.

The Grade II listed Holly Bush pub is a fine pub I’ve visited on several occasions. It was built in the 1790s as a stable block for the home and studio of portrait painter George Romney, but in 1807 was converted to provide catering for Hampstead Assembly Rooms. By around the middle of the nineteenth century it had begun to be used as a pub, but was apparently not fully licenced until 1928. In 2010 it was bought by Fullers and is a pub whose restaurant and drink prices reflect its situation in one of the most affluent areas of London.

*Mount Vernon, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4g-65*

Slopes lead up from Holly Hill to yet another mount in Hampstead, Mount Vernon, which gets its name from Major General Charles Vernon MP (1791-1810) who owned land here. The blue plaque is for Sir Henry Dale (1875–1968), a pharmacologist and physiologist who shared the 1936 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Otto Loewi for his work on acetylcholine as agent in the chemical transmission of nerve pulses.

At the end of the street is another blue plaque on the corner with Holly Walk, to the rather more famous Robert Louis Stevenson.

St Mary's, RC, Church, Holly Walk, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4g-53 — *St Mary’s, RC, Church, Holly Walk, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4g-53*

The church was first established here by a French Catholic priest Abbé Jean-Jacques Morel (1766–1852) who fled here from the French Revolution but it only had a church building here from 1816 and even then it looked nothing like this.

London had had a week of huge anti-Catholic riots in 1780, the Gordon Riots, and after a week of widespread destruction the army were brought in and around 500 rioters were killed and many injured and arrested. In 1816 anti-Catholic feeling was still running high and at first the church was built to look like another Georgian house.

By the 1850s feelings had quietened and the law had changed to allow Catholic churches to ring bells and William Wardell designed this facade with its bell tower, statue of the Virgin and Child and a massive doorway. Abbé Jean-Jacques Morel died in 1852, the year it was finished.

*Sun House, Frognal Way, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4g-21*

Various streets in the area share the name Frognal – and rather to my surprise simply because they were developed where a lot of frogs lived and croaked. Much of the area is private streets where Google Streetview does not go.

Sun House at 9 Frognal Way is Grade II* listed, as “a pioneer work of the Modern Movement in the UK“, designed by Maxwell Fry and built in 1935-6. “Fry was a founder member of the MARS Group which did much to forward the cause of the new architecture.”

It is a difficult house to photograph from the street as it it largely hidden behind trees and now also I think behind tall gates.

*House, Frognal, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4g-25*

66 Frognall is another Grade II* listed modern house, designed by Colin Lucas with
Amyas Connell and Basil Ward in 1937-8, on the corner with Frognal Way.

*House, Frognal, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4g-11*

Another photograph of the Grade II* listed 66 Frognal showing the entrance at its north end.

I’d had enough of Hampstead and had other places to go – I had taken many more pictures than I’ve so far put on line, and perhaps some time I’ll go back and scan more. But Hampstead still seems to me a place of its own, not really a part of the real London I know.

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More Hampstead – 1990

More Hampstead: More from my walk in Hampstead on Sunday 9th April 1990. The previous post was Hampstead Alleys, Hospital, Baths, House, Heath – 1990.

Hampstead wasn’t (and isn’t) an area of London I feel particularly sympathetic or comfortable in and I prefer the less affluent areas of the capital and those with more industry and that are less arty.

I worked hard at taking pictures but somehow find many of them less interesting and looking back at them over 30 years later have digitised a rather smaller proportion. The eight in this post come from around 60 that I took on this section of the walk, almost all carefully composed and correctly exposed. Probably I should go back and digitise more, but I think Hampstead is a part of London that many others have photographed and so my pictures are perhaps less important.

*Houses, Cannon Place, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4e-31*

I walked down from Hampstead Heath and turned into Cannon Place, where Sir Gerakd Du Maurier lived in Cannon Hall from 1916 until his death in 1935, and the childhood home of Daphne du Maurier and her siblings. The last Secretary of the East India Company had bought Rous Hall around 1838 and put a few old naval cannons in its grounds, renaming the house Cannon Hall. I haven’t digitised my picture of the Hall but found these two dogs mguarding the steps of one of the substantial Victorian houses in the neighbourhood.

*Lion House, 19, Well Rd, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4e-22*

Back on Well Road I took this picture of part of the Grade II listed Italianate Gothic Lion House, part of the large detached villa The Logs, built for civil engineer Edward Gotto (1822-1897) who was for several years in charge of North London’s sewers and went on to build sewers around the world. For him muck was obviously brass and this large house was designed by J.S. Nightingale and built by Charles Till in 1861. This section was named Lion House when the property was divided in 1951. Boy George lived in the Logs from the mid 1980s, and he sold his part of the house for £22million in 2022.

*House, Heath St, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4e-12*

This is the doorway of the Grade II listed Friends Meeting House at 120 Heath Street designed by Frederick Rowntree in the Arts and Crafts style, very much under the influence of Voysey and built in 1907. Among its famous visitors was Mahatma Gandhi who spoke here in 1909.

*Elm Row, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4e-16*

I think this is the alley with steps which leads from Elm Row to New End.

*Heath St, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4f-62*

The leaping sculptures here have long gone, and there are fences on top of the wall to give greater privacy to the residents of the property on the east side of the street just north of Elm Row. I think it was here that D H Lawrence and Frieda lived rather miserably after their return from New Mexico in 1923, along with Catherine and Donald Carswell, who was the lawyer who checked his work for possible libel claims.

But I can find nothing more about these sculptures.

*Hampstead Grove, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4f-51*

“The Hampstead Scientific Society observatory is one of the few places left in London that provides regular public viewings of the Moon, planets and other objects of interest in the night sky.” Though skies in London have so much light pollution that the view must be rather dim though being on the edge of the heath must help. It would still be interesting to book a free ticket if I lived closer.

The site is on the top of a Victorian covered reservoir, the Kidderpore Reservoir built in 1867 by the West Middlesex Water Company which still stores around 2.5 million gallons pumped here from water works at Hampton to supply 11,000 homes in the area. Still in use it was re-roofed in 2015 but still has its impressive Victorian architectural brickwork hidden away in the water.

*The Mount, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4f-23*

1 The Mount, on the corner of Hollybush Steps, has lost almost all of its interest since I made this picture in 1990. There is a new brick wall and tall hedging hides the front garden, though I think everything in it has gone, along with the vases on the steps, the lions and even the little roof over the door. It just looks neat and plain now.

*The Mount, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4f-24*

Most of this had changed by the time there appears to have been major building work on the site around 2019. What had been quirky and interesting is now rather dull. This large 3 bedroom end terrace house sold in 2017 for £2.64million.

Still more from Hampstead to come.

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Hampstead Alley, Hospital, Baths, House, Heath – 1990

Hampstead Alley, Hospital, Baths, House, Heath: My walk on Sunday 9th April 1990 continues. The walk began at my post A Hampstead Walk -1990.

Streatley Place, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4d-26

Another picture of Streatley Place. The narrow width of this alley makes it difficult to photograph, and it still retains some of the character of the rural path through fields which had still still been at the end of the 18th century. By the time of the 1860s OS Map it was completely surrounded by buildings – and was then known as Brewhouse Lane.

For reasons unknown to me its name changed around 1890 to Streatley Place. Some of the 19th century buildings of what began as Hampstead Workhouse, later New End Hospital, which backed onto Streatley Place were converted to flats around 1990.

As you can see the path slopes fairly steeply up here.

*Mansfield Place, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4d-15*

As Camden Council’s Conservation Appraisal states, Mansfield Place, built in 1860-61, is a “secluded quadrangle of low, two storey cottages approached down a narrow path between long front garden plots” making “a dramatic contrast between the cottage type gardens and the former hospital buildings looming up behind them” which you can see in this picture. Mansfield Place is Grade II listed.

*Streatley Place, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4e-65*

More steps on Streatley Place, I think looking down to the row of houses in a previous picture, part of the development around the alley around 1860.

*New Hospital, New End, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4e-51*

There is an extensive description of the history of New End Hospital which began life in 1800 as Hampstead Workhouse on the Lost Hospitals of London web site.

At left of picture is the 1878 building for the vestry then responsible for the hospital. Its architect Henry Edward Kendall was also responsible for the Vestry Hall built in the same year which later became Hampstead Town Hall. It was named Kendall Hall. The ‘New Hospital’, a slightly plainer block, was added in 1896. The hospital closed in 1986, and most of it was converted to flats.

*The Wells and Campden Baths, Wash House, 71, Flask Walk, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4e-55*

The Grade II listed Wells and Campden Baths were built in 1888 by architect Henry Simpson Legg for the Wells and Campden Charity, close to the site of the original Hampstead spring in Flask Walk though I think they relied on the local water supply then provided by a private water company, but later by the Metropolitan Water Board.

At the time it opened few of the homes where the working-class lived had bathrooms, often just a single cold tap, sometimes shared with other households, and public baths such as as this provided a much needed facility with many coming here and to other public baths for a weekly bath – soap and towels provided as well as hot water.

The Wells and Campden charity built baths in Kilburn and here. As well as the nine private baths in the building there was also a laundry and drying room. The baths was leased and run by the council (who had also opened their own baths) in 1906 as the charity found them too expensive to continue running. Perhaps surprisingly the baths continued in use until around 1978. The were converted to private flats in the 1980s.

*House, Well Walk, East Heath Rd, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4e-56*

Architect Ewan Christian designed this house at 50 Well Walk on the corner with East Heath Road in 1881 for his family and called it Thwaitehead, but later it became known as Klippan House. It was built by Norfolk builders Cornish and Gaymer. Christian (1814-95) was a well-known and extremely prolific church architect who became President and Gold Medallist of the Royal Institute of British Architects, and was the architect of the National Portrait Gallery.

You can read more about it and see a rather better picture of this house and of its interiors from Belsize Architects who refurbished the house in 2010, converting the Grade II listed building back into a single residence for Daniel and Gaynor Harris and their daughters who had bought it for £11 million. They restored many of its original features, but could not restore the view it had when built of Hampstead Heath.

*Hampstead Heath, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4e-43*

But a short walk from that house took me to Hampstead Heath, where you can see a church spire and some rooftops over a small hillock.

My walk continued – more posts later.

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A Hampstead Walk -1990

A Hampstead Walk: On Sunday 9th April 1990 I took the North London Line to Hampstead Heath Station and began wandering around the streets near there. Of course I’d been to Hampstead before, walked on the Heath and visited some of the better known attractions, but I’d rather put off taking many photographs there. I’ve always felt more comfortable on the streets of the more plebeian areas of London.

*Gate, 29, Hampstead Hill Gardens, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4c-11*

On Hampstead Hill Gardens the morning light was just right for the gateway and porte-cochère at number 29, a simple but satisfying iron and glass structure on very solid gate posts. The house is of course still there, but it lost this distinctive feature some time around 2010.

Hampstead Hill Gardens was developed around 1870 with stucco houses like this and completed with a number of red-brick Queen Anne Revival houses designed by Thomas Batterbury and W.F. Huxley further around the street around the end of the decade. A number of those are Grade II listed but they failed to interest me enough to photograph them.

St John's, Church, Downshire Hill, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4d-65 — *St John’s, Church, Downshire Hill, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4d-65*

St John’s Church, technically a proprietary chapel of the Church of England, was built in 1823 and in 1832 became the subject of an ecclesiastical dispute between the Calvinist evangelical John Wilcox and the perpetual curate of the parish Samuel White who refused permission for Wilcox to preach there. Wilcox lost the case and the church was closed until 1835 when Wilcox died and was replaced by another more mainstream minister, while the “church’s name remained infamous in ecclesiastical circles for some years following“.

Something about the building reminded me of the wooden building blocks I played with as a child – before the advent of Lego. In a neo-Classical style and Grade II listed I was not surprised to read in the listing “Possibly by CR Cockerell or designed by its builder, William Woods” and it looks like a builder’s idea of a church in that style.

Figurehead, House, 8, Pilgrims Way, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4d-51 — *Figurehead, House, 8, Pilgrims Lane, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4d-51*

I was amused by the figurehead on the house apparently looking down at the white-stockinged legs of a child standing on the pavement. On the house is a Hampstead Plaque Fund Plaque stating:

William Johnson Cory
Ionicus
Teacher, scholar and poet. Lived in this house. An assistant master at Eton College 1845 – 1872, he composed the Eton Boating Song.

In 1872 a letter Cory wrote to one of his pupils was found by his parents and shown to the Headmaster of Eton; Cory was forced to resign. Widely regarded as one of Eton’s best masters, he was well-known “for encouraging a culture of intimacy, possibly non-sexual, between teachers and pupils“.

Cory (1823-92) wrote the words for the Eton Boating Song during the Christmas break in 1862 and it was first performed in the following year to the setting of his former pupil Captain Algernon Drummond. In later years it has been much parodied, notably in the obscene song “The Sexual Life of the Camel“, a popular song in the after-match bath and changing rooms when I played rugby many years ago.

After a few years abroad following his resignation Cory came to live in this Queen Anne style house on Pilgrims Lane until his death. For some years the front of the house has been hidden behind a tall wooden fence, probably with extensive building work being carried out. Some of the houses in Pilgrim’s Lane were not well built and it may be one. According to Camden Council, “No.8 is an interesting Arts and Crafts influenced house. It has a gable with decorative brickwork and distinct chimneys.”

Pilgrims Lane gets its name from a former Hampstead resident James Pilgrim who bought land here in 1787 and died in 1813 (or possibly his son Charles Pilgrim who held on to a small part of his estate.) Too many famous people have lived on the street to list here.

*Albany House, Flask Walk, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4d-31*

Albany House was one of first purpose-built blocks of flats in the area when it was built around 1873. It is still flats.

*Boades Mews, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4d-22*

Boades Mews is a short pedestrian street with some granite steps and setts, some name signs, a high brick school wall and a couple of residential properties. It links Flask Walk to New End. Once it was an actual mews.

*New End Primary School, Streatley Place, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4d-23*

New End Primary School in Streatley Place is still in use as “a happy and diverse school situated in Hampstead Village.” The flamboyant Edwardian baroque Grade II listed school was built in 1906, architect T J Bailey. It is said to be his best building.

*Streatley Place, Hampstead, Camden, 1990, 90-4d-24*

Streatley Place begins just off the busy Heath Street as a narrow alley off Back Lane and only widens a little by the school, whose playground is over the wall at the left of this picture. The chimney was for the boiler house of New End Hospital, founded in 1869 as the infirmary for the Hampstead Union workhouse which was closed and sold for redevelopment in 1986.

Art Deco, Houses, Bingo and King of Lee – 1990

Art Deco, Houses, Bingo and King of Lee: The final part of a short walk around Lewisham which took me to Ladywell before returning to catch a train in Lewisham. The previous post on this walk was Ravensbourne, Quaggy & More -Lewisham – 1990.

Tickitape House, Works, Art Deco, 59, Ladywell Rd, Ladywell, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4c-43 — Tickitape House, Works, Art Deco, 59, Ladywell Rd, Ladywell, Lewisham, 1990 *90-4c-*43

This classic Art Deco factory, at one time ‘Tickitape House’, home to Adhesive Specialities has sadly been demolished.

In Lewisham Council’s St Mary’s conservation area supplementary planning document it states:

“This building was built in the 1930s as Neuk Laundry in a simple ‘Moderne’ style by a local builder, Mr Howkins. It was altered in 1988-9 by another local firm, Rainey and Rainey, which added metal windows and a clock and heightened the parapets, giving the building a more Art Deco style.”

Tickitape House, Works, Art Deco, 59, Ladywell Rd, Ladywell, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4c-45 — Tickitape House, Works, Art Deco, 59, Ladywell Rd, Ladywell, Lewisham, 1990 *90-4c-*45

Unfortunately local listing and being a popular local landmark that, according to the council “makes a positive contribution to the character and appearance of the conservation” area and their comment that “Any development on this site should therefore retain the main body of the Art Deco building” fell on deaf ears of the developers, and despite considerable local opposition it was completely demolished and replaced by undistinguished student housing around 2009.

*Tickitape House, Works, Art Deco, 59, Ladywell Rd, Ladywell, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4c-46*

Perhaps the building did not fall within the criteria needed for national listing, though many far less interesting buildings have been listed. But the architectural community and particularly as this was represented by such vital figures as Nikolaus Pevsner in the past had a very snooty attitude to Art Deco and Moderne buildings, regarding them as of little merit compared to the true modernism of the age. It doesn’t get even a fleeting mention in London 2:South.

*Ladywell Rd, Ladywell, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4c-44*

My interest was caught by the rather ramshackle buildings in the centre of the picture and I wondered what their original purpose could have been, with what appear to be doors at first-floor level and ventilators on top. My first thought was pigeon lofts and others have suggested stables. I think they have since been rebuilt in a similar form in Mercy Terrace.

*Houses, Ladywell Rd, Ladywell, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4c-33*

Breeze blocks fill the windows and doors of the foreground house in this terrace and I think were there to prevent squatting of the property which has since been renovated.

*Mecca Leisure, Lewisham High St, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4c-34*

The Bingo Hall was built as a Temperance Billiards Hall in 1910, and I wrote more about this in my previous post. Left derelict for some years after the last Bingo session it has been slowly and carefully restored by the Tabernacle Church.

*King Of Lee, Motors, Lewisham High St, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4c-35*

No trace remains of King of Lee Motors at 256 Lewisham High St, a scrap yard offering a wide range of reconditioned and reclaimed motor spares from stock, immediately south of the railway bridge on Lewisham High Street. They apparently paid “TOP CASH PRICES” for “FAILED MO.O.T., DAMAGED, NON RUNNERS, INSURANCE WRITE-OFFS” and their buyers will call to collect them – evenings and weekends.

Curness Street now runs here,. leading to new flats built between 2003 and 2006

*King Of Lee, Motors, Lewisham High St, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4c-36*

Finally I took three portrait format near identical images of the gate, fascinated by the remains of a telegraph pole with its various wires and strands of deadplants. Although the yard claimed to be open ‘7 DAYS’ I had managed to find one where it was firmly closed with a car wedged against its frontage.

It was time to make for the station and go home.

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Ravensbourne, Quaggy & More -Lewisham – 1990

Ravensbourne, Quaggy & More -Lewisham: The real end of my walks on April 1st 1990 was a short walk around Lewisham. The previous post from these walks was Monkey Business, Wrecked Cars & Roupell – 1990.

*River Ravensbourne, River Quaggy, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4b-11*

Arriving at Lewisham Station I crossed to the opposite platform and walked along it away from the exit to photograph this view looking south along the River Ravensbourne which curves away to the west – towards the right of the frame. Just after the river runs down a small slope it is joined by Lewisham’s other river, the smaller flow of the River Quaggy. There is now a small park, Confluence Park, where the two rivers meet, opened in 2021.

The scrap yard and the car sales and Allied Carpets are gone replace and the whole area redeveloped with tall blocks since around 2020. There is now another tall apartment block – around 15 storeys tall – to the left of the river,

Maggie's Cafe, Silk Mills Path, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4b-14 — Maggie’s Cafe, Silk Mills Path, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4b-14

Silk Mills Path runs alongside the north platform of the station and Maggie’s is still there now offering Breakfast-Lunch-Dinner. It gets excellent customer reviews for its reasonably priced meals and friendly staff. At right one of the arches leads under the railway to Station Road.

Lewisham did have a number of mills using power from the flow of the Ravensbourne, and the silk mills were a short distance downstream on its east bank at the end of Conington Road, close to Elverson Road DLR station. The site is now occupied by flats, built around 20 years ago. The mill had a large mill pond, part of which is now Tesco’s car park.

Although there are still some mulberry trees in the area, the essential feed for the silk worms, the Lewisham mill apparently relied on imported silk.

*Houses, Lewisham High St, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4b-15*

The River Quaggy runs in a an open channel in front of this long terrace at 15-31 Lewisham High Street, some way below street level, emerging into this from a tunnel under the central streets of Lewisham. It can next be seen from a bridge on Clarendon Rise just south of Lee High Road – see below.

*River Ravensbourne, Riverdale House, Molesworth St, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4c-64*

The Ravensbourne runs under recent flats on Molesworth Street and can be seen from the west side of the street where it runs under the railway line there. There is a small park, River Mill Park, with a bridge across the river.

This section of the river was channelled between tall concrete banks I think in the 1960s to alleviate the flood risk. The rather fortress-like Riverdale House was designed by Frederick Gibberd in 1981 as offices. In 2013 planning permission was granted for its conversion into luxury flats.

The site had a mill at the time of the Domesday Book and Riverdale Mill was restored as flats when this new building was erected on the rest of the site. It was built on the site of earlier mills as a leather mill in 1828, later becoming a flour mill and in 1901 was bought and turned into the John Wallis bakery, closing around 1970. It is the only remaining mill building in Lewisham.

*Houses, St Stephens Grove, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4c-66*

The River Quaggy emerges from a tunnel under the end of St Stephen’s Grove where it meets Lewisham High Street at the south side of Saint Stephen With Saint Mark, Lewisham, a Grade II listed Parish Church by Sir George Gilbert Scott built in 1863. This and St Stephen’s Terrace also date from the mid-1860s.

90-4c-52-Edit — *River Quaggy, Clarendon Rise, Lewsiham, 1990, 90-4c-52*

The Quaggy apparently got its name for being very muddy – a real quagmire. Here it runs along the backs of the buildings on Lee High Road.

Following pressure from and plans developed by the Quaggy Waters Action Group under the name Operation Kingfisher in 1995, parts of the river have been restored to a more natural state and brought back above ground. Much of the work already completed has been driven by the need to control flooding by the river.

*Mecca Leisure, Lewisham High St, Lewisham, 1990, 90-4c-54*

Taken from the pavement in front of the building at 233-241 Lewisham High St, this shows some detail of the building, built as a Temperance Billiards Hall in 1910, architect Norman Evans, the company architect for Temperance Billiard Halls Ltd. This Grade II listed building was derelict when bought as new premises for The Tabernacle Church around 2010 and is slowly and carefully being restored – details on their web site.

Later on the walk I photographed the building again from across the road which gives a far better impression of the building when it was in use as a Mecca Bingo Hall – I’ll post this picture in the final post on this walk shortly.

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Monkey Business, Wrecked Cars & Roupell – 1990

Monkey Business, Wrecked Cars & Roupell: I’d thought when I wrote my previous post about 1990 that my day on April 1st 1990 had finished when my walk in Stoke Newington ended, but my contact sheets and the dates written on them tell a different story.

I’d not gone to the Poll Tax demonstration the previous day, but from Stoke Newington took the tube down to Covent Garden and walked to St Martin’s Lane and Tottenham Court Road where I photographed a few burnt out cars before going on to Waterloo East and catching a train to Lewisham to take more photographs there.

*Monkey Business, Covent Garden, Westminster, 1990, 90-4b-33*

Monkey Business was a restaurant in Covent Garden which apparently came to an untimely end around 1991. In a Facebook post Sajan Narain relates: “While I was studying at Cambridge, a few of us friends went to Monkey Business, an aptly named restaurant in Covent Garden. While we were dining in the basement there, we heard loud sounds of guns being fired, and smashing of glass, like sound effects from an action movie. Waiters and staff were running around shouting.

We saw lots of huge red marks on white shirts worn by waiters. It turned out to be blood. There was a huge gang war going on above us. Many shots were fired and glass windows at the front of Monkey Business had been smashed.

Armed police, ambulances, doctors and paramedics arrived while we were there. We survived the gang war without any injuries. After that incident, Monkey Business had to be shut down, unfortunately.”

Burnt out car, St Martin's Lane, Covent Garden, Westminster, 1990, 90-4b-21 — *Burnt out car, St Martin’s Lane, Covent Garden, Westminster, 1990, 90-4b-21*

Back in 1990 I rarely photographed demonstrations, mainly only on the large marches of organisations to which I belonged such as the Anti-Apartheid movement and CND. Although I was aware of protests against the Poll Tax – and had photographed people burning their community charge demands – I did not attend the major protest called for March 31st when around 200,000 crowded into the area around Trafalgar Square.

The police had thought there would only be a few thousand and laughed at the protest organisers when they had suggested there could be 20,000 but it turned out much, much larger and the police were unprepared.

*Smashed car, Charing Cross Rd, Westminster, 1990, 90-4b-22*

Heavy-handed policing, including the violent arrest of a man in a wheelchair and a charge by mounted police into the crowd in Trafalgar Square, followed by police driving riot vans into the crowd aroused huge anger from the protesters, many of whom began attacking the police with anything to hand, including scaffold poles. The police actions turned what would have been an angry but largely peaceful protest into a riot.

*Smashed car, Charing Cross Rd, Westminster, 1990, 90-4b-23*

According to Wikipedia “Scuffles between rioters and police continued until 3 am. Rioters attacked numerous shops, most notably Stringfellow’s nightclub, and car showrooms, and Covent Garden cafés and wine bars were set ablaze, along with motor vehicles.”

*Smashed car, Charing Cross Rd, Westminster, 1990, 90-4b-24*

A police report the following year found “no evidence that the trouble was orchestrated by left-wing anarchist groups”, though some of these definitely claimed the credit. As usual at protests, most of those responsible for attacks on police evaded arrest and those arrested were largely bystanders and many were acquitted with video evidence showing the police had “fabricated or inflated charges”.

Protests including this one against the Poll Tax led to the questioning of Margaret Thatcher’s position as Prime Minister and led to her replacement by John Major. In 1991 he announced his intention to replace the Poll Tax by a new Council Tax, still in operation.

This returned to basing tax levels on property valuations but was in many respects a much cruder and less fair system than the former rates, particularly favouring owners of large and expensive properties at the expense of those in moderate and smaller homes.

*Rooftops, Waterloo, Lambeth, 1990, 90-4b-26*

My day was still not finished and I was on my way to Lewisham. As I walked down to the platform at Waterloo East station I pushed my camera through the gap in one of the slightly open windows and took this picture of the rooftops of Roupell Street and its neighbours.

These densely packed late Georgian worker’s cottages were developed by metal merchant John Roupell in 1824. He had married the daughter of a wealthy City wine merchant and after she inherited a wealthy aunt’s estate in Essex bought around 7 acres here at a cost of £8,000 to develop the Roupell Park Estate, its streets named after his family.

In their early years many of these small 4-roomed houses will have housed perhaps four large families, one to a room, perhaps over 20 people. These streets are much used as settings for films and TV, and the small houses now sell for around £1.5m

Pictures from Lewisham in later posts.

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Church Path, Town Hall & West Reservoir – 1990

Church Path, Town Hall & West Reservoir: The third and final post from my walk on April 1st 1990. The previous post was Reservoir, Castle & Lordship Lane

Church path, The Old Church, St Mary's, Church, Stoke Newington, Hackney, 1990, 90-4b-61 — *Church path, The Old Church, St Mary’s, Church, Stoke Newington, Hackney, 1990, 90-4b-61*

The Old Church is the only remaining Elizabethan church in London, built in 1563 when the then Lord of the Manor decided to rebuild the near-derelict parish church, including a private chapel for him and his family. The Church was extensively restored in 1827-9 by Charles Barry who almost doubled its seating and replaced its wooden spire – not visible in my picture. But although much has changed it has retained its Tudor character.

The Old Church was heavily damaged in wartime bombing in October 1940, but repairs were made quickly and it was back in use only a couple of months later. Later there were more repairs and most of the box pews were removed. In 2013 the interior was remodelled to make it a flexible arts and community space.

The Old Church is on the right of my picture, rather overshadowed by its successor; there was a call by the end of the eighteenth century for a larger building to cope with the growing population of the area, but the new and much larger church was only opened in 1858. The new St Mary’s Stoke Newington was designed by George Gilbert Scott but its spire was completed by his son, J O Scott, in 1890. The building is in the Decorated style of the late C13/early C14 made popular by Pugin and the Ecclesiologist Movement. The Old Church became a ‘chapel of ease’ and has never been deconsecrated. Both churches are Grade II* listed.

*Monument, Church path, The Old Church, Stoke Newington, Hackney, 1990, 90-4b-63*

One of the several impressive monuments in the churchyard around the Old Church, but I cannot make out the names of those buried here – though one of them died in 1789.

Several people prominent in the abolition of the slave trade have their graves here including James Stephen (William Wilberforce’s brother-in-law, a lawyer and chief adviser on the anti-slavery bill) and Wilberforce’s sister and daughter. He also asked to be buried here but when he died it was decided he should be in Westminster Abbey.

Two tombs in the cemetery are Grade II listed, that of James Stephen and of the Romantic woman poet and abolitionist Anna Laetitia Barbauld (1743-1825) and her ‘beloved brother’, John Aikin (1747-1822)

*Stoke Newington Town Hall, Stoke Newington Church St, Stoke Newington, Hackney, 1990, 90-4b-65*

Stoke Newington Town Hall is an impressive municipal building, designed by J Reginald Truelove as the Town Hall for the Metropolitan Borough of Stoke Newington and built in 1935-7 and still in use as council offices.

On its noticeboards are fly-posters from the TKiH, the Türkiye Komünist isci Hareketi, Communist Workers’ Movement of Turkey, illegal in Turkey. Founded in 1984 it merged with other Turkish groups in 1994 to form the Marxist-Leninist Communist Party, MLKP who still appear in force in London’s May Day March.

*West Reservoir, Lordship Rd, Stoke Newington, Hackney, 1990, 90-4b-55*

I returned to the West Reservoir and took a walk around it – I think this picture shows the New River at right and was taken from a bridge over it. There appears to be a channel with a sluice gate joining the reservoir and the river just beyond the skip in the centre of the picture.

*West Reservoir, Lordship Rd, Stoke Newington, Hackney, 1990, 90-4b-31*

And I think this view was from more or less the same place but looking in the opposite direction, with the New River now in the foreground and council estates and solid blocks of council flats at Woodberry Down, a huge LCC estate built immediately after the war and now redeveloped.

This wasn’t quite the end of my walk, as I made my way back to Manor House station from here, and I took my final picture of the day going down the escalator there – but it was not worth digitising. For my next walk I returned to south London.

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