Used furniture, Caledonian Rd, Barnsbury, Islington, 1990, 90-2c-54
From Thornhill Square I returned along Bridgeman Road to Caledonian Road, both sides of which are here lined with shops. Almost immediately on the east side of the road I saw this shop selling used furniture (I think it is now an estate agents) with the pavement in front having some of its stock – stacking tubular chairs – in front of a crude partition, at its left a phone card box and in front of that some cabinets used to support the shop’s sign.
The pavements along here are now cleared of clutter.
Sandwich Bar, Fire Escape Specialists, Caledonian Rd, Barnsbury, Islington, 1990, 90-2c-56
R Bleasdale & Co Ltd, Fire Escape Specialists had a splendid gate advertising their Victorian Metal Design. This was at 394 Caledonian Road where a similar business, The Cast Iron Shop, remained until around 2020, though the gate was long gone, together with the Sandwich Bar.
The sandwich shop also interested me with it with its striped awning and notices, incluind ‘DELICIOUS HOT SALT BEEF’ though I was unable to try it as like most shops then it was closed on Sundays.
Chinese Chef, Restaurant, Caledonian Rd, Lower Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2c-42
Another window I found of interest, divided into two halgs one of much had four shleves each with two spider plants and above them a net curtain. The left half mixes the reflection of the buildings opposite with the menu, a light fitting, plants and cans of soft drink under a counter inside.
Chinese Chef was on the corner with Roman Way until around 2019
Romeo Trading Co Ltd, Roman Way, Lower Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2c-44
I walked a few yards down Roman Way to photograph Romeo Trading Co Ltd, making several pictures both in black and white and in colour. I think this is the company founded in 1941 specialising in military surplus clothing and now operating online and in “an impressive 85,000 square foot warehouse“, Romeo House, in Tottenham.
Their former site and more of the street is now occupied by a large block of flats, Roman Court.
From Roman Way I photographerd Mallet Porter & Dowd on the west side of Caldedonina Road at 465 made hard-wearing fabric from horse-hair at their premises close to the Metropolitan Cattle Market, used for uniforms and textile products. This building inscribed with their name dates from 1874.
It was disgracefully converted into student housing for University College London by Mortar Developments in 2015, in a development that retained the facade a few feet in front of an unsympathetic modern development to the detriment of both. It was a worthy winner of the 2013 v awarded by Building Design for the year’s worst building. Islington Council had rejected the scheme but this was overturned on appeal.
Salvo C F S Ltd, Wine & Provision Importers occupied the building immediately south of Mallet Porter & Dowd until it was demolished around 2011. The company was set up by Salvatore Cumbo who owned a pizzeria in London to import Italian food and drink as wholesalers. The company moved here in 1975, and moved out in 2011 to larger premises in Hertfordshire.
The doorway between the two buildings had the number 465 and so was to the Mallet Porter & Dowd building; the free-standing ‘facade’ rather oddly retains its right hand edge of this door. It perhaps led to the offices and the building also had the wider doorway at the right of the picture.
At this point I think I decided to take a little rest and got on the tube. I’d planned to get to Finsbury Park and time was running out. The next in this series of posts will begin with tthe next frame I made which was in Finsbury Park.
Battlebridge, Canalside and Barnsbury continues my walk which began at Kings Cross on Sunday February 11th 1990 with the post Kings Cross and Pentonville 1990.
Battlebridge Basin on the Regent’s Canal was opened at the same time as the Camden Town to Limehouse stretch of the canal in 1820, though the buildings around it took a couple of years longer to complete. In 1815 the landowner William Horsefall contracted with the canal company to allow them to dump the soil extracted from the Islington Tunnel a short distance away on his land, and he used this to form the basin.
It seems odd that you should need earth to form a basin, but it was needed to raise the ground level around it as part of the 480ft by 155ft basin is above the level of the streets around. Horsefall got an Act of Parliament to fill the basin with water from the canal and by 1822 it was surrounded by industrial premises, including timber yards. Among later occupants were W J Plaistowe & Co, jam, marmalade and preserve makers, here until 1926, and at Albert Wharf on the northeast corner were Cooper & Sewell (c1847-1880) and J Mowlem & Co (c1880-1922).
The best-known building on the basin was the warehouse built around 1860 by ice-cream maker Carlo Gatti to store ice brought from Norway, which since 1992 houses the London Canal Museum. In a Key Stage 2 teaching resource on their site is an excellent plan showing the uses of the different areas around the basin in the late 19th century.
Unlike other canal basins in London this was privately owned, known first of all as Horsefall Basin, then Maiden Lane Basin before taking its current name – the old name for the Kings Cross area, which had a bridge over the River Fleet. There seems to be no agreement as to which battle this was named after but few beleive the popular legend it was fought by Boudicea. In 1978 a group of boat owners came together so set up moorings here which over the years since have developed into a substantial marina.
Mercantile House, All Saints St, Pentonville, Islington, 1990, 90-2b-14
My previous post on this walk showed an overall picture of Mercantile House and gave a little of its history. In 1990 the whole site was undergoing redevelopment as you can see in pictures below. Mercantile House was retained.
All Saints St, Pentonville, Islington, 1990, 90-2b-13
I photographed Bartlett Ltd, Export Packers in 1979 from the canal towpath and wrote a little about Battlebridge Basin and Bartlett’s works then and wrote:
Although many of the canal-side buildings in the area have been replaced, a warehouse on the basin of Bartlett Export Packers survives in greatly altered form as Albert Dock. The works buildings in this picture, at the end of New Wharf Road, have been replaced by those of Ice Wharf, three blocks with 94 apartments in a highly regulated private development with 24 hour concierge service and a private, gated underground parking space where a 2 bed flat overlooking the canal could be yours for only £1,195,000.
Demolition of the buildings on All Saints Street whichg meets New Wharf Road at its west end provided me this view of part of Bartletts from here.
From Thornhill Bridge on the Caledonian Road over the canal I could see the cleared development site and, in the distance St Pancras Hotel, the Post Office Tower and other buildings. At the left are the back of buildings on Caledonian Rd.
I walked on north up Caledonian Road to Thornhill Crescent at the northern end of Thornhill Square, once of the well-known Barnsbury Squares, though it certainly is not square – together they are more of an oval, narrowing towards the southern end. Wikipedia calls it “an unusual large ovoid ellipse“.
Much of the land around here was owned by the Thornhill family who had come from Yorkshire and let to dairy farmers. George Thornhill began Thornhill Square in 1847, and Samuel Pocock, one of those rich farmers began Thronhill Crescent around 1849.
Lived in at first by prosperous middle class households, the area became run-down by the middle of the last century with many properties in multiple occupation and high levels of street crime. But Islington became fashionable in the 1960 and 70s and gentrification led many of those living to purchase the freeholds and the area went upmarket. Some flats now sell for over a million pounds and entire houses over two million.
More from Barnsbury in the next post in this series.
Kings Cross and Pentonville: Although I took a few pictures in the next few weeks, mainly on my way to or from meetings, it was well into February before I was able to go on another long photographic walk. Of course the weather at that time of year often isn’t too kind and days are short, but winter is the best season for photographing much of London’s buildings, as so much is hidden once trees come into leaf.
Grays Inn Rd, Kings Cross, Camden, 1990, 90-2b-54
I can’t now recall why I decided to return to the Kings Cross area on Sunday February 11th 1990, though I liked to revisit areas periodically, and the journey to the Victoria line station was an easy one, suitable for short days to give me more hours of usable light.
I left the station by the Pentonville Road entrance and walked back towards the main station, taking a couple of pictures on my way before heading down Grays Inn Road. This picture looking back towards Kings Cross Station includes both the station clock tower – I seem to have arrived shortly before 10am – and the well-known “lighthouse” built simply as advertising for Netten’s Oyster Bar. What seems an incredibly long horizontal pole holds one of the many traffic lights in the area .
Posters, Grays Inn Rd, Kings Cross, Camden, 1990, 90-2b-55
In the centre of these fly-posted posters is an advert for ‘THE BEST SHOP IN TOWN’, SHE-AN-ME at 123 Hammersmith Road, West Kensington, London W14. It offers ‘UNUSUAL – BONED DRESSES – 6″ HEEL BOOTS – LATEX RUBBER …’ and much more, a fetish shop specialising in PVC, rubberwear and bondage equipment. Although Yelp still has a listing for the business it is long gone; after some years as ‘Simply Pleasure’ it is now ‘Quick Local Store’ selling snacks, cold drinks, tobacco, souvenirs, toiletries and household items.
One of London’s more photographed signs, though now a little faded and above a Nail Bar and Computer Centre on this nicely curved building. The Greek Restuarant at 325 is now a fast-food place – and is flanked by two others.
I walked back onto Pentonville Road, here the boundary between the London boroughs of Camden and Islington. Modern Jock’s Tattoo Studio on the south side was on the ground floor and Chestnuts Hair Studio for Men and Women through the same door on the first floor, illustrated by arrows for the non-literate. Born around 1920 British tattooing legend Jock Liddel started as a tattoo artist at the age of 16 in Scotland and his famous shop was at 287 Pentonville Road for many years. He died in 1995 but had moved down to Kent a few years earlier. His shop and several adjoining are now an American multinational fast food burger and fries chain.
‘Kings X People Say NO’ to the Chunnel Terminal for Kings X – Chaos for London’ read the array of posters on the back of a road sign, one of four signs in this picture, along with those for the Autodrome, Peacemeal Whole Foods and Loseley Dairy Ice Cream.
I was briefly and peripherally involved with the Kings Cross Railway Lands Group and their ‘Planning for Real’ exercise with local residents which formed a basis for the comprehensive alternative plan published in their Kings Cross Railwaylands Towards a People’s Plan Full Report published in October 1991.
Of course their plans were not adopted but the opposition certainly played a part in the decision to drop the plans for a new Kings Cross and instead to develop St Pancras as the international terminal. As an article on Londonist points out, “The plans would have seen 83 homes and 58 shops demolished. The scale of destruction would have witnessed landmark listed buildings like the Scala pulled down … The entire block between Caledonian Road, York Way and Caledonia Street would have also been lost.”
The Kings X Sauna on the corner of Northdown Street and more useful shops and offices on Caldedonian Road. The sauna at No.70 later became an estate agents.
Mercantile House, All Saints St, Pentonville, Islington, 1990, 90-2b-25
Further north on Caledonian Road I turned west into All Saints St where I photographed Mercantile House which appropriately later became home to global brand consultancy agency Wolff Olins – who have now moved to Southwark.
Work began in 2022 to transform this and other buildings on the site into Regent’s Wharf, “a ground-breaking new campus … created with the next generation of innovators in mind.”
Mercantile House was built in 1891 as the Head Office for Thorley’s Food for Cattle with their mill behind it on the bank of the Regent’s Canal. They had moved onto the site in 1857.
“A family owned business for over 100 years, Joseph Thorley’s Ltd was an iconic player of the industrial age, inventing and distributing ‘spicy aromatic condiments’ that would beef up your cattle, pep up your pigs and ensure your chicken laid the best clutch in the roost.
This MiracleGro for animals was made to a secret recipe and sold around the world even in far flung outposts such as the Falkland Islands, all from the headquarters at Regent’s Wharf in King’s Cross.”
“Thorley’s progressive ideas extended to their charming and playful marketing, with eye-catching advertising and branding that has become collectable today. Animal feeds went by many wonderful names such as Grula for Horses, the famous Thorley’s Cake that reared ‘Champions’, Ovum for chickens and Rabbitum.”
Springfield Grove estate, Charlton Rd, Charlton, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1j-62
This estate was built on what had earlier been the site of the late 17th Century Springfield House, which was demolished just before the Second World War – the LCC had bought Stonefield Farm in 1927 for the Thornhill Estate. During the war there was a pig farm on the site. Springfield House took its name from a spring here which ran down in a valley here when the house was built. and though it is sometimes described as a wooded combe (dry valley) construction of the estate was held up in 1949 by the spring having to be stemmed and the ten blocks date from 1951-2.
The blocks were named with associations to previous Lords of the Manor of Charlton “Bayeaux – Bishop Odo of Bayeaux ; Downe & Ducie – Sir Wm.Ducie created Vise.Downe ; Erskine – Sir John Erskine Games – Wm.Langhorn Games ; Langhorne – Sir Wm.Langhorn, Mar – Earl of Mar (Sir J.Erskine) ; Priory – Priory of Bermondsey and Wilson – Sir Thos. Wilson 6th Bt. who married into the Maryon family, owners of the Manor & Estates.“
These ten brick LCC point blocks in the Sparingfield Grove Estate (also known as Thornill Estate which it adjoined) were built around 1950, and the view between the towers here is described in the conservation area document as the most dramatic of the “number of good panoramic vistas” from the escarpment here, with a view towards the Thames and central London. The estate was built by the LCC but was transferred to the London Borough of Greenwich when that was set up and then in 1999 to a housing association. In 2012 the blocks were clad hiding the brickwork, which although I think is aesthetically poorer will have been much appreciated by residents for increasing their comfort.
I walked along here, but perhaps the best way to appreciate the views is from the upper deck of a bus going along Charlton Road or Charlton Church Lane.
War Memorial, Drinking Fountain, Public Toilets, Charlton House, Charlton Church Lane, The Village, Charlton, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1j-54
The triangle in the middle of the junction between Charlton Church Lane and The Village would, apart from the traffic be a pleasant place to sit and there is now a seat between the war memorial and the drinking fountain, though I think you need to bring your own drink. Most of our old drinking fountains have been disconnected for hygienic reasons, though London does now have some new ones. At least in winter you can see a wide variety of architecture, though trees tend to block some views for the rest of the year.
The cattle trough which replaced the old village stocks must I think have been just out of my picture on the left and like the drinking fountain was erected to commemorate the coronation of King Edward VII in 1902, together costing £247 donated by local residents and Sir Spencer Maryon Wilson, 11th Bart – who gets his name on the side of the trough. The fountain was damaged in 1980 when a driver without tax or licence drove into it; Greenwich Council decided they could not afford the £3,000 needed to repair it, but local residents again reached into their pockets.
Charlton House, The Village, Charlton, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1j-66
Charlton House is said to be the “finest Jacobean mansion in all London”, designed by architect John Thorpe, said to have been the inventor of “humble and now-ubiquitous corridor” which allowed independent entrance to the various rooms of a grand house – previously each room had led through doors to the next in what was know an an enfilade.
The house was first opened to the public in 1909 with the one shilling (5p) entry fee going to provide free lunches for the children of Deptford. Now in public ownership for 100 years it is one of the few things that cost less than then, with house and grounds free to the public.
The large classical arch was once the entrance to the grounds but is now isolate, all on its own in a large area of grass.
Part of the house was badly damaged by wartime bombing in 1944 but has been carefully restored, and perhaps the only visible sign is a slightly lighter colour to the bricks used – and apparently the sundial between the first and second floor windows was fitted upside down.
The house was built by the crown for Prince Henry, the son of James I, and older brother of the future Charles I and his then tutor, Sir Adam Newton who was Dean of Durham, though hardly convenient for him as the 260 mile commute would then have taken several days. But I imagine he could claim his salary while working from home despite there being no internet connection.
The house has a grandly decorated doorway.
Roman Stone, Acorn, Charlton House, Charlton, Greenwich, 1990, 1990, 90-1j-45
Charlton was of course long famous for its Horn Fair, held not at Charlton House on the top of the hill but at Cuckold’s Point on the River Thames. It was described by Daniel Defoe as a “yearly collected rabble of mad-people” which “ought to be suppressed, and indeed in a civiliz’d well govern’d nation, it may well be said to be unsufferable” and at which “the women are especially impudent for that day; as if it was a day that justify’d the giving themselves a loose to all manner of indecency and immodesty, without any reproach“.
And in 1872 it was suppressed but a considerably “tamer version of the fair was re-established in 1973 in the grounds of Charlton House“. I went at least once and was disappointed, particularly by the lack of female impudence.
The ‘Roman Stone’ is not of course Roman, but an artificial stone probably bound together with Portland Cement (invented by Joseph Aspdin in 1824) much used for garden ornaments in the Victorian era and beyond. These materials can be moulded using sand moulds.
Woodland Terrace, from Maryon Park, Charlton, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1j-25
Woodland Terrace is in what was a large wooded area known as Hanging Woods which hung on the side of the slopes rising from the River Thames here. The main Dover Road runs through these woods and Shooters Hill was a popular haunt for highwaymen, though less popular for travellers. Hanging Woods was a wild wooded area good for the gentlemen of the highway to hang out and evade pursuit.
Maryon Park, Charlton, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1j-11
Maryon Park is a former quarry, part of Charlton sandpits on the edge of Hanging Wood, which the Maryon-Wilson family gave to the LCC in 1891. The sandpits were dug in the 18th and 19th centuries for sand in the local foundries and for making glass, and there were also chalk pits nearer to the river. One of the four pits, Charlton Station Pit is now The Valley, home to Charlton Athletic Football Club, and another, Gilbert’s Pit, is part of a nature reserve. The East Pit is Maryon Park, along with an un-quarried ridge on its west side.
Maryon Park, Charlton, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1j-15
On the Charlton Parks Reminiscence Project you can read a great deal about the history of the park which was opened in 1890. Serpentine fenced paths lead down from Woodland Terrace to the floor of the park below. The park’s moment of fame came in 1966 with the filming there in Michelangelo Antonioni’s ‘Blow Up‘ featuring David Hemmings, and Vanessa Redgrave. A YouTube video ‘Blow Up Revisited‘ intercuts scenes from the film with those taken in the same areas of the park in 2010.
I’d photographed the park in 1985 and in 1990 only too a few pictures of some of the fences before rushing to the station to catch a train towards home.
Around Shooters Hill Road: Continuing my walk on Saturday 20th January 1990 which began with the previous post, Westcombe Park and Blackheath 1990.
Heath House, 1 Shooters Hill Rd, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1i-34
This is an area full of mostly large houses, and this, at 1B Shooters Hill on the corner of Vanbrugh Terrace – the A2 ancient main road Watling Street from London to Dover via Canterbury – is one of the larger and is extended by the substantial conservatory.
According to its Grade II listing it was “built by Benjamin Cooke the cooper and shipowner of Dock Head, Bermondsey, about 1850” though the glazed conservatory was a later extension.
House, 19, Shooters Hill Rd, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1i-21
One of a long line of large houses on the north of Shooters Hill Road Grade II listed as 7-33 Shooters Hill Road. The listing is rather vague about dates, stating “2nd quarter of C19” and is mainly about the relatively minor differences between the pairs of houses mentioning the extra windows of 19 and its pair 21 at each side of the tympanum – probably why I chose this pair as one of two I photographed (the other not online.)
Houses, Stratheden Rd, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1i-24
I turned northeast from Shooters Hill up Stratheden Road, to photograph this impressive row of late Victorian large semi-detached houses leading up to St John the Evangelist Church. Two of the blocks at 15-17 have been joined with a new central entrance as Bardon Lodge.
St John the Evangelist Blackheath was designed by Arthur Ashpitel (1807–1869) in a largely Perpendicular style and was completed in 1853. It was built as a landmark to be seen from the west as the centre of the Vanbrugh Park development and is Grade II listed.
House, St John’s Park, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1i-26
This house immediately to the south of St John’s Church in St John’s Park was then surrounded by far more overgrown vegetation than now. There are two similar detached houses here and this is No 32. I saw it as a villa in some Gothic mystery – and may have deliberately chosen the viewpoint to exaggerate this.
These two detached villas are both locally listed and were built in 1873.
House, Vanbrugh Park, Shooters Hill, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1i-11
I’m rather surprised I didn’t photograph the rather fine pub on the corner as I turned from Stratheden Road into Vanbrugh Park, but my next frame was of these three storey houses at 30 and 31 Vanbrugh Park – there is another pair to their left.
I think these are probably late Victorian, built after many of the others in this street.
House, 90, Shooters Hill Rd, Charlton, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1i-14
Originally this was a semi-detached house, but the left half was lost with the construction of the ‘Sun in the Sands’ roundabout to take Shooters Hill Road over the the Rochester Way Relief Road which opened in 1988.
Westcombe Park and Blackheath: On Saturday 20th January I got off a train at Westcombe Park station to begin another walk. Westcombe Park is in the London Borough of Greenwich and is at the east of Greenwich and north of Blackheath. Twelve years after I made this walk the Westcombe Park Conservation Area was designated in 2002.
House, 146, Humber Rd, Westcombe Park, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1h-21
Banker John Julius Angerstein (1735-1823) bought a large part of what had been parkland around a large country house to build his own house, Woodlands, now a Steiner School and the only listed building (Grade II*) in the area.
It was only when a large area of land was sold in 1876 that residential development of the area was begun – after a false start the Westcombe Park Estate Company was formed in 1878. They laid out roads, drains and sewers and offered freehold and leasehold plots for sale with only fairly loose guidelines over what could be built.
The Woodlands, 90, Mycenae Rd, Westcombe Park, Greenwich, 1990, 1990, 90-1h-23
The development from then on was piecemeal and sporadic and by 1900 much was still undeveloped – and the estate company went into liquidation and the remaining land was sold off cheaply. There are a few properties from the 1880s, rather more from the 1890s particularly in the roads close to the station from which city clerks could travel into work. Although Woodlands is the only nationally listed building in the area, there are many locally listed buildings.
The Woodlands, Mycenae Rd, Westcombe Park, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1h-24
Houses, Beaconsfield Rd, Vanburgh Park, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1h-12
These houses are in the Blackheath Conservation Area and are on the north side of Vanburgh Park, so their frontages facing south with views across the common. The road at right angles in the picture is Beaconsfield Rd. These 3 storey locally listed Victorian villas date from 1860-1866 and were designed by architect Henry William Spratt.
Tree, Bower Avenue, Greenwich Park, Greenwich, 1990, 90-1i-62
From Vanburgh Park I walked across into Greenwich Park and then went down Bower Avenue where I found this massive tree trunk.
The Grade II listed buildings of Vanburgh Terrace date from around 1840. I think this view is from somewhere near Charlton Way or Maze Hill. The terrace faces west across the parkland.
More from the Golden Mile continues from where my previous post on my walk on Sunday 7th January 1990, Curry’s, Firestone, A Fountain & Kluwer – 1990, ended. This is my final post on this walk.
Adini, 891, Great West Rd, Isleworth, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-12
Just to the west of Syon Lane on the Great West Road in Isleworth is this 1933 Art Deco factory by Wallis, Gilbert and Partners built for William Burnett Chemicals. This was the furthest west of the 1930s commercial buildings on the new road and past it are residential properties in the north of Isleworth and Osterley.
Adini, 891, Great West Rd, Isleworth, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-12
The building is I think still in use by fashion clothing firm Adini. In 2023 Hounslow Council turned down a planning application to develop the site retaining and restoring this locally listed Art Deco building but with two six storey blocks containing 51 flats on the site. The developers appealed and I am not sure of the current state of the proposal.
Softsel, 941, Great West Road, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1h-65
I hadn’t finished with the ‘Golden Mile’ and turned around and walked east back into Brentford along the Great West Road. 941, the occupied by Softsel was another building by Wallis, Gilbert & Partners for cosmetics company Coty.
This building is now the private Syon Clinic.
Steps, 971, Great West Road, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1h-66
Another grand set of steps led up to the factory of Leonard Williams Ltd, who made Packard cars here from 1929. Queensway in 1990 it now leads to DFS Brentford Sofa & Furniture Store, but only these steps remain of the previous building.
Pyrene Building, Westlink House, 981, Great West Road, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1h-51
Built 1929-1930 by Wallis, Gilbert & Partners for Pyrene, makers of fire extinguishers it is Grade II listed. The main windows here had already been altered by 1990.
Pyrene Building, Westlink House, Great West Road, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1h-44
This grand entrance and the gate posts are perhaps the most interesting feature of the building. The building now provides tailor-made office space for companies of all sizes.
Pyrene Building, Westlink House, Great West Road, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1h-44
I still hadn’t quite finished with the Golden Mile, but my final pictures were a set of five pictures of the remarkable former Curry’s HQ at 991 Great West Road which featured in an earlier post – you can see them starting here on Flickr.
Grand Union Canal, Great West Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1h-34
I ended my walk by with a final picture looking south from the bridge which takes the Great West Road over the here combined River Brent and the Grand Union Canal before getting away from the noise and dust of the road and walking along the canal towpath to Brentford High Street where I could catch a bus to start my journey home.
Curry’s, Firestone, A Fountain & Kluwer continues from where my previous post about my walk on Sunday 7th January 1990 In Memory of Macleans & Trico – 1990 ended.
Former Curry’s, 991, Great West Road, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-42
Warehouse and offices built in 1935-6 by F E Simpkins as a distribution centre for Curry’s Ltd. Grade II listed in 1994. Curry’s lost their headquarters building when it was taken over during the war to make aircraft parts. But in 1996 they opened a new superstore a few yards down the road at 971, a site where from 1929 Packard Cars were built; it had beenbadly damaged by a V2 in March 1945, but was rebuilt and became an annexe to Sperry Gyroscope until they moved to Bracknell in 1966.
In 1990, 991 Great West Road was Cooper West London Service. After some years of disuse in 2000 it became the offices of JC Decaux.
Gate, Firestone Tyre Factory, Great West Road, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-43
Closed in 1979, the factory was bought by Trafalgar House and demolished during the 1980 August bank holiday to preempt its listing, due to be announced two days later. It was one of the finest buildings designed by Wallis, Gilbert and Partners and only the second to be opened on the Great West Rd in 1928.
Gate, Firestone Tyre Factory, Great West Road, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-31
Its demolition was widely condemned as an act of architectural vandalism by architectural critics, many of whom would gladly have lain down in front of the bulldozers had they known about it in time. It’s demolition led directly to the listing of at least 150 twentieth century buildings previously ignored, though too many remained unprotected and have been lost.
Many of us felt that Lord Victor Matthews who ordered the instant demolition to avoid listing should have been in some way brought to justice – or at least have his life peerage removed. But nothing was done.
Fountain, Great West Road, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-35
The building at the left of this image is the former Coty Cosmetics Factory at 941 Great West Road from 1932 by Wallis, Gilbert and Partners, now Syon Clinic, and to the right an odd structure outside Homebase. This fountain must have been close to the corner of Shield Drive, perhaps to distract attention from the bland and mediocre more recent buildings in the area.
Harlequin Avenue runs north from the Great West Road and is still lined by factories and commercial buildings, few of much architectural interest. Kluwer Publishing was perhaps the exception but this building has since been demolished.
The Gillette building at the corner of the Great West Road and Syon Lane marks the western end of Brentford’s ‘Golden Mile’. To the west of here the land was owned by the Church Commissioners who only permitted residential development in Osterly.
Designed by Sir Banister Flight Fletcher in 1936-7, Gillette continued to make razor blades here until production was moved to Poland in 2006. The tall tower can be seen from miles away in this flat corner of Middlesex.
Plans to convert the building into a hotel and small business park fell through and in 2013 the site was purchased by The Vinyl Factory and made available for filming, at first with four large stages. Plans were approved in 2025 to make more of the site available for filming while preserving the Grade II listed building – and are expected to provide more than 3,400 permanent jobs.
Macleans Toothpaste, Great West Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-03
Toothpaste in my youth came as dentifrice, a usually pink powder or block in small tins, around 7 or 8 cm diameter and 2 cm tall, and Macleans had a patent aluminium tin. In my home we only changed to toothpaste in tubes at some time in the 1950s, but we could have been behind the times. And we used Gibbs Dentifrice, not Macleans.
Macleans was begun by a New Zealand born businessman, Alex C. Maclean in 1919, and moved into this splendid new factory on the Great West Road in 1932. The company was bought by Beechams in 1938 and later was swallowed up as a part of GlaxoSmithKline or GSK. You can still apparently get Macleans toothpaste though it bears little relationship to the orginal product and is now produced by Haleon
Macleans, Great West Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-04
The centenary of the Great West Road is celebrated in the book The Great West Road: A Centenary History by James Marshall, so far as I know not a relative of mine. “For two miles, from its junction with the North Circular Road and Chiswick High Road to Gillette Corner, a corridor of inter-war factory buildings emerged, a stylish celebration of art deco architecture.”
Macleans, Great West Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-61
Unfortunately many of the buildings have now gone, Trico and Macleans among them, although a few of the grander survive. I think I knew when I took these pictures two years before the business moved that these would shortly be demolished.
Trico, 980, Great West Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-51
The Trico Products Windscreen Wiper factory, No. 980, Great West Road, Brentford opened in 1928, three years after the new road was opened by George V in 2025 as the Brentford by-pass. Trico relocated to Pontypool, South Wales in 1992 and the building was demolished.
Certainly I took more pictures of these buildings than the others along this stretch of road, about three times as many as are in this post, though most of the rest are fairly similar to these.
Trico, 980, Great West Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-52
In the 1980s there was still little general appreciation of Art Deco or moderne buildings from the 1920s and 1930s and few had been give the protection afforded by listing. The most celebrated case of demolition was the Firestone Tyre Factory which had closed and been sold to Trafalgar House, a company run by Lord Victor Matthews and Nigel Broakes on 22nd August 1980.
A Department of the Environment inspector had the same week decided the building should be listed, but as it was the Bank Holiday weekend no civil servant was available to sign the emergency listing document. “On Saturday 23 August Lord Matthews ordered demolition men to destroy the main features of the facade – the ceramic tiles around the entrance, the white pillars, the pediment above and the bronze lamp standards.” And so one of the finest buildings on the stretch was destroyed.
Trico, 980, Great West Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-54
Victor Matthews, who as well as being Chairman of Trafalgar House was the proprietor of the Daily Express, had been made a Life Peer as Baron Matthews of Southgate a month before this despicable act of cultural vandalism.
Grand Union Canal, Trico, Great West Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-56
The canal which had been so important in earlier Brentford history was irrelevant to the companies which now set up along the new road. They were entirely based around road transport and very much used their impressive frontages as advertisements for their businesses to those driving along the new highway.
Grand Union Canal, Trico, Great West Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-41
More from other buildings along the Great West Road in the next instalment.
Jubilee Chapel, Primitive Methodist, New Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1f-26
Built in 1897, the year of Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee, the church closed in 1964 when a new church opened in Clifden Rd. The Primitives had joined with the Wesleyans and United Methodists in 1932. The building is a rather curious design laid out along the road with a tower like this at each end and five bays between, the central one with what looks as it should be an entrance with taller brickwork and a triangular pediment above a large oval-topped window. You can see a little of the interesting brickwork in my photograph. The windows now have some delicate metal protection in front of them and the building is still in use, I think by an Electrical contactor. It is locally listed for its architectural and social significance.
House, Hamilton Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1f-11
This Gothick style house at 17 Hamilton Road stands head and shoulders above its neighbours with a basement, steps up to a grand doorway and the fine decoration below its distinctive oriel window. It is capped on one side with an attic gable, making it three and a half storeys. Locally listed.
Performance Cars Ltd, Windmill Rd, Great West Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1f-13
Although it might gain no stars for its uncompromising 1930s architecture this building for Performance Cars had a blunt and striking appearance and I was sad to see it was about to be demolished, one of many losses of buildings along the Great West Road. It’s a shame it was not saved, although the adjoining workshops were no great loss. Most of its site is now empty or parking for another motor dealer. I took this picture from underneath the elevated M4.
The Globe, Boston Park Rd, 104, Windmill Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1f-15
The Globe pub on the corner of Boston Park Road and Windmill Road is still open and is a popular traditional pub which still has some original features.Though it is no longer run by Fullers you may still be able to get a pint of London Pride. My picture just shows a little of the large globe let into the parapet above the corner of the building.
The pub was built in the 1880s and acquired by Fuller Smith & Turner in 1908. It is named in an impressive series of reviews of Brentford’s pubs written by ‘Wandering Tom’ and published in the County of Middlesex Indepent in 1996 but he tells us nothing mopre than its name. Unearthed by Vic Rosewarne as part of extensive research into Brentford’s pubs, these notes have been re-published as part of the Brentford High Street project.
Macleans Toothpaste, Great West Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1f-16
Finally two pictures – more to follow later – of another and more important loss of the 1920’s factories that lined the Brentford section of the new Great West Road. This was Maclean’s Toothpaste factory, opened in 1932 and together with the neighbouring Trico was demolished in 1992.
Trico Products Windscreen Wiper factory, No. 980 Great West Road, opened in 1928. The Trico business relocated to Pontypool, South Wales in 1992 and the building was demolished.
Macleans, Boston Manor Rd, Brentford, Hounslow, 1990, 90-1g-01
Initially the Macleans site, along with the adjoining former Trico factory next to the Grand Union Canal was to be a UK headquarters for Samsung, but plans fell through with an Asian financial crisis and instead building a new headquarters of GlaxoSmithKline was begun in 1998 and completed in 2001. Designed by Hillier with RHWL and Swanke Hayden Connell it was the biggest single commercial development of the time, and one of the few more interesting new buildings on the Great West Road.
GSK announced they were selling it in 2021 and the last of their staff left the building in 2014. There are now plans being made for what will probably be the largest ever development in Brentford.
