Bikes, Canals & Walthamstow: On Sunday 5th September 2004 my work began with cycle racing in Whitehall, after which I went to Islington for a canal festival, finally making my way to High Street Walthamstow for another festival there. As usual I’ll reproduce what I wrote back then and link to more pictures from the three events still on My London Diary.
Cycle racing in Whitehall
The first lap of the club race and one cyclist has already broken from the pack on Embankment.
The Tour Of Britain has so far lacked the public interest of the Tour De France, but a last day involving a road race around a mile course through Whitehall should have given it a boost. I only stayed for the warm-up event with club cyclists competing on the same course.
The crowding and the pace made for some excitement, but for an outsider I think there needed to be some way to make individuals more recognisable in the crowd.
Morris Dancers entertain outside a pub inIslington
Up at the Angel, it was the 19th annual Canal Festival, with singers and other performers, boat trips, decorated boats and various stalls along the towpath.
Classical music at the City Road Lock
It really did seem to be a very pleasant event for a sunny summer Sunday with everyone enjoying themselves.
Boat trips were a popular attraction
Up on the street people were sitting around the pub and being entertained, first by a three piece band, apparently of Cockney persuasion with a little Dixie thrown in, then by some Morris men
A women’s morris dancing in High Street , Walthamstow
The attraction that dragged me away [from the canal and the pub] was the promise of belly-dancing in Walthamstow.
The musicians sensibly stayed in the shade
Walthamstow has of course a William Morris connection (and an occasionally open museum [reopening by 1 October 2026 after significant renewal]) but there were no discernible signs of this. [Though I’m sure there were but I missed them.]
The first event that drew my interest was however a women’s Morris performing in the high street.
Belly-dancing is one of those things I always wonder if there is more too it than the obvious attraction. And I was obviously attracted, though it’s hard to think of any way to photograph it other than the obvious.
The display involved two solo performers of very different frame. If you don’t have much to wobble, the movements can be much more controlled, but to this male eye are considerably less provocative.
This long run of flats – numbered 1-64 is St John’s Park Mansions.
Sir James Pemberton was a goldsmith and Lord Mayor of London in 1611, and was one of the eight freeholders of the Manor of Highbury. The street was developed around 1870 on land owned by the Corporation of the Sons of the Clergy, a charity set up in 1655 by merchants of the City of London and priests of the Church of England to support clergy who had lost their livings thanks to Oliver Cromwell – and which still (now as the Clergy Support Trust) supports Anglican clergy and they named it after him. The street was renamed Pemberton Gardens in 1895.
These flats were built in 1899-1900 and have nine blocks extending out to the rear to accommodate 32 flats as well as the 32 in those in the buildings on the street.
House, Cathcart Hill, Tufnell Park, Islington, 1990, 90-2h-66
I continued my walk down Junction Road, turning briefly into Cathcart Hill to photograph this house where considerable building work was taking place. The house probably dates from the 1860s and I think is 1 Cathcart Hill. Although the web page for the Cathcart Hill Historical Society is dedicated to the history of numbers 1-16 Cathcart Hill, it has as yet no information about No.1.
Boston Arms, pub, 178 Junction Rd, Tufnell Park, Islington, 1990, 90-2h-54
This pub designed by Thorpe and Furniss was built in 1899 for Bass & Co Ltd replacing an earlier earlier building, there in 1860, the Boston Arms Tavern on the corner with Dartmouth Park Hill. A few years later it changed its name to simply ‘The Boston’ and this was the name when it was rebuilt, though it is now ‘Boston Arms. It was Grade II listed in 1994 and remains in use.
Boston Arms, pub, Junction Rd, Tufnell Park, Islington, 1990, 90-2h-56
Attached to the pub – but not in my pictures – is the Boston Music Room, also Grade II listed. It was built in 1884 with a ground floor 60ft swimming bath and above this an assembly hall. In 1909 the swimming bath was converted into a second assembly hall and used as a cinema, called the Electric Theatre, later the Stanley Theatre. After this closed in 1916 it became the Tufnell Park Palais, used for wrestling and concerts.
It reopened in 1981 as an independent music venue, with the upstairs called The Dome and downstairs The Boston Music Room. Among those appearing there have been Coldplay, Bring Me the Horizon, Blur, Primal Scream, Noel Gallagher,Madness, The White Stripes, U2, Florence & The Machine, and Cradle of Filth.
Surroundings Ltd, Burghley Rd, Tufnell Park, Camden, 1990, 90-2h-55
Opposite the west side of the pub on Dartmouth Hill Road (and so in the London Borough of Camden) is Burghley Road where a few yards down at No 118 I photographed Surroundings Ltd, a company which appears to have disappeared without trace. The building is now residential.
Turning back to Dartmouth Hill Road I walked the few yards down to the junction and then continued down Fortess Road to photograph Montrose Products at Nokeener House, No. 28-34. This private limited company, L.& M.(MONTROSE PRODUCTS)LIMITED was incorporated in 1954, moved its registered office from here in July 1990 and was finally dissolved in 2024. A mail order company it occupied the first floor while at street level was Everbond Limited, who I can find nothing about. More recently the ground floor was occupied by Major Travel.
This was built as a factory for piano makers T & G Payne who began here in 1891 and it has has some interesting decorative detail. In 2012 permission was granted for its conversion into luxury flats as The Piano Works, retaining most of its external features.
Fortess Grove, Fortess Rd, Kentish Town, Camden, 1990, 90-2h-45
Fortess Grove is at the north side of the old piano factory and twists here around the side of the Fortess Works, then occupied by L C Bennett (Mechanical Handling) Ltd. Later it became home to vehicle repair shop M. & A. Coachworks but since the end of 2015 has been transformed into “a modern, flexible, and contemporary work environment” called Fortess Grove and some housing.
The street still continues past it more or less as in my photograph, a charming little curved cul-de-sac of early Victorian (or possibly late Georgian?) small houses.
Works, Nugent Road, Spears Rd, Crouch Hill, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-34
A factory here was established here next to the house in Lambton Road of William Britain (1828-1906). The company grew greatly and the factory expanded after in 1893 his son William Britain Jnr found a way of casting three-dimensional hollow-cast soldiers in 1893 using an alloy of lead, tin and antinomy. Previously toy soldiers had been flat, two-dimensional.
Sales slumped during and after the Great War for Britains Ltd and at Christmas 1921 they introduced Britains Model Home Farm, which became a big seller; later they also made zoo and circus figures.
In 1931 they expaned with a new factory, the North Light Building in Walthamstow. They finally left this Crouch Hill factory and moved completely to Walthamstow in 1968. That closed in 1991 with production being moved to Nottingham.
This building on the corner of Hornsey Road and Fairbridge Road offering timber, building materials and electrical supplies to the trade and for DIY use clearly had had a rather different past with this rather grand entrance. I had photographed the building the previous year and commented on it but had not found out much about its history.
According to Edith’s Streets it was orginally a coffee tavern, the Jubilee Hall, and from 1905 until 1937 was the premises of Newton and Wright, electrical and scientific instrument makers. They were the makers of The British Snook Machine, a “1920s gas filled or cold cathode medical X-ray tube with a collimator extension of the anticathodeode“. If like me you are totally mystified you can find out more and see pictures on The Hornsey Road blog.
E D Elson, Timber, Fairbridge Rd, Upper Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-22
E D Elson had a yard at 169 Fairbridge Road for 43 years from when they were founded by Eddie Elson in 1968, along with branches in north London and Hertfordshire – presumably including Barnet. They relocated to St Albans in 2011 and were quickly replaced by a new block of ground floor shops with flats above.
Although the street sign is Sussex Way, the doorway at right is 166 Fairbridge Road and Geo F Trumper‘s perfumery is on Fairbridge Road. This is the head office of the company which was established in 1875 by George Francis William Trumper as a gentlemen’s barber shop in Curzon Street, Mayfair. It sells a range of men’s fragrances and personal grooming products, none of which I have ever tried.
This building was the Holloway Mills dating from around the 1870s as a steam saw mills for W Betts, the son of J.T. Betts who had founded the company in Bordeaux in 1804. They made boxes and packaging and later became specialists in metal packaging. The company was taken over in 1960 and other businesses moved in. More recently the building has been in use by a a number of artists organisations.
Byam Shaw School of Art, Ethorne Rd, Upper Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-12
The Byam Shaw School of Art was opened as an independent school of fine art in Kensington in May 1910 by John Liston Byam Shaw and Rex Vicat Cole, and was at first called the Byam Shaw and Vicat Cole School of Art.
It moved to these larger premises in 1970 and in 2003 was absorbed into the art establishment as a part of Central Saint Martins College of Arts and Design.
According to a Facebook post by Matt Crandall, this 1920s building was the factory for G Leonardi Ltd, Leonardene Co, and Leonardene Art Models, all founded by Giuseppe Leonardi, an ex-pat Italian, in the 1920s. They were “primarily makers of Art Deco pieces in the 1920s and 1930s including figures, lamps, and wall masks. Their quality far surpassed the usual plasterware items produced at the time, highly detailed and beautifully painted. Many Leonardi designs were reproduced by other companies into the 1970s.” They apparently had a Disney licence from “sometime in the 1940s, which ran at least through 1953“
Where I was standing to make this picture is now called Navigator Square , part of a new gyratory road system. The Archway Tavern is still standing and opened again as a pub after being closed in 2014 over licencing issues. There has been a pub on this site since the 1700s. It was rebuilt in 1860, and then this larger building replaced it in 1888.
Behind at right is the Holborn Union Building, another historic landmark, designed by Henry Saxon Snell which opened on Archway Road as the The Holborn and Finsbury Union Workhouse Infirmary with 625 beds on 1879. More recently it was a campus for University College London and Middlesex University. Vacant since 2013, controversion plans for redevelopment including a 23 storey student housing tower were turned down by Islington council but the called in by London Mayor Sadiq Khan whose decision is still awaited.
The Royal London Friendly Society, Insurance, Junction Rd, Archway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-14
The Royal London Friendly Society was launched by Henry Ridge and Joseph Degge in 1861 and in 1908 became a mutual, owned by its customers. Now just Royal London, it “is among the top 30 mutuals globally, and is the largest mutual life, pensions and investment company in the UK.”
This fine building for the society at 32 Junction Road dates from 1903, architects Holman & Goodham and was still in used by Royal London Insurance in 1990. Later it became solicitors offices, but since around 2015 has housed a series of cafés, and is currently Dune Brasserie and offices above.
Along Hornsey Road, Holloway 1990: More from my walk on Sunday February 25th 1990 which began with Around Finsbury Park – 1990. The previous post on this walk was Houses, a Club, Ghost Sign, Blouses and Baths – 1990.
DON’T BE SCARED OF FREEDOM, Andover Medical Center, Hornsey Rd, Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-65
The Andover Medical Centre is at 270-282 Hornsey Road a short distance north from the Hornsey Road Baths and I made my picture from the corner of Hornsey Road and Newington Barrow Way which leads to the Andover Estate, a large council estate begun in 1938 but greatly enlarged in 1973-9.
The graffiti ‘DON’T BE SCARED OF FREEDOM’ which attracted my attention is of course long gone. So too is the sprawling bush and there are no some car parking spaces in its place.
I continued walking up Hornsey Road for well over a quarter of a mile before making my next picture looking across the road and down Bavaria Road. Here a sign high on the wall at 395 Hornsey Road announces the Alexandra Coffee Tavern and above the modern street sign is the former name of the street, Blenheim Road. Before becoming a temperance tavern this had been a pub, the Blenheim Arms, opened (and built) probably in 1869, but by 1881 it was the Alexandra Coffee Tavern, part of a then growing temperance movement.
The name Alexandra probably came from Princess Alexandra of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg who married the son and heir of Queen Victoria in 1863 and became a popular royal very much involved in charity work as Princess of Wales until 1901 when she became queen.
I was also attracted by the signage for the locksmiths then in the former pub, particualr the four different types of keys shown above the shop at right. The Victorian building had been incorporated into a more modern structure both on Hornsey Road and Bavaria Rd. Since 1990 an extra storey has been added to the building which now houses The Pelvic Academy offering Physiotherapy and Wellness.
I walked a short distance down Bavaria Road to photograph Replica House, built in 1883 as a chapel to seat 450 on what was then Blenheim Road to the designs of architects Lander & Bedells, possibly replacing an earlier chapel here. By 1916 it was known as Blenheim Congregational Mission Hall. According to British History Online it had closed by 1954. The street had become Bavaria Road in 1938.
Replicards Limited who occupied it at the time of my picture had renamed the building Replica House. They were a graphics design studio incorporated in 1967. At the right of their sign are the letters ‘Exhibitic’, perhaps where the end of the sign had been at some time truncated with that ‘c’ really being part of an ‘o’. Had it been moved from a slightly wider building where it had once said ‘Exhibitions’?
Back on Hornsey Road I photographed a long terrace of shops with The Hanley Arms pub at the left, roughly opposite Bavaria Road looking to the south. This Grade II listed pub was apparently in place here by 1827 although the ground floor frontage dates from around 1900. It closed as a pub around 2007 and 440 Hornsey Road is now an Islamic mosque, Masjid-e-Yusuf.
I continued up Hornsey Road to Marlborough Road where I made this picture close to the corner, but I think this building with its flower motifs above the doorway has been demolished.
Marlborough Service Station,Marlborough Rd, Upper Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-54
A little further down is a splendid garage building I think from the 1920s or 30s, Marlborough Service Station, still there and very much in business in 2025.
The building at 165 Marlborough Rd is still there and has been sympathetically remodelled on the ground floor with a extra door and two new windows in what was then a blank area of brick.
Megatron was a company that I had some dealings with, as from 1984 until the company was liquidated in 2010 they made – among many other products – the legendary Weston Master photographic exposure meters. When I broke the very thin glass over the needle on mine I sent it back to Megatron for repair. It wasn’t cheap, and when I broke it again I decided instead to replace the glass with a thin sheet of acrylic, superglued in place.
As well as still photographs, many professional movies were shot with the aid of a Weston light meter in various models since the 1930s. Later models came with a white plastic ‘Invercone‘, an inverted cone which fitted over the metering cell to allow accurate measurement of incident light – the light falling onto a scene – as well as the more normal reflected light measurement. The Weston meters have a large selenium cell which generates an electric current when light falls on it and do not need batteries.
Car Breakers, Grenville Rd, Upper Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2g-46
Grenville Road is a turning on the east side of Hornsey Road a short distance north from Marlborough Road, just before the bridge over what is now the Suffragette Line of the Overground, then known as the Gospel Oak to Barking or Goblin line. I’m unsure exactly where on the road Astoria Auto Breakers was, but I liked the skeletal nature of the racked cars and the leafless tree.
Houses, Prah Rd, Finsbury Park, Islington, 1990, 90-2f-22
A long terrace of three-storey houses on Prah Rd built in 1876-1878 – and there are others in a similar style on nearby Romilly Rd. There is a long and detailed section on Prah Road and its early occupants cited in an essay by John Bold and Charlotte Bradbeer; Booth’s investigators described these and neighbouring streets as having a higher class of occupant: ‘clerks, city men, some mechanics and a great many railwaymen of the better sort, head ticket collectors etc‘.
Doorway, 1, Prah Rd, Finsbury Park, Islington, 1990, 90-2f-24
The Finsbury Park Conservative Club opened at 1 Prah Road in 1886 but there was little to show its presence when I photographed its decorative entrance. Later it had a Carlsburg sign added above the doorway, still there though faded although the club closed in 2015. The building was sold in 2016 for over 1.65 million, but completion was delayed as the building was squatted. It is now residential.
I walked north towards Finsbury Park Station and then turned left down Seven Sisters Road towards Holloway, taking few photographs as I had walked this way before. FINSBURY PARK was then fairly clear at the top of the ‘ghost sign’ on the Berriman Road side of 158 Seven Sisters Road, but I cannot make out the rest of the wording, though the next line could be GENERAL.
Fosby Of London Ltd were at 3-5 Thane Villas, a few yards down the next turning south off Seven Sisters Road after Berriman Road. The company, established in 1977, made luxury high quality ladies blouses and shirts with “a feminine, elegant feel” which still sell on vintage clothing sites, but the building is now student accomodation.
A closer view shows some of the fine detailing on the Grade II listed building built in a Queen Anne style in 1909 as factory, offices and wholesale showroom for manufacturing pharmaceutical chemists Fletcher, Fletcher and Company Ltd. Grace’s Guide lists their specialities: ‘”Vibrona” the Ideal Tonic Wine, of which they are the proprietors; is largely prescribed by the medical profession as a Tonic Restorative. ” Bronamalt,” an Ideal Tonic Food for delicate Children and Invalids. Also proprietors of Fletchers’ Syrups of the Hydrobro mates and Fletchers’ Concentrated Liquors, all of proved value. Are the patentees of Fletchers’ Thermo-Hydrometer and Fletchers’ Autometric Stopper, also of Endolytic Tubes for Clinical Diagnosis.
Other products included Effico tonic, Flexaphyll deodorant tablets, Aperigran laxative granules and Rubelix cough syrup. They called the buildings Vibrona House and remaines there until the 1960s when it was bought by Vortex Jersey Ltd.
The building was only listed in 2007, and the listing text comments: “The building has been little altered and retains several features of note including panelling, a glazed partition, a fireplace and rare historic automatic door, an unusual feature in commercial buildings of the era. The difference between the manufacturing and commercial spaces is clearly marked by two staircases which are both of special interest: the utilitarian stone staircase with metal balusters providing access to the factory and the grand timber Jacobean staircase serving the offices and commercial areas.“
At the next crossroads I turned north up Hornsey Road and photographed the Hornsey Road Baths – Grade II listed in 1994. Another Queen Anne style building, this was built in 1891-2, designed by architect Alfred Hessell Tiltman (1854-1910).
When opened it had two pools for men and one for women, but such was demand that the baths were enlarged in 1894 and a second women’s bath was added in 1900. The listing text concludes by mentioning the “remarkable neon Diving Lady on the South flank elevation, one of 12 such illuminated features placed on swimming pools and lidos in London in the 1930’s and now believed to be the only survivor.”
The frontage of the baths has the text ‘PUBLIC BATHS AND WASH HOUSES’ incised across it. The wash houses or laundry were added in 1894 and had a large drying room; they became self-service in 1965. The baths were refurbished at a cost of £1.5 million in 1985 and as the board shows were still in use for swimming, warm baths and a sauna when I took these pictures. But lack of funds led to the closing of the baths and laundry the following year.
From 2002-9 the baths were redeveloped, retaining the listed entrance block on Hornsey Road and the chimney but providing 200 apartments, some at affordable rent and others for private sale, an office building for Islington Council and a Sure Start Centre for parents and children.
12 Days of Christmas -some of my favourite pictures from those I made in August 2025.
London, UK. 2 Aug 2025. We Are Alll Migrants. Rival groups of protesters kept apart by police at the Thistle City Barbican Hotel, Finsbury. Some locals say asylum seekers there had caused a plague of crime and antisocial behaviour and right wing groups held a protest there, opposed by Stand Up To Racism and groups who say racism and Islamophobia are being used to scapegoat refugees and migrants and fascists are not welcome here. A large block of anarchists arrived, ignored police and stood between the two other groups. Peter MarshallLondon, UK. 2 Aug 2025. Louise Raw holds a long list of far right convicted sex offenders. Rival groups of protesters kept apart by police at the Thistle City Barbican Hotel, Finsbury. Some locals say asylum seekers there had caused a plague of crime and antisocial behaviour and right wing groups held a protest there, opposed by Stand Up To Racism and groups who say racism and Islamophobia are being used to scapegoat refugees and migrants and fascists are not welcome here.. Peter MarshallLondon, UK. 6 Aug 2025. Councillor Eddie Hanson, Mayor of Camden lays a wreath at the new Cherry Tree which had just been planted. Ceremonies around the world mark the 80th anniversary of the devastating US exploding the world’s first nuclear bomb at Hiroshima, instantly killing thousands of innocent civilians with many more dying in the days, months and years from radiation. A new cherry tree was planted in Tavistock Square where speakers, artists and singers led reflections calling for no more nuclear war. Peter MarshallLondon, UK. 9 Aug 2025. Police arrest an old woman at the protest supporting Palestine after the march through London protesting against Israel starving the people of Gaza to death. They seemed to object to a leaflet she was handing out. They called on the UK government to stop arming Israel and to end their complicity with genocide and join the international community in opposing Israel’s actions. Peter Marshall/Alamy Live NewsLondon, UK. 9 Aug 2025. Police arrest and carry a protester away. Hundreds, perhaps a thousand or morecampaigners defied the law and sat to Parliament Square with the message “I oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action” despite warnings they might be arrested under the Terrorism Act. The protest came after Amnesty and international scholars and others had joined many others in calling for the ban to be lifted and permission had been give for a legal action against the ban to go ahead. Police carried away many of them to waiting police vans. Peter Marshall.London, UK. 9 Aug 2025. Members of the United Voices of the World at the Canary Wharf Radisson Blu hotel and the Draughts board game bar both on strike held joint protests at Canary Wharf and here outside the bar in the Leake St graffiti tunnel. The housekeepers are fighting brutal cuts to hours and demanding 40-hour contracts, fair workloads, and the London Living Wage and bar staff are protesting against zero-hour contracts, unpaid training and unsafe working conditions. Peter Marshall.London, UK. 23 Aug 2025. At Starbucks. The Revolutionary Communist Group protest at UK businesses on and around Oxford St which support and profit from the ethnic cleansing, starvation, and genocide of the Palestinian people. Israel’s colonial regime provides high profits, and speeches at each stop detailed evidence against the company. The protest demanded severing all ties with Israel and comprehensive sanctions and claimed the UK government is committed to crushing the Palestine solidarity through state repression and media lies. Peter Marshall.London, UK. Journalists and media workers at Downing Street honour the courageous reporting of the journalists of Gaza who are being deliberately targeted and killed by Israeli attacks on Gaza for telling the world the truth of the genocide. The names of over 240 who are confirmed killed since 7 October 2023 were read out after speeches from Al Jazeera journalist Wael Dadouh, Ahmed Anaouq of We Are Not Numbers and Sangita Myska. Peter Marshall.
Around Finsbury Park: On Sunday February 25th 1990 I began a walk from Finsbury Park Station
Bookmarks, 265, Seven Sisters Rd, Finsbury Park, Haringey, 1990, 90-2f-42
The Bookmarks shop was at 265, Seven Sisters Rd, Finsbury Park and was home to the Bookmarks Publishing Co-operative which had been established in 1979 to publish books and pamphlets by members of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP). In 1998 it moved to 1 Bloomsbury Street and is now Britain’s largest socialist bookshop and now sells a wide range of “non-fictional and fictional books that concern politics, economics, anti-fascism, anarchism, labour history, trade unionism, arts and culture, anti-racism, the environment, biographies, and feminism.”
Two doors beyond this at 269 was the former entrance to a cinema, built in 1909 as Pyke’s Cinematograph. Later it was combined with the larger Rink Cinema behind it at 10 Stroud Green Road and when I took this picture it had closed as a club and became as a large sign indicates ‘LONDON’S LATEST LUXURY TENPIN BOWLING ALLEY!’ with its entrance in Stroud Green Road around the corner. There is now a Lidl here.
House, 169, Queen’s Drive, Finsbury Park, Hackney, 1990, 90-2f-43
After the railway station – at first Seven Sisters Road station – opened in 1869 the area around it was opened up to speculative building, with trains taking workers into the City at Moorgate station in around 15 minutes. This very substantial Victorian detached house was one of those on Queen’s Drive, just a few yards from Finsbury Park and a short walk to the station which would have provided a home for a well-paid city worker and his family and a servant or two.
Houses, Queen’s Drive, Finsbury Park, Hackney, 1990, 90-2f-45
Further down Queen’s Drive were more very substantial semi-detached residences and although much of the area had deteriorated particularly since the war these houses still seemed in good condition. This was clearly built as one of the posher streets in Finsbury Park and had remained so, although many of these large houses were now dividied into flats and some had been replaced by later and larger blocks of flats.
House, Brownswood Rd, Wilberforce Rd, Finsbury Park, Hackney, 1990, 90-2f-31
A strikingly vertical house on the corner of Brownswood Road and Wilberforce Rd, though in fact is I think actually only the same height as the house opposite, also with a full height attic window. There are similar houses on all four corners of the junction. The large block of flats looks very near but is on Citizen Road around a kilometre away to the south-west.
Squat, 63, St Thomas’s Rd, Finsbury Park, Islington, 1990, 90-2f-36
Two adjoining doors of 63 and 65 St Thomas’s Road both have notices on them from the squatters, on the left door warning that the premises are occupied and that any attempt to enter without permission is a criminal act, while on the right visitors are told they need to knock and shout up up to people on the upper floors. Squatting in a residential building in England only became illegal in September 2012.
Stop the Roads, poster, St Thomas’s Rd, Finsbury Park, Islington, 1990, 90-2f-21
YOUR LAST CHANCE TO STOP THE ROADS states a poster for a march from Kings Cross to Archway on 24 February 1990, the day before I took this picture. In 1989 Margaret Thatcher had outlined plans for a £23 billion trunk road enlargement programme in the Roads for Prosperity white paper, designed to assist economic growth, improve the environment, and improve road safety. It led to years of protest with many schemes being cancelled though others, including the M3 extension at Twyford Down, the Newbury bypass and the M11 link road went ahead.
Dancers, Shops, Gym, Laundry, a Lab and Cobblers: The next set of pictures from my walk on February 18th 1990 around Kings Cross & St Pancras. The previous post on this was St Pancras Old Church & More – 1990.
Dancers, Mural, Stanley Buildings, Stanley Passage, Pancras Rd, Kings Cross, Camden, 1990, 90-2f-64
This was my favourite mural in London on the side of Stanley buildings and one I’d photographed several times since 1985. Unusually it was painted in black and white and it extended across the whole side of the flats from first floor level to the chimneys. You can see an image in colour I made a few months earlier from a similar viewpoint on Flickr.
Pancras Rd, Kings Cross, Camden, 1990, 90-2f-65
Nearby on Pancras Road I photographed this rather finely proportioned frontage with some interesting brickwork and decoration at its top. I wish I had made another exposure to show more clearly the two busts at the left of the ground floor.
Turnhalle, German Gymnasium, Pancras Rd, Kings Cross, Camden, 1990, 90-2f-66
Another image of the Pancras Road frontage of the German Gymnasium in a row of shops including the St Pancras Cafe. All this was lost for the redevelopment of St Pancras International – with the Gymnasium being given a new modern frontage in a style matching the rest of the building.
To the east of Kings Cross the first turning to the right from York Way is Caledonia Street. I’d photographed the laundry with its large intertwined KCL insignia on a walk the previous year. Although there were more recent signs for occupiers including those for Lanitis Fabrics Ltd, and Stella Models and signs calling for Machinists, Overlockers, Pressers, Finishers and Cutters, the building appeared to be no longer in use.
The building is still there, though all of the sings apart from the ‘KCL’ have gone and it is now offices with a gateway leading into the ‘Regent Quarter’ redevelopment.
New Wharf Rd, Pentonville, Islington, 1990, 90-2f-53
A little further to the north is Wharfdale Road, another right turning from York Way and from that New Wharf Road goes to the north. These two roads are on the south and east of the ‘new wharf’, Battlebridge Basin on the Regent’s Canal, serving the wharves around its sides.
A large notice on the lefthand buildin, formerly MAMMA ROMA, advertises the development of Battlebridge Basin with 3 buildings with planning consent for offices.
Ozonol Laboratories, New Wharf Rd, Pentonville, Islington, 1990, 90-2f-54
The next building on the road was the then derelict Ozonol Laboratories, Manufacturing Chemists. In 1932 the company had patented a product for “disinfecting mouthpieces of telephones, speaking tubes and the like” and similar products mainly under the similar names: “Ozonol”, “Ozlab”, “Oztox” and others were marketed for use in air purifiers and as an ointment for treating sunburn and hemorrhoids and a wide range of other uses. Ozonol ointments are still sold in some countries though probably not containing some of the original components such as lead oxide.
I walked through to Caledonian Road where I photographed through the window of this cobblers shop with its phone, hand-made sign, electric fire and general clutter. It looked then like something out of an earlier age.
It was time to go home, and I walked back to the tube at Kings Cross.
House, 1A, Cornwallis Rd, Finsbury Park, Islington, 1990, 90-2d-56
This 3 storey detached house on Cornwallis Road, just a few yards down from Tollington Way, attracted my attention for its unusual decoration above what seemed a very ordinary door and window. According to Streets With a Story the street was developed in three periods as Shadwell Road, Esher Villas and Cornwallis Road in 1863, 1879 and 1885. This house probably dates from the latter part of that development but I’ve found nothing about it on-line
Royal Northern Hospital, Tollington Way, Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2d-42
The Royal Northern Hospital was founded in York Rd (York Way) in 1856 at his own expense by a surgeon who had been sacked from University College Hospital for smacking a patient’s bottom. The hospital provided free services for North London’s Poor as well as treating railway workers. But the railway bought the house and they had to move, using several properties in the area. Finally it got is own home and the Great Northern Central Hospital opened on Holloway Road in 1888, changing its name to the Royal Northern Hospital in 1921 and expanding to Tollington Way in the 1930s. It merged with the Whittington Hospital in 1963. The facade of the main building has been retained on Holloway Rd and the building is the Northern Medical Centre
Holloway Rd, Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2d-43
This picture was made from Tollington Way looking to the rather grand Italianate terraced villas on the opposite side of Holloway Road, Belgrave Terrace. They were locally listed in 1978. At left is The Cock Tavern at 596 Holloway Road. The pub was built in the 1880s and in the 2000s became a live music venue and bar, now Nambucca. Damaged by fire in December 2008 it reopened in 2010 and was refurbished in 2014 only to close in 2022 but unexpectedly reopen in 2024.
VICTORY TO THE IRA, Landseer Rd, Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2d-46
Holloway is one of the more densely populated areas of London with a very multicultural population including many Irish among its residents, and among them a significant number who supported the Irish struggle against the English occupiers in Northern Ireland. In 1990 we were in the middle of active attacks by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) on targets in London – the following year they attacked Downing Street using mortar shells and in 1992 a powerful bomb at the Baltic Exchange destroyed it and other buildings in the City of London, following this in 1993 with another bomb in Bishopsgate.
The street was named after the animal painter and sculptor Sir Edwin Landseer, best known now for the lions at the base of Nelson’s column. He became a ‘national treasure‘ and his death in 1873 gave rise to mourning across the nation and large crowds lined the streets as his funeral cortège made its way to St Paul’s Cathedral. Probably the street dates from around then.
The building is still there on Holloway Road, but sadly is no longer an Egg & Butter Merchant and has a new shopfront – and a bus shelter on the pavement in front of it.
As I made my way to the station at the end of my walk I could not resist this shop window with a rather strange mix of products including those listed and some rather strange health supplements. I only stopped long enough to take a picture and wasn’t tempted to buy anything.
My next walk a week later was also in North London and will be the subject of a later post.
More City of London Panoramas: This is the final set of picturesI’ll post from those I made while working on a personal project on the City of London in July 1994. Of course I took many which I’ve not digitised, spending several days walking the City and making over 300 exposures. The camera I used makes negatives on standard 35mm film which are wider than normal and a ’36 exposure’ film only gets around 20 or 21 panoramic frames. Film loading is also trickier as the film has to go around a curve.
Each exposure took a few minutes to select a viewpoint, set up my tripod, level the camera, use a handheld lightmeter to check exposure and finally press the cable release. Most of those not uploaded are similar to those I have posted with just minor changes to the view.
London Bridge Walk, Tooley St, Borough High St, Southwark, 1994, 94-711-52
Not quite in the City, but made as I made my way from London Bridge Station to London Bridge along London Bridge Walk. The road in the background is Borough High Street which leads on to London Bridge and the City boundary is in the middle of the river. You can just see the pinnacles on the top of the tower of Southwark Cathedral.
After the operation of the Waterloo & City underground line from Network South East to London Underground in April 1994 I could no longer use my ‘London Terminals’ ticket on this route, and my cheapest journey became to go to London Bridge on this and walk across to the City.
This is one of a few pictures I had digitised but missed when I was uploading these images to Flickr.
High Walk, Wood St, City, 1994, 94-713-42
Another exposure from the highwalk at Wood Street, leading south along the east side of the street away from London Wall. In the centre of the picture is the City of London Police Headquarters, with two white police vans at bottom right. Steps lead down from the walkway to Wood Street but the highwalk also continued straight on at extreme left – though with more steps.
In the centre of Wood Street at right is the tower of St Alban Wood Street. The medieval church was destroyed in the Great Fire and rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren. The church was largely destroyed in the Blitz in 1940. The tower remained and was Grade II* listed in 1950 and is now a private house; the remains of the rest of the church were demolished in 1965.
Lower Thames St, King William St, City, 1994, 94-711-12
Again on my way from London Bridge Station to the centre of the City, this is made from where London Bridge joins to King William Street and goes across Lower Thames Street. You can see a highwalk bridge going across Lower Thames street a couple of hundred yards to the east, still there in 2025.
Until around 1970 Thames Street was a fairly narrow street, just wide enough to allow a single lane of traffic in both directions. It was then turned into a major road and divided at London Bridge into Lower and Upper Thames Street. At the left you can clearly see where older buildings were cut through to widen the road.
Bank Junction, City, 1994, 94-712-33
The heart of the City. I made the picture close to the corner of Mansion House Street and Princes Street with the Underground entrance on the corner. At left is a corner of the Bank of England and the main modern building towering above it is the Stock Exchange Tower, home to the Stock Exchange until 2004.
Towards the centre is the Royal Exchange, I think then still home to the International Financial Futures Exchange rather than just an upmarket shopping mall. Two buildings full of banks and insurance companies book-end Hawksmoor’s St Mary Woolnuth and at the extreme right is the edge of the Mansion House with a gilded lamp on its steps.
Milton Court, Silk Street, City, 1994, 94-713-21
Another section of highwalks ran from close to Moorgate Station to the Barbican Estate and these last four pictures show sections of this, which could also be accessed from Ropemaker Street. This northern section has now been lost.
Milton Court was designed by Chamberlin, Powell & Bon and built as a part of the Barbican development in 1959 for various City services – “a fire station, Coroner’s Court, mortuary, office of weights and measures and a civil defence school.”
It was arguably London’s most outstanding single post-war building and English Heritage wanted to list it in 2001, but the government’s Department of Culture, Media and Sport objected and in 2007 Secretary of State James Purnell granted it immunity from listing. In a sad act of cultural vandalism this remarkable building was demolished in 2008.
Milton Court, Silk Street, City, 1994, 94-713-12
The building which replaced Milton Court was also given the same name but is a much more bland modern structure. The bridge which linked to the northern section of highwalk disappeared.
The new 115m tall Milton Court is described on its builders Sir Robert McAlpine web site: “Climbing to 36 storeys, Milton Court redefines luxury living in the Square Mile. In addition to a graceful residential tower, the development is home to a spectacular new annexe to the Guildhall School of Music & Drama.” But to me it looks like just another tall city office block.
Highwalk, Ropemaker St, City, 1994, 94-715-52
This enclosed section of highwalk ran from Ropemaker Street to the bridge across Silk Street to the Speed Highwalk still there along the north side of Speed House.
Ropemaker St, Islington, City, 1994, 94-715-32
Remarkably I think none of the buildings in this picture looking east along Ropemaker Street has ssurvived. Even the building at left, Ropemaker Place, a 60m high block which I photographed while it was being built in 1986 and was completed in 1987 and which I thought was one of the more attractive modern buildings in (or rather a few feet outside) didn’t last long and was demolished only 18 years later in 2005.
