Italian food | >Re-PHOTO

Caledonian Road, Barnsbury & Lower Holloway – 1990

Caledonian Road, Barnsbury & Lower Holloway continues my walk which began at Kings Cross on Sunday February 11th 1990 with the Kings Cross and Pentonville 1990. The previous post to this was Battlebridge, Canalside and Barnsbury – 1990.

*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.

*Mallet Porter & Dowd, Caledonian Rd, Lower Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2c-45*

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, Caledonian Rd, Lower Holloway, Islington, 1990, 90-2c-46*

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.

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Italian Festival & Ritzy Strike – 2014

Italian Festival & Ritzy Strike: On Sunday 20th July 2014 I spent several hours at the Italian festival in Clerkenwell and photographed the procession around the local streets before rushing off to Brixton where striking cinema workers were holding a protest in front of the Ritzy cinema.

Festival of Our Lady of Mount Carmel – St Peter’s Church, Clerkenwell

I think I first photographed the procession of Our Lady of Mount Carmel in 1992 – you can see pictures from then and the following year in one of my Flickr albums, Procession in Honour of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.

In 1883 when the event began it was the first Roman Catholic event on English streets for 349 years and required special permission from Queen Victoria, but since then – with a few interruptions for war etc – has taken place every year on the third Sunday in July.

Since then I’ve frequently gone back to the event and taken more photographs, though in more resent years it has become more of a social event for me, meeting up with photographer friends – including one with Italian heritage – and sharing plastic cups of cheap Italian wine.

As well as the procession I’ve always photographed the people at these events and Sunday 20th Jul 2014 was no exception. As well as watching the procession many from the Italian community come from across this country to meet with old friends at the event and enjoy the food, wine, music and dancing in the Sagra in Warner Street.

This year (2025) it is also on 20th July and if you are in London and reading this on the day I post it, if you can get to St Peter;s Church in Clerkenwell (a short walk from Farringdon Station) by 3.30pm you can see what is I think London’s largest annual and certainly most colourful Christian processions.

It is still in my diary, but probably I won’t make it this year, partly because of being tired from photographing another protest calling for an end to the genocide taking place yesterday. But also because last time I went the wine had gone up in price and down in quality. More seriously because I’ve photographed it so many times it is hard to find anything new and not just repeat myself.

The event in 2014 was, as I noted, the first I’ve attended when there were no white doves released. So, although the other pictures are all from 2014, here is one from the last time I went to the festival in 2019. Pigeons are unpredictable and often look rather strange in flight and I was pleased to get one frame with them all visible.

London, UK. 20th July 2019. Three white doves are released from a basket in the historic procession in London’s Clerkenwell from St Peter’s Italian Church.

I usually stayed for an hour or two photographing the people celebrating, but in 2014 I rushed off after the procession to photograph another event.

Much more on My London Diary Festival of Our Lady of Mount Carmel.

Ritzy workers strike for Living Wage – Windrush Square, Brixton,

Despite some torrential rain “the Ritzy workers, some soaked to the skin, kept standing behind their long banner across the whole wide frontage of the cinema. Some had umbrellas, others did not, but it was the kind of rain that made umbrellas next to useless.”

*I sheltered under the tree and my umbrella but still got wet.*

For once I had my own umbrella up, holding it while taking pictures but still “enough came through to soak my clothes and my feet were squelching in my shoes.“

The Ritzy is the busiest and most successful art-house cinema in the the UK but was still paying its workers at only 82% of the London Living Wage – not enough to live on in London. Backed by their union, BECTU, they went on strike after negotiations with employers Cineworld failed. The workers say ‘Living Staff – Living Wage.

More at Ritzy workers strike for Living Wage.

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Our Lady of Mount Carmel – 2009

Our Lady of Mount Carmel: I think it was in 1992 that I first photographed the Procession in Honour of Our Lady of Mount Carmel which has taken place at St Peter’s Italian Church in Clerkenwell since 1883. You can find around 50 of my photographs from that year in my Flickr album 1992 London Photos which you can access by clicking on this, the first picture in the set:

Float, Procession, In Honour of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, St Peter's, Italian Church, Clerkenwell Rd, Clerkenwell, Camden, Islington, 1992, 92-6y-62 — *1992*

I went back the following year, and I think the pictures from 1993 are generally better.

First Communicants, Our Lady of Mount Carmel, Italian Festival, St Peters Church, Clerkenwell, Camden, 1993, — *1993*

And I’ve been there most years since when I’ve been in London at the right time in July, though I’m not sure if I will go this year, when The liturgical feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel is celebrated on 16th July and the procession takes place on a Sunday close to that – the 2024 Procession is on the afternoon of Sunday 21st July.

It’s London’s most colourful Christian procession and the celebrations around it have an Italian liveliness – and most years I’ve gone together with a fellow photographer of Italian origin and we have enjoyed a few glasses of cheap Italian wine together. But we are getting older and the wine is getting more expensive…

And while its still a fine event to attend, in recent years it has perhaps lost a little, and like most events become a little more formalised and a little less spontaneous, harder to take the kind of informal images I like and which I hope reflect more the atmosphere of the event.

All of the colour pictures here are from Sunday 12th July 2009 which I think was for me a fairly typical year, with one exception. At the centre of the event for me photographically has been the release of doves, usually by three of the clergy. The doves fly unpredictably and extremely rapidly when released, and capturing them in flight is a challenge. In 2009 I got lucky.

Back in 2009 I was working with a Nikon D700 and made this picture with the focal length set to 24mm. That camera could take pictures at 5 frames per second, though I probably relied on pressing the button at the right time. Fortunately I’d decided to set a small aperture, f16, to try to keep clergy, background and doves in focus, although working at ISO400 this meant a slightly slow shutter speed, 1/250s.

Nikon’s autofocus kept up with the pigeon as it flew directly towards me, and its feathers and claws are the sharpest part of the image, with the background remaining only slightly out of focus thanks to the small aperture. The wingspan of a pigeon is around 30 inches and a little elementary maths tells me the bird must have been just over 2 feet from the camera. I certainly felt the breeze as it passed inches over my hair.

You can read more about the 2009 event, including the lively Italian festival – the Sagra – with various stalls food, drink, dancing and more in a street below the church, as well as the procession itself with its various floats and walking groups including the first communicants and others who carry the statues of saints on My London Diary.

The clergy join the procession in front of the last float, which carries the statue of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, and a large crowd of parishioners follows after it as it goes around the local area before returning to the church.

Also on My London Diary are pictures from the processions in 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004, and 2003 as well as some later years. Our Lady of Mount Carmel 2009

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Our Lady of Mount Carmel

Most years around this time I would be enjoying an afternoon in Clerkenwell, with the area thronged with Italians and people of Italian descent enjoying their major London festival, the procession of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, in the area around St Peter’s Italian Church. These pictures are from Sunday 21 July 2013, eight years ago.

When Queen Victoria gave the procession special permission to take place in 1883, it was the first Roman Catholic event on English streets for 349 years and was doubtless rather a contentious event. The Popery Act of 1698 had made discrimination against Catholics official, and when the Papists Act of 1778 relaxed some of these restrictions it led to a week of intense riots in London, with the Catholic Chapels at foreign embassies being burnt down and attacks on Newgate Prison and the Bank of England before the army was sent in to stop the destruction. After that things got rather quieter, though we still celebrate with what was very much an anti-Catholic bonfire on November 5th each year.

The celebrations now are very much both a religious and cultural event, and along with the procession from the church there is also an Italian festival or Sagra in the street below the church, with traditional Italian food, music, dancing and wine.

I’m not sure if the wine improves my photography, but it’s hard to resist and I usually meet up with a few of my photographer friends and it is as much a social as a photographic occasion. But I always try to photograph the religious procession, and in particular the release of doves which has become the highlight of the event. In 2013 six doves were released by six of the first communicants in a slightly uncoordinated manner, and – as the top picture shows – didn’t really fly in a way that made a good picture, at least not for me. It’s always a rather unpredictable event.

The rest of the procession follows in a more predictable fashion, though it has changed a little over the 20 or so years I’ve photographed it. But as often with processions most of the more interesting photographs come before the actual event, and while I stay taking photographs until the end of the procession has moved off down the road, my photographer friends are probably back down in the Sagra, while most of the crowd is up on the street applauding the walking groups and floats.

The route has changed since I first began to photograph the event, perhaps to make things a little easier for those carrying the heavy statues, though I think some of the floats had problems in the narrow streets to the south of the church in Hatton Garden. It now sticks to the main roads, in a triangle down Clerkenwell Road, up Rosebery Ave and back down Farringdon Rd. At its rear are the clergy and a large group of parishoners, but most of those watching are long back down drinking and eating before the procession finished.

I didn’t feel my photographs from 2013 were as good as on some other years, but they do tell the story of the event. You can see more of them at Our Lady of Mount Carmel.

Links to the festival in some other recent years on My London Diary: 2008, 2009, 2012, 2014, 2015, 2017, 2018, 2019

All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.