Posts Tagged ‘Lancaster Gate’

Ashura Day & Italian Gardens – 2007

Tuesday, January 30th, 2024

Ashura Day & Italian Gardens: On Tuesday January 30, 2007 I came to Hyde Park close to Marble Arch where Shi’ite Muslims were gathering for their annual Ashura Day Procession from there to the Notting Hill Mosque.

Ashura Day & Italian Gardens

The procession celebrates the life and ideals of Imam Husain, the grandson of the Prophet, and mourns his martyrdom at Karbala in Iraq in 61 AH (AD680.) His example in dying for human dignity, human rights and the aims of his faith inspire them in trying to live a good and moral life and they seek Husain’s blessing on their daily lives.

Ashura Day & Italian Gardens

Here is part of the post I wrote in 2007 of the event (with slight corrections):

Several thousand people joined in the annual procession in London, making their way slowly from Hyde Park to the mosque in Notting Hill. Many wore black, and all joined in the chanting of “Ya Husain” accompanied by the beating of drums clashing of sanj (cymbals) and the blowing of trumpets, along with calls to prayer. Those taking part beat their breasts, largely in a symbolic fashion, although there were groups of young men who from time to time swung their arms vigorously.

Ashura Day & Italian Gardens

The Ashura Procession is impressive to see, and everyone taking part seemed to welcome my interest in what was taking place and were happy to be photographed.

Ashura Day & Italian Gardens

The weather was dull and it soon began to get dark; it didn’t help that I had one of my fiddle-fingers technical disaster days, where I kept finding I’d altered the camera settings without being aware of doing so. But it was the kind of occasion where it would be hard not to get some interesting images.

The procession was slow-moving – I wrote “it was moving at a speed that would not have embarrassed a snail” and by the time it reached Lancaster Gate I had taken many pictures and also needed a rest. Dusk was approaching rapidly – and there had been little enough light all day. I went into the Italian Gardens and took a few pictures there in the falling gloom, experimenting a little with flash for some of them.

http://mylondondiary.co.uk/2007/01/jan.htm

The Grade II listed Italian Gardens were Prince Albert’s idea, and built for Queen Victoria in 1862 as a part of the gardens of Kensington Palace which had been opened to the public in 1841. Albert had previously created an Italian garden at their Isle of Wight Osborne House.

The gardens were designed by some of the big names of the day. Sir Charles Barry and Robert Richardson Banks designed the Pump House (now a shelter), Sir James Pennethorne the overall layout, and the reliefs and sculptures were by the unfortunately named John Thomas. The first monument in the garden erected in 1862 by public subscription was a statue by William Calder Marshall of Charles Jenner, the pioneer of vaccination against smallpox. The gardens were renovated a few years ago.

The gardens are at the point where the River Westbourne (known by a dozen different names at various times and places) once flowed into Hyde Park. The river comes from various sources in West Hampstead and Brondesbury, flowing through Kilburn and through Hyde Park (where it was dammed in 1730 to produce the Serpentine) and then on through culverts and a large pipe across Sloane Square Station and on into Bazalgette’s Northern Low Level Sewer – with only storm discharges reaching the Thames at Pimlico. These should end with the completion of London’s Super Sewer.

By 1834 the growth of London and widespread adoption of water closets had largely turned the river into a foul sewer and it could no longer be used to supply the Serpentine, The water for this lake and the gardens now comes from three artesian wells bored in Hyde Park.

More pictures from both the Ashura Procession and the Italian Gardens on My London Diary:


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All photographs on this page are copyright © Peter Marshall.
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More from West London: 1987

Tuesday, October 6th, 2020
Horse, Craven Hill, Bayswater, Westminster, 1987 87-7i-55-positive_2400
Horse, Craven Hill, Bayswater, Westminster, 1987

One of William the Conquerers companions in his 1066 invasion was Ralph Baynard, and among the rewards for his services was an area of land in Paddington. Bayswater was in the 14th century Baynard’s Watering Place, where the River Westbourne or Bayswater rivulet passed under the Uxbridge Rd and horses could drink from it.

Lord Craven bought Upton Farm close to here in 1733 and soon after called the area Craven Hill. The Westbourne rises in Kilburn but springs on Craven Hill added to its flow. Large houses – like this one largely Grade II listed – were developed on Craven Hill and the surrounding area in the early 19th century and in the 1830s it became fashionable as a place of residence, particularly for the literary and artistic. The grand town houses here date mainly from the 1830s to 50s. The horse is an appropriate decoration for the area, but I can tell you nothing more about it or when it disappeared.

Chilworth St, Bayswater, Westminster, 1987 87-7i-63-positive_2400
Chilworth St, Bayswater, Westminster, 1987

This ornate doorway is in Chilworth St, and not as the note on my contact sheet suggested in Devonshire Terrace, which is just around the corner. There is more carved brickwork on the frontage of this building, which is rather grudgingly Grade II listed for its ‘group value’.

Westbourne St, Paddington, Westminster, 1987 87-7i-21-positive_2400
Westbourne St, Paddington, Westminster, 1987

This area of London has been home to many ethnicities and nationalities at least since the Victorian era.

The Fountains, Hyde Park, Bayswater, Westminster, 1987 87-7i-35-positive_2400
The Fountains, Hyde Park, Bayswater, Westminster, 1987

The River Westbourne used to emerge into the open in Hyde Park, and Queen Caroline had a dam built to make the Serpentine Lake in 1730. By the 1830s, with Bayswater being developed the river had become a sewer, and water was instead pumped from the Thames – and is now from deep boreholes into the chalk below the park. One borehole is in the Italian Gardens, which were built in the 1860s when Prince Albert decided it would be nice to have something here like those which he had made at Osborne House. The pavilion which held a pump for the fountains was designed by Sir Charles Barry and the gardens by James Pennethorne with sculpture by John Thomas.

Bayswater Rd, Bayswater, Westminster, 1987 87-7i-46-positive_2400
Bayswater Rd, Bayswater, Westminster, 1987

This rather ugly truncated column on the corner of Lancaster Gate marks the service road in front of the building at left (now the Columbia Hotel) as a private road, running parallel to the Bayswater Rd. Planned in 1856-7, this was one of the grandest developments in London and took around ten years to complete. The architect for the two long terraces facing Hyde Park was Sancton Wood (1815–1886) who worked for his cousins Robert and Sydney Smirke and also designed many railway stations.

All Saints Rd, Notting Hill, Kensington & Chelsea, 1987 87-7j-25-positive_2400
All Saints Rd, Notting Hill, Kensington & Chelsea, 1987

‘DOC ALIMANTADO SAY FREE SOUTH AFRICA’. Dr Alimantado, born in Kingston Jamaica in 1952 as Winston Thompson and also known as ‘The Ital Surgeon’ is a Jamaican reggae singer, DJ and record producer, best known in the UK for his ‘Born For A Purpose’, made after he was knocked down and injured by a bus and for his 1978 album Best Dressed Chicken in Town. He gained success for his ‘toasting’ over the work other singers and his own recordings as a vocalist were less successful.

All Saints Rd, Notting Hill, Kensington & Chelsea, 1987 87-7j-26-positive_2400
All Saints Rd, Notting Hill, Kensington & Chelsea, 1987

‘REMAIN CAREFUL OF YOUR TRUE CONDUCT, DIGNITY, STEER AWAY FROM TRASHY INTEGRATION, BE WORTHY OF THE BEST’

This graffiti on one of Notting Hill’s best-known streets was based on advice given given to the young Dr Martin Luther King:
Remain careful of your conduct. Steer away from ‘trashy’ preachers. Be worthy of the best.”

More on page 5 of my album 1987 London Photos.


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.