A Puzzle and More North London: My post today from my colour work in May 1994 begins with a plea for help. I’ve spent ages trying to find the location of this first picture and hope someone will recognise it and let me know.
As you can see it shows a street with some impressive houses beside a pond. Unfortunately the only information I recorded back in 1994 was on the back of the contact sheet containing this and a dozen other images:
Bounds Green / New Southgate Hendon Barnet Vauxhall : 28 May 1994
On the film this frame comes between one which I think is from Barnet and some which are clearly at Vauxhall suggesting that this may also be in or around Barnet. But I don’t know Barnet at all well and other pictures taken there at the same time do not include a duck pond like this or any of the houses here.
Although my black and white work was fairly well organised at the time – and I was selling some and putting work into libraries, colour was then simply personal projects. At the time I was also working in south London, and this picture could possibly have been taken there. I’d like to know.
Hobart Corner, New Southgate, Enfield, 1994, 94-53-62
Henlys were a major car dealer in the UK mainly for British Leyland, but here they were selling Vauxhall. The New Southgate Gas Works were first built in 1859 and closed in 1972 and this gasholder was a landmark on the North Circular Road until it was demolished in 2014. It was the largest of three on the site and had been built in 1912. It was still in use in 1994 and was only decommissioned in 2001.
Planning permission was given in 2021 for tower blocks with 182 homes on the site but the developer has now dropped these and it is expected to remain empty for several more years.
Chinese Restaurant, Edgware, 1994, 94-54-62
Chinese Restaurant, Station Road, Edgware, 1994, 94-54-64
I made several pictures of this Chinese Restaurant in the centre of Edgware. The reflection in the window shows the building on the corner of Manor Park Road and Station Road.
Northway House, High Road, Whetstone, Barnet, 1994, 94-54-66
Northway House was built in 1968-70 and was a landmark office tower development on the High Road in suburban Whetstone. Back in 1994 it still appeared well-used and in good condition but by 2015 much of it had become empty and dilapidated.
Planning permission was granted to a developer working closely with Barnet Council on a “mixed use residential led mixed use development” which retained and renovated the original building and was completed in August 2025.
Goldies, pub, 58, Regents Park Road, Finchley, 1994, 94-54-51
Formerly known as the Golden Eagle, this pub was demolished in 2002. In its place, just north of the North Circular Road is now Holiday Inn Express London – Golders Green.
There was a pub on this site in the 1930s, built by Charringtons but I think this building dated from the 1950s or 1960s. Possibly it was rebuilt following war damage or because of the conversion of the road to a much wider double carriageway
North and South – London: In May 1994 I was mainly photographing around Enfield, the most northerly of London Boroughs, but in the middle of one film there are a few pictures from Morden, the southern end of the Northern Line. I can’t remember why I made the trip there, possibly on a visit to a friends or perhaps on a family outing to Morden Park on the River Wandle.
This pub or club seems to have had an unusually large number of changes over the years and was also at various times Club X Zone’, Bar FM’, ‘Bell’, ‘Hotshots’, ‘Texas Cantina’, and more. Now a restaurant.
Shop Window, Bush Hill Park, Enfield, 1994, 94-52-61
A strange assortment of clothing on some rather odd two dimensional figures of women with holds in their heads and a line of children’s toys at the bottom of the window.
The Flower Box, Bush Hill Park, Enfield, 1994, 94-52-62
A colourful building though I was sad that parts of the mural below the windows was was obscured by almost empty display stands, one made from milk crates.
The Flower Box, Bush Hill Park, Enfield, 1994, 94-52-65
A small section of the mural from the previous picture shows a wedding couple striding across the fields.
Shops, London Rd, Morden, Merton, 1994, 94-52-44
A fairly typical suburban shopping street with a Boots, Abbey National, Holland & Barrett and at right ‘A NEW FORCE ON THE HIGH STREET’ which I’ve never heard of. The sun is clearly shining but there are ominous clouds above.
Merton Civic Centre, London Rd, Morden, Merton, 1994, 94-52-46
These buildings are still there on the corner of London Road and Crown Lane close to Morden Underground Station and are still Merton’s Civic Centre.
The Civic centre is in a triangle of land surrounded by busy roads. This view seems now largely unchanged except for the names of the shops.
Morden Court Parade, London Rd, Morden, Merton, 1994, 94-52-34
Morden Court Parade is still there a little to the south on London Road from the Civic Centre and looks in rather better condition now. But sadly those 1930s windows have been replaced by fatter plastic double glazing which although greatly more comfortable for the residents both for keeping warm and reducing traffic noise from busy A24 dual carriageway rather spoil the appearance of the building. There are also some new balconies which fit in fairly well with the building and although it has lost than ‘MORDEN COURT PARADE’ from the frontage it has been replaced rather larger on the roof.
Bridge Avenue used to run from King Street to Hammersmith Bridge Road close to Hammersmith Bridge, but was severed with the building of the Great West Road through Hammersmith in the 1960s, the section to the south of this now being Bridge View, though the two are still linked for cyclists and pedestrians by a crossing.
This derelict building was demolished and replaced by a block of offices which is now occupied as the sixth-form block of a Free School. You can faintly make out its former name above the doorway BRITISH HOME STORES. This had its main 1937 Deco frontage at 111-117 King Street, still visible above more recent shopfronts (see below.)
I also photographed the Grade II listed mid-nineteenth century terrace at 1-31 on the east side of Bridge Avenue but have not yet digitised this.
Frank Dale & Stepsons, King St, Hammersmith, Hammersmith & Fulham, 1990, 90-1e-66
Frank Dale and Stepsons was an unusual business name and the shop, a high-end car showroom, seemed an unusual building for a high street here. The company, trading in Rolls-Royce and Bentley motor cars was set up by Frank Dale in 1946 in Paddington, moved to Holbein Place off Sloane Square in 1966, on to Fulham in 1972 and to these larger premises in Hammersmith in 1985. In 2000 they went further west to Harlequin Avenue off the Great West Road in Brentford and since 2020 has been based in Sandhurst on the borders of Berkshire, Hampshire, and Surrey. The company history is well illustrated on its web site.
This building at 120-124 King Street was on the site of a pub established in 1419 and later known as the Plough & Harrow Public House. The building dated from 1903 and the pub closed around 1960. The facade was retained when the site was rebuilt around 2002 and its ground floor resurrected the old pub name as a Wetherspoons. A pleasantly airy alternative to the William Morris a short walk away it was closed by the company in June 2025. The upper floors are a hotel.
Wades, King St, Hammersmith, Hammersmith & Fulham, 1990, 90-1e-51
This is the 1937 Deco frontage of the former British Home Stores. When I made this picture it was Wades’ NATIONAL UPHOLSTERY CLEARANCE CENTRE, but was holding its Branch Closing Down Sale. Wade Upholstery are apparently “recognised as one of the finest British makers of sofas and chairs, with a history dating back to 1921, and is sold by the best furniture retailer’s around the world.”
Two bridges carry the District and Piccadilly lines across Cambridge Grove and this entrance is on the west side of the road next to the northern of the two. Since 2020 this has been The Clay Garden, a ceramics studio running pottery classes, membership, private hire and masterclasses.
The Cambridge Arms, pub, Cambridge Grove, Hammersmith, Hammersmith & Fulham, 1990, 90-1e-55
The Cambridge Arms was built in 1853 but following a major refurbishment in 1997 it was renamed The Stonemasons Arms and it mainly caters for young professional people and prides itself for “serving craft beer and sourdough pizzas daily.”
Behind it is St John the Evangelist, Glenthorne Road, by William Butterfield built 1857–9. Grade II* listed, it closed as a church in 2005 and is now used by Godolphin and Latymer School as a performing arts centre.
The Cambridge Arms, pub, Cambridge Grove, Hammersmith, Hammersmith & Fulham, 1990, 90-1e-41
Another pictures of the Cambridge Arms. Formerly a Watney Combe Reid house it was revamped by Fuller’s. On its side are what I think are the arms of the Prince of Wales – the Duke of Cambridge is a hereditary title of nobility in the British royal family.
Arthur Luckett was an undertaker with this shop at 59 Glenthorne Road, Hammersmith. Later it became a Unisex hairdressing salon who added an awning which rather spoils the frontage and more recently a property management company.
The modern offices at right were for Phillips Medical Systems and have since been replaced.
Finally in Hammersmith I made this picture of Ashcroft Square in Leamore St, a 1973 housing estate on top of a shopping centre designed by Richard Seifert. The shops were only officially opened in 1979. The Kings Mall Shopping Centre is now owned by IKEA.
But this was not the end of my walk. I jumped on a bus to take me a mile or so to the west before the pictures in another post.
London Walking Weekend: Most weekends since the 1980s I’ve spent at least one day walking around London, often on my own but more recently mainly with others carrying banners and placards. But Saturday 6th June 2009 was a little different as it was designated as the Walking Weekend of the Story of London Festival, and I went to a couple of free events put on by the Heritage of London Trust and Pevsner Architectural Guides in east London, as well as doing a little on my own.
London 2012 site
On Saturday morning I took a guided tour of St Mary Magdalene’s Church in East Ham led by Tara Draper-Stumm for the Heritage of London Trust, a charity which does a great deal of work in restoring buildings and sites in danger across the capital.
It was a great guided tour of one of London’s most interesting churches, Grade 1 listed and “claimed to be the oldest parish church still in weekly use in Greater London“, large parts dating from the first half of the 12th century but of course greatly added to, altered and restored over the centuries, most recently in 1965-6.
But I didn’t take any pictures, so nothing to post here from this tour. Back in the 1990s when I was a regular contributor to our National Building Record I often found myself waiting in the library there for my appointment and would pull a box file for an area of London from their shelves – to find it almost entirely full of photographs of old churches, many taken by their vicars back in the day when many were gentlemen of leisure with the money to take up photography. It rather put me off photographing them and on this morning I decided to simply experience the event, listen and look. But there is a fine illustrated tour of the church online.
London 2012 site
From there I had some time to spare before the afternoon walk and went to visit the huge building site on Stratford Marsh for the London Olympics, by then sealed off by miles of blue fence. It was something of a rush to take pictures to later make into panoramas as well as some other pictures before getting back on the DLR from Pudding Mill Station to Poplar.
Footbridge at Poplar Station – a similar panoramic image I took on this footbridge a years earlier was used wrapped around two sides of a 12 inch record, ‘Limehouse Link’and less impressively on the CD.
There I met someone whose name had been familiar for many years but I’d not met, Bridget Cherry, a leading architectural hisotrian whose name appears on the essential works for anyone with an interest in the subject, The Buildings of England, begun by Nikolaus Pevsner in 1951. She worked on many volumes, some with him, as well as becoming General Editor.
1930s streamlined moderne concrete at Constant House, refurbished and fitted with entrance doors
These books remain essential guides to anyone with an interest in architecture in England, and I walked most of the ‘perambulations’ in London from them, although my interests were rather wider than the buildings contained in them and my walks also took me to many other places. You can read more about this walk on My London Diary. Here I’ll include just a few of the pictures I took with captions and some brief comments.
The 1930s pub ‘The Resolute’ , named for HMS Resolute, one of the ships sent in 1850 and 1852 to search for Sir John Franklin, lost in the N W PassageRobin Hood GardensSome gardening going on with residents growing salad crops
Robin Hood Gardens, designed in the late 1960s by Alison and Peter Smithson and completed in 1972, gained international recognition for its Brutalist architecture and was the highpoint of the walk. Its two long blocks enclosed a large garden area which was suprisingly quiet despite the site being alongside of one of London’s busiest roads. Neglected for years by Tower Hamlets council it was used to house many ‘problem’ tenants but by 2009 had largely recovered and become well regarded by those who lived there.
But the local authority had already decided to demolish it as a part of a ‘regeneration’ scheme. Attempts to list it scandalously failed – despite its international architectural significance – probably to protect the profits of the developers and demolition began in 2017 but was only finally completed in March 2015. Listing of large council estates became largely impossible under New Labour and expensive, highly profitable and environmentally disastrous schemes regeration schemes providing expensive but largely poorer quality buildings with little social housing have since obliterated estates – including some fine architecture – which could have been refurbished to modern standards at a fraction of the cost.
St Matthias Old Church built 1652-4 but exterior reworked in 19th centry and monument to Captain Samuel Jones
Thames Gateway – Essex: I didn’t write much about my bike ride in south Essex on 24th May 2007, though the pictures on My London Diary tell the story of my route. I began at Rainham on the edge of Greater London in the London Borough of Havering.
It wasn’t a linear ride but one where I went back and forth rather extensively exploring some of the areas.
Next came the village of Aveley, where the Old Ship has a pub interior “of Outstanding National Importance” but I didn’t go inside.
I photographed the Mar Dyke at North Stifford along with a number of houses, some thatched and cycled around the Stifford Green estate on site of Stepney Boys Home built around ‘The Tower’. This had been an approved school and then a community home until it closed in 1994.
Next came Chafford Hundred, an area where chalk was extensively quarried from 1874 until the last quarry closeed in 1976. In 1986 a proposal by Blue Circle Industries, West Thurrock Estates and Tunnel Holdings to build 5,000 homes on derelict land was approved and the first were completed in 1989.
Parts of the area were still in industrial use in 2007 and there is a nature park with extensive lakes and ditches.
Lion Gorge, Chafford Hundred
From there I cycled a little deeper into Grays before going to Orsett Fen and Orsett and Horndon on the Hill which has a rather fine old pub I also didn’t go inside. Cycling and beer really don’t mix well with modern traffic.
There are more impressive ancient buildings, a reminder of the wealth that once came from the wool trade.
I made my way via Bulphan towards Upminster where I could use my railcard to start my journey home.
Here is the short text I wrote back in 2007 – with the usual corrections. The cost of the ticket I bought then is now £15.30 – an increase of around 9% above inflation – another of the costs of privatisation.
Thursday I bought an expensive ticket – just up from £6.60 to £7.90 – for a one-day railcard for Greater London from Staines, and put my folding bike aboard the train, changing to reach Rainham, Essex, (L B Havering) on the furthest edge of London from where I live.
Don’t let anyone tell you Essex is flat. O boring. Over a few hundred yards you can move from idyllic thatched cottages to post-industrial dereliction; from dramatic man-made scenery with lakes and chalk gorges to densely packed modern housing estates. From farms owned by city millionaires to council tower blocks.
Most of my winding route took me through Thurrock, one of the major growth sites of the Thames Gateway area.
Three Colt Street & Limekiln Dock: My walk in Limehouse on Sunday 6th January 1990 continued. The previous post from this walk is More from Narrow Street – 1990.
Limehouse gets its name from the making of quicklime here, an industry dating back here into antiquity getting its first written reference in 1335. The newly developed flats of Limekiln Wharf and Dundee Wharf on the south side of Limekiln Creek (or Limekiln Dock) are probably on the site of old lime kilns (lime oasts) where chalk (calcium carbonate) brought by boats from Swanscombe or Northfleet or other areas of North Kent was brought ashore in the Creek and roasted to give quicklime (calcium oxide) the vital ingredient for cement, mortar and concrete and with many other uses. When water is then added it forms slaked lime (calcium hydroxide.)
Along the street are the late-Victorian buildings of the Dundee, Perth, and London Shipping Co. which were used by the London Docklands Development Corporation which was responsible for the redevelopment of docklands, over-riding the normal functions of the local authorities and still have the LDDC logo as a weathercock, though this was not in place in 1990.
Limekiln Dock, Three Colt St, Limehouse, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-1b-36
The always interesting ‘A London Inheritance‘ has a fascinating and very detailed account of the area, based on considerable research, Limekiln Dock and the Black Ditch.
The Black Ditch has been much mythologised as one of ‘London’s Lost Rivers‘ and its lower parts were after the 1855 replaced by the Limekiln Dock Sewer. I imagine the Black Ditch and this were both subsumed into Bazalgette’s grand designs in the 1860s and now flow to Beckton.
The view here is looking out towards the River Thames. Since 1996 there has been a swing bridge taking the Thames Path across the mouth of the creek. It had to be built as a swing bridge because of the ancient rights of navigation into the dock, though I would be surprised to find that it has ever needed to be swung to allow this.
Limekiln Dock, Three Colt St, Limehouse, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-1b-25
There seemed to be quite a lot of rubbish in the dock in 1990, but in earlier years things were much worse. The post in ‘A London Inheritance’ quotes a court case from 1893 where it is described as “the common receptacle for the sewerage of part of Fore-street, and also being a harbour for a large portion of the animal refuse of the Thames.”
J R Wilson, Ship Stores, Limekiln Dock, Three Colt St, Limehouse, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-1b-26
J R Wilson, Ship Stores at Limehouse Wharf has a frontage on Narrow Street and its back faces Limekiln Dock. I think the area from which I took this and the other pictures is no longer open to the public, but gave access to the Thames Path before the footbridge across the dock was built. In the foreground is the white-painted flood wall which was built around the Thames in London in the 1970s. Together with the Thames Barrier this has protected London from the serious floods of earlier years, but with rising sea levels will soon become inadequate.
110, Three Colt St, Limehouse, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-1b-11
The late-Victorian buildings of the Dundee, Perth, and London Shipping Co were in 1990 in use by D D Repro Limited, ‘Plain Paper & Dyeline Specialists. Their board on the building depicts the rough outline of the Thames from Tower Bridge around the Isle of Dogs and on to Beckton.
The Enterprise, pub, Milligan St, 145, Three Colt St, Limehouse, Tower Hamlets, 1990, 90-1b-12
The sign on the pub shows a three-masted ship caught in ice. The ships on Sir John Franklin’s doomed 1845 search for the North-West Passage were last seen by the whaler ‘Enterprise’, and I think this picture may be a depiction of one of his two ships, which were abandoned after being ice-bound for over a year. It was a story that very much caught the Victorian imagination.
The pub is said to have closed in 1963, but was open again in 1990, It closed in 2001, the pub became an Indian restaurant but is now an estate agents with another floor added in recent years.
Still more to come from my Limehouse walk in 1990.
Diamonds, Peace & St George: St George’s Day, 23rd April, celebrates the death of this Cappadocian Greek soldier in the Roman Army martyred on this day in AD 303 for refusing to recant his Christian faith. We know little about his life, but can be sure that he never killed a dragon.
As I commented back in 2005, “St George keeps busy as a patron saint of Canada, Catalonia, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Lithuania, Malta, Palestine and Portugal, as well as a number of cities including Moscow and Venice, a whole raft of trades including farmers and soldiers, as well as herpes and syphilis. It’s perhaps surprising he still has time for England, although until recently you would hardly have noticed it in any case.“
It is also at least 23 other national days around the world, a few of which are related to the birth of Shakespeare who was most probably born on April 23, 1564. But I won’t be celebrating National Talk Like Shakespeare Day, World Table Tennis Day, National Cherry Cheesecake Day or any of the rest, though I suppose there is just an outside chance I might dabble with German Beer Day (though I’m more partial to British Bitter, increasingly a rare species, which has its day on June 15th.)
My day began with two protests against the selling of blood diamonds from Sierra Leone at leading London stores, before I went to Trafalgar Square to briefly visit the unimpressive St George’s Day event there. I ate my sandwiches in the Peace Garden at the Imperial War Museum before going to a St George’s Day procession in Southwark from St George’s Cathedral to the church of St George the Martyr, and finally went to a pub in Southwark with a couple of friends where I met and photographed two St Georges.
Sierra Leone Blood Diamonds at Selfridges – Oxford St
Octea mine diamonds in Sierra Leone, Tiffany sell them in Selfridges and children in Kono die
People from the Kono district of Sierra Leone protested at Selfridges on Oxford St as part of a global demonstration against the financial partnership of Tiffany & Co with Octea, the largest diamond mining company in Sierra Leone. They say people in Kono suffer and die because of Octea’s diamond mining.
Octea, wholly owned by Israeli billionaire, Benny Steinmetz is operated by former mercenaries and has been allowed to operate without a licence and tax free. The protesters say it’s operation defies all national and international legal norms and ethics.
Sierra Leone Blood Diamonds at Tiffanys – Sloane Square
From Selfridges the group went on to Tiffanys. Police told them they could not protest on the wide pavement there but must go across to protest in a pen set aside for them in the square opposite.
After some argument they did so, although there seemed to be no reason other than lessening the impact of the protest for the police to move them. Why UK police should take the side of Tiffany and support illegal diamond mining by Octea that defies all national and international legal norms and ethics is hard to understand.
St George was there and you could have your picture taken with a dragon and the square was filled with long tables where you could sit and eat food from the many stalls set up around the edges of the square.
Everyone got handed little St George’s flags, but there seemed to be little going on and little real atmosphere. Perhaps things might have picked up later in the day, but I didn’t feel like returning.
Instead I ate my sandwiches in the Samten Kyil (Garden of Contemplation) in Geraldine Mary Harmsworth Park commissioned by Tibet Foundation, designed by sculptor Hamish Horsley and opened by the Dalai Lama in 1999. A few yards from the Imperial War Museum it was conveniently just across the road from where my next event was to start.
St George in Southwark Procession – St George’s Cathedral to St George the Martyr
A procession for St George’s Day, led by St George, a Roman Emperor, the Mayor of Southwark and others and with a dragon at its rear made its way from the St George’s RC Cathedral to the Church of England St George the Martyr in Borough High Street. It was a part of ‘A Quest for Community’ with the aim of ‘Taming the dragon of difference’ and was followed by a play outside St George the Martyr telling the true story of St George, a Roman solider from Palestine who chose death rather than give up his Christian faith.
From right to left: St George, Emperor Diocletian, the priestess or haruspex and the emperor’s daughter
I’d not been inside this building before and we had an interesting tour of the building before the procession. Designed by Augustus Pugin it was gutted by incendiary bombing in 1942, left it with only walls and one chapel standing but was rebuilt to the same plan, finishing in 1958.
The route was an interesting one and along streets I had previously photographed – and went past the blue plaque where photographer Bert Hardy was born – and I was able to tell the Mayor something about one of Southwark’s more famous.
We arrived rather late at St George the Martyr and I had to leave shortly after the beginning of a play about St George being performed there by local children – possibly something of a relief.
Two of my photographer friends had been going to come to the St George procession, but had apparently been unable to find St George’s Cathedral. Instead we had arranged to meet afterwards at the King’s Arms, a traditional British pub just off Borough High Street.
Among those drinking there were not one but two St George’s and I photographed both of them, one with his fortunately rather friendly dragon.
Highgate – Mirrors, Mansions & Luxury Cars: My next photographic walk in 1989 was on Sunday 19th November, and began At Highgate Station on the Northern Line, from where long escalators took me up to Archway Road.
The picture is a double self-portrait with me appearing – if dimly – in two of the mirrors in a shop window with the message ‘IF YOU DO NOT SEE WHAT YOU REQUIRE IN THE WINDOW PLEASE ASK INSIDE. My Olympus OM4, held in my right hand (left in the mirrors) covers most of my face.
Mirrors have often featured in photographs and seem endemic in film, and in 1978 John Szakowski staged an exhibition of American photography since 1960 and a book, Mirrors and Windows exploring what he felt was the distinction between photographers whose work largely reflected their own subjective view and others who used photography as a window on the world. It is of course not a dichotomy and we all do both, though perhaps at different positions on the spectrum.
I wandered around a bit up and down Archway Road and can’t remember exactly where this shop was, but not far from the station. Eventually I turned south down Southwood Lane.
Southwood Mansions is an imposing late Victorian mansion block build in 1897 and although its entrance (one of a pair) looked rather down-at-heel in 1989, the large flats here now sell for well over a million pounds. This is a very desirable location, close both to the Underground station and to Highgate village.
Car Showroom, Highgate, Haringey, 1989 89-11e-42
I went back to Archway Road and wandered a little around the area, taking few pictures. This rather grand car showroom had some rather expensive cars – I was told they are 930 and 964 Porsches and would be worth a fortune now and the first advert that came up on Google lists them at £64,995 to £449,995. I can’t find this showroom now and think it has probably been demolished.
North Hill, Highgate, Haringey, 1989 89-11e-45
These houses are a part of a small estate on North Hill, Bramalea Close and Cross Crescent. They are among those featured on a walk along the street by the Highgate Society which states “Arguably no other road in London, Britain, Europe or, who knows, even the world compares with North Hill in terms of the diversity of its domestic architecture” though it gives rather little information about these. They were built between 1976 and 1982.
BMW, Garage, The Victoria, Pub, 28, North Hill, Highgate, Haringey, 1989 89-11e-46
More expensive cars at Highgate dealer Hexagon, founded by Paul Michaels in 1963. The company is still in business but this site has been demolished and replaced by housing.
The pub building is still there but closed in 2017 and planning permission was granted for the site to be developed with extra residential building but retaining the pub. Some think the developers are waiting until the pub is in such a poor condition they will be able to demolish it and develop the entire site. But so far it does not seem to have been treated to the usual fire started by persons unknown.
Houses, 53, North Hill, Highgate, Haringey, 1989 89-11e-31
Thes building are not mentioned in the Highgate Society walk on North Hill, though I did photograph some of the others. I found it interesting for the porch and the balcony above at 51 and the 1930s style windows of 53 to the right (since replaced) and the unusual fenestration of 53 and 55, clearly a later addition to 51.
Kingdom Hall, North Hill, Highgate, Haringey, 1989 89-11e-35
There is something very odd about these walls and steps that lead up to the door of the Kingdom Hall of Jehovah’s Witnesses at 33 North Hill, and it seems perverse in the era of accessible entrances. It was certainly not the straight gate of Matthew 7 verse 14. The The steps from the pavement now seem to have been levelled out and there is now I think step-free access to a lower level of the building.
Seven Sisters Road: on Sunday 1st October 1989 I took the Victoria Line tube to Finsbury Park (a couple of pictures here) and walked through the park to its most easterly corner, the junction between Green Lanes and Seven Sisters Road at Manor House.
Finsbury Park, The Manor House, Manor House, Haringey, Hackney, 1989 89-10a-53
A view from beside the wall to Finsbury Park by the gate. This area was know as Woodberry Down before the Manor House Tavern was first built here on 1830-4 at the crossroads with Green Lanes, a turnpike or toll road, after a 1829 Act of Parliament had allowed the building of Seven Sisters Road. Local builder Thomas Widdows had owned and lived in a cottage on the site and saw a business opportunity, though it is unclear why it was given the name Manor House – probably because it sounded posh.
It opened as a ‘public house and tea-gardens’ in 1834 and its first landlord advertised it, writing “The Grounds adjoining are admirably calculated for Cricket, Trap-ball, or any other amusement requiring space. There is likewise a large Garden and Bowling green, good Stabling, lock-up Coach-houses, &c. Dinners for Public and Private Parties.
The original pub was demolished in 1930 when the road was widened and the Piccadilly line Manor House station built here, and replaced by this attractive Flemish style building with just a hint of Art Deco. The pub and tube station led to the area becoming known as Manor House, with the name Woodberry Down being revived for the large post-war housing estate built a little to the east by the LCC from 1948-62.
You can learn more about its interesting history and varying clientele – including its time as a major Blues venue in the 1960s – in the Wikipedia article cited. The pub closed around 2000 and its ground floor became a supermarket in 2004.
Shops, Seven Sisters Rd, Finsbury Park, Islington, 1989 89-10a-42
Finsbury Park was a rather run-down area in 1989 and some friends were worried about my safety as I walked around the area carrying a bag full of expensive camera equipment, but I had no problems. People were friendly though sometimes clearly thought I was mad to be taking photographs of their streets and shops.
At left is KYPRIAKON KAFENEION, shown more clearly in my next picture. Between the shops are decorated pillars and above them rather odd decorated stone balls. I think the shops were probably added a few years later to the mid-Victorian houses behind.
Cypriot Social Club, Seven Sisters Rd, Finsbury Park, Islington, 1989 89-10a-43
You can still see this row of shops on Seven Sisters Road, in the parade between Yonge Park and Medina Road*, and I think this Cypriot cafe is now a dentists. In 1989 there were many Cypriot businesses in the area, but the area is now more diverse and has a large Muslim community. None of the businesses in my previous picture are still present.
* I have now decided that these shops are those at 218-230 Seven Sisters Road which can clearly be seen in a photograph I took later on this walk. They were very similar to those further down the street but have been more altered since 1989, and some demolished.
Sisters Gowns, a few yards down Coleridge Road was also clearly a Cypriot business, and one of many clothing manufacturers in the area, which has now become one of London’s most vibrant fashion areas, particularly around nearby Fonthill Road.
This doorway could still be seen iin a derelict building n 2008, but the whole corner site was demolished soon after, although the site was still empty in 2022.
Shop Interior, Seven Sisters Rd, Finsbury Park, Islington, 1989 89-10a-31
I think this busts and bodies were for wale along with other pieces of equipment for use in shop displays, but it looked to me like some kind of kinky torture chamber. Though shopping for clothes is often a torture, particularly when accompanying others who are looking for them. I’m not sure what the football is doing here.
Shops, Seven Sisters Rd, Finsbury Park, Islington, 1989 89-10a-32
An extremely motley assortment of buildings from different periods, including BANGS, established in 1907, but I think the frontage at least is from the 1930s.
Rather to my surprise, these buildings are still there, though the shops have changed and below BANGS rather than JANE CAST LTD is now a Tesco. Even the building at the right of the row which appeared in my photograph to have no visible support is still there as well as the pub surrounded by scaffolding have survived. The Eaglet, built in 1869, was apparently badly damaged by a Zeppelin in 1917 but recovered and is still open.
North London Drapery Store, Axminster Rd, Seven Sisters Rd, Holloway, Islington, 1989
Built in 1938 as North London Drapery Store this Art Deco store was damaged in the war. In 1989 it was used by a variety of businesses including London International College. It has recently been converted to provide 118 expensive flats, with shops on the ground floor.
According to ‘Streets With A Story‘, “Robert Enkel from 1830-49 owned property and occupied the nursery until 1834 when Cornelius Crastin and his family took over and continued as nurserymen until at least 1890. The street name disappears by 1975.” Enkel’s family came from Holland and his name was given to the street which dated from around 1875-6. As you can see the street name was actually still there in 1989.
There is still an Enkel Arms pub a few yards away on Seven Sisters Roadm but Enkel Street disappeared with the development of the Nags Head Shopping Centre in 1992. And there is a Nags Head Market indoors at 22 Seven Sisters Road, apparently since 1975.
More from my walk on Sunday September 3rd 1989 which had begun in Stratford, from which some images appeared in my web site and self-published book ‘1989’, ISBN: 978-1-909363-01-4, still available. For those images which were in the book I’ll show the book pages here.
Posters, High Rd, Leytonstone, Waltham Forest, 1989 89-9a-44Plough & Harrow, pub, 419, High Rd, Leytonstone, Waltham Forest, 1989 89-9a-45
London City Mission, Ferndale Rd, Leytonstone, Waltham Forest, 1989 89-9a-46
The Victoria County History records an incredible number of missions in Leytonstone mostly formed in the late nineteenth century when this area must have seemed particularly Godless. This mission in Ferndale Road began about 1895 “when the five children of Henry Borton, a builders’ merchant at Wanstead, began holding evangelistic services in the Assembly Rooms. In 1901 their father built for them the present hall in Ferndale Road, designed in brick and stone with baroque features by T. & W. Stone. “
In 1948 the last of these children working there invited the London City Mission to take charge of the building and it became their central Hall. Google Street view shows it in 2008 as Christ Apostolic Church but by 2018 it had become Gospel Generation, “A Church Like No Other“.
Hyams Gymnasium, 857 High Rd, Leyton, Waltham Forest, 1989 89-9a-32
I can find little or nothing on-line about Hyams Gynasioum other than my pictures, but the building is still there this side on Gainsborough Road with its entrance on High Rd, but in very different use.
This is now The Walnut Tree, a Wetherspoon pub, and as often it has some history of the area it its web page, but this does not mention Hyams Gym. The figures on the building’s side have gone and its groundfloor windows have been bricked up but the rows of 8 or 9 upper floor gym windows remain.
Leytonstone House has lost its Virginia creeper but otherwise looks much the same, though I think its surroundsings are now different.
Wikipedia states “Leytonstone House, built 1800 and Grade II-listed, was the home of Sir Edward Buxton, MP and conservationist, who with his brother played a big part in preserving Epping, Hainault and Hatfield forests. It housed Bethnal Green School for the juvenile poor from 1868 to 1936.”
Leyton Flats in Snaresbrook is not a tower block but a green space that is part of Epping Forest, largely open grass land but some woodland and two large ponds, Hollow Pond and Eagle Pond which is one of the oldest in the forest and swarms with swans, probably because many injured swans nursed to health by swan resuce organisations on the Thames have been released here. But people are more likely to be imprisoned as the Flats is also home to Snaresbrook Crown Court.
The house in the distance here is at 85, 85a and 87 Whipps Cross Rd, on the corner of Chadwick Road. Locally listed, The Gables was built in 1895 and was part of the Wallwood Park estate which was once the home of the Governor of the Bank of England William Cotton who died in 1845.
Men are fishing in the Hollow Pond on Leyton Flats, close to the Whipps Cross roundabout and Whipps Cross Hospital. The pond, the result of gravel workings, is also a boating lake. Water from the ponds may eventually find its way into the River Roding, but they have never as has been claimed fed the ornamental lakes of Wanstead Park.
