A Walk in London 20 Years Ago; On June 28th 2004 I had an important meeting at one on London’s major cultural institutions. It was a fine day, so I took an early train and then wandered towards the meeting taking pictures.
My walk began at London Bridge Station and I walked towards the River Thames through ‘More London’ a large area to the south-west of Tower Bridge owned and redeveloped by the Kuwaiti sovereign wealth fund’s St Martins Property Group with buildings designed by Foster and Partners architects.
In 2004 this was a recent development and in 2007 it was one of six on the shortlist for the Carbuncle Cup architecture prize, an annual competition by Building Design for “the ugliest building in the United Kingdom completed in the last 12 months“. But it, two other new London developments as well as a Holiday Inn in Aberdeenshire and a high-rise residential tower in Birmingham all lost out to student accomodatiion for Leicester University.
I walked across Tower Bridge and continued into the East End, taking another picture of the Grade II* listed Wilton’s Music Hall entrance in Grace’s Row. In 2004 this was beginning to once again produce a varied range of shows and was internally considerably restored from 2012-5, though I think the doorway still looks much the same.
The music hall was largely destroyed by fire in 1877, but rebuilt and opened as a Methodist mission, The Mahogany Bar. This was an important resource for the local community until it closed in 1956. The building was saved from demolition by a determined campaign supported by Sir John Betjeman, Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan and others and in 1971 was given Grade II* listing and bought by the GLC.
In Dock St, Wapping I photographed the window of a fish and chip shop, The Codfather. I think this is now an estate agents, although there are many other Codfathers around the country.
Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772), Swedish inventor, thinker, scientist and mystic lived in this area – then Prince’s Square – and was buried in the churchyard of the Swedish Church here. He had stayed in London for 4 years as a young man and returned here aged 57 where he had a vision of meeting the Lord who appointed him to write to reveal the spiritual meaning of the Bible. He abandoned his other work and over the next ten years wrote his 8 volumes of Arcana Cœlestia.
From 1747 until his death he spent his time in Stockholm, the Netherlands and London, publishing this and another 14 spiritual works in the latter two to avoid censorship by the Swedish Empire. He returned for the last time to London in the Summer of 1771 and suffered a stroke in December. In February 1772 he wrote asking John Wesley to visit him, and when Wesley replied he could not do so for six months he told him that would be too late as he was going to die on March 29th. And he did.
New Road took me north.
Tower House at 81 Fieldgate Street was a superior doss house which provided those staying there with decency and privacy. Jack London stayed there soon after its opening, in 1902 when researching his ‘People of the Abyss‘ and Maxim Litvinov and Joseph Stalin spent some time there when attendeing The London Congress of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party – but Stalin soon moved out into private lodgings at 77 Jubilee Road.
It was the fifth of the Rowton Houses to be built in London as “poor men’s hotels” and opened in 1902. It was the first to be lit by electricity. George Orwell described it as the ‘best of all common lodging houses with excellent bathrooms’, though he found some of its rules irksome, particularly that you could not enter your room before 7pm.
Renamed Tower House in 1961 it was acquired by the GLC for Tower Hamlets Council in 1983. Various schemes to adapt in fell though and it was still derelict in 2004. A private developer converted it into luxury flats in 2005-8.
The time for my meeting was approaching and I was having to hurry back into the City, and took only a few more pictures though rather more than I put online back in 2004. This view is of the Alban Highwalk leading off south from Alban Gate, and the tower of St Alban Wood Street as well as the City of London Police building clearly visible.
I think my meeting went well, but a couple of years later I had a great disappointment when the project was cancelled at the last minute.
There are just a few more pictures at More London and more.
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