May 15th, 2008
The Museum of London has just opened a new exhibition on Jack the Ripper and the East End.
Rather than trying to solve the problem of just who the Ripper was - Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence, Lewis Carroll, Queen Victoria’s surgeon Sir William Withey Gull, Walter Sickert - the exhibition looks at the human stories behind the legacy of myths.
You feel suddenly very close to Jack the Ripper when you hear recordings of people who grew up in the East End at the time talking about their experiences.
Meticulous maps show you the slum maze of alleyways with their doss houses and tenements. But as a journalist, I personally find one of the most intriguing features of the exhibition the way it shows that the media set the agenda - but were also caught up in a frenzy trying to get the latest scoop, the latest titbit of information or speculation. You might think such media madness is a modern invention - it’s anything but!
We will probably never know who the Ripper really was. But he’s become an icon of London - one of our most famous former inhabitatants. And he did, in the end, do some good. So shocked was Victorian society by the appalling standards of living in the slums of the East End, that there was a philanthropic drive towards clearing the slums and providing decent houses for the working classes.
Go and set the Ripper in his context, and you’ll understand Victorian London. Then wander back from Docklands through Whitechapel and Brick Lane, and you’ll see poverty hasn’t entirely gone away… the city still has its dark side.
Where: The Museum in Docklands, West India Quay
When: 10-6 daily
How much: £7 adults, £5 concessions and under 16s
Photo credit: Ben Scicluna on Flickr
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By Andrea -- 0 comments
May 14th, 2008
This is Norton Folgate looking into the City. It’s all po-mo stuff, the Gherkin, Broadgate on the right with its huge steel and glass blocks.
But if you look the other way, the view changes. Small Victorian houses, little shops, some fantastic old pubs with those old style decorated frontages, all curlicues and pinnacles.
It’s a step back into the old days. And it’s a view that’s going to disappear if the developers get their way.
Naturally, there’s a residents’ group opposing the plans. So far, it’s a typical story of developers versus residents, new building versus history.
But there’s a surreal twist. The residents have discovered that Norton Folgate - that little strip of road between Bishopsgate and Shoreditch - has separate legal status. Or had, anyway - according to an ancient document.
So they’re preparing to declare independence.
It really makes you wonder how far they can go. Road blocks? Passport controls? Of course they would fail Frank Zappa’s criterion for a country, that it must have a beer and an airline. There’s room to install a microbrewery in Norton Folgate - but nowhere to land even a microlight! (Except the road itself, of course…)
Now this idea of local independence is a very British thing. Any fans of old film will probably know Passport to Pimlico, an Ealing Comedy in which the south-west London district declares its independence after finding an ancient charter, and even manages to stop an underground train at the border. Then there’s the Principality of Sea-Land, an WWII sea fortress off the Suffolk coast - still unrecognised by the UN, though. And there was always the People’s Republic of Tooting in the great comedy Citizen Smith.
I suspect it’s a very British sort of bolshieness. French eco-campaigner José Bové ran for President of the Republic. Over here, he’d be establishing the Green Republic of Cold Christmas*, and making himself president of that, instead.
Anyway, I’ll be following the saga with some interest!
Photo credit - Chris Eason, on Flickr
* Cold Christmas exists. It’s in Hertfordshire.
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By Andrea -- 0 comments
May 14th, 2008
This is a lovely shop to visit. And it’s not just a shop - it’s a working studio as well.
Lots of space, lots of light, no clutter, make you think ‘minimalism’ at first. But the lushness of the floral patterns on the bags, the flower-printed screen, and the curvy lines of the chaise longue give the environment a sense of drama. (And if you like the furniture, you can buy it - Susannah’s launched her own furniture line.)
I don’t like flower prints. I don’t like tea dresses. I don’t like that kind of ‘English rose’ femininity which is all about restraint, and repression, and chintz.
And thank goodness Susannah Hunter’s floral designs aren’t like that at all!
Her handbags feature lovely strong flowers, picked out in appliqued coloured leather. As a craftsperson I’m amazed by how much work goes into these lovely bags. And the colourways are really strong - there’s a lovely bag with white flowers and several different greens on a bluey-gray background, and there’s a fantastic tangerine bag with pink roses. Vivid colours and imaginative designs.
Alas, these bags come in far above my budget - though I probably could just manage to afford one of the £190 clutch bags. But I can go and look.
Where: 7 Rugby Street.
When: Mon-Fri 10-6, Sat 12-4.
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By Andrea -- 0 comments
May 13th, 2008
I first became aware of Ottolenghi because of Yotam Ottolenghi’s vegetarian recipes on the Guardian website. With a traditional Mediterranean feel, but a modern twist, they attracted my attention - and I did manage to make a couple quite successfully.
Then I found out there was an Ottolenghi restaurant in Islington. A chance to try the recipes as they are meant to be cooked - and also to try the non-vegetarian stuff.
The menu is very interesting. From Asian style dishes like seared tuna wrapped in nori seaweed, though to marinated lamb in a Mediterranean style, there wasn’t anything I wouldn’t gladly have tried. Ottolenghi is not afraid of spices, either - when a dish is meant to be garlicky, it really does taste of garlic - that typically English retience with any spice or herb you might actually notice was not at all in evidence here, thank goodness. Caramelised onion (something I just can’t ever get right at home) makes some of the dishes really special.
However, I wouldn’t make this restaurant a regular hangout. If you look at where Ottolenghi has opened shops and restaurants, it’s uniformly in very well heeled areas. I don’t mean aspirational - I mean places where the average house costs a number of millions, not just a million! Notting Hill, Belgravia, Kensington are not frugality central.
And Ottolenghi’s prices are rather steep. Besides, the portions are really rather small.
But you don’t have to splash out on a meal. Because you can buy some superb cakes and pastries from the extremely appetising window display. And I certainly will consider doing that again - though it may play havoc with my diet.
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By Andrea -- 0 comments
May 11th, 2008
The British Museum, the V&A, the Natural History Museum - London is stuffed with big, impressive museums.
But it’s sometimes the quirky little museums that are more fun to visit. No queues, no throngs of tourists on a schedule, and a chance to see some very unusual things.
I like the Fan Museum in Greenwich. As far as I know, it’s unique. No other museum in the world is devoted purely and simply to fans. It was set up by the Worshipful Company of Fan Makers and occupies one of the fine Georgian houses just off Crooms Hill - an elegant and refined home for an elegant art.
Here you can see royal fans, fans with a history. Lace fans as delicate as cobwebs. Chinoiserie fans and real Chinese fans. You can see how fans were made. If you like intricate and delicate crafts, if you’re interested in the decorative arts, it’s a great place to go and pick up ideas.
One recently acquired fan was painted by Sickert and it’s a real piece of history, showing the entertainer Little Dot Hetherington singing in a Victorian music hall. We sometimes forget how painters in England sought out the music hall the way Degas or Toulouse Lautrec sought out the ballet and cabaret as a subject for their pictures. An entire world captured on a tiny fabric lunette.
There are even fan-making workshops on the first Saturday of each month. Family fun perhaps, but not for the real youngsters - children need to be over 12.
Go on Tuesday or Sunday and you can have afternoon tea in the museum as well.
Where: 12 Crooms Hill, Greenwich SE10
When: Tuesday to Saturday 11-5, Sunday 12-5
Admission: £4
Photo credit: Roman Guy, on Flickr
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By Andrea -- 1 comment
May 10th, 2008
I must admit I’ve never been that turned on by Harry Potter. I was brought up on Ursula Le Guin’s Earthsea trilogy, with a much smarter, much more interesting wizard, Ged, or ‘Sparrowhawk’. Yes, I did read the Harry Potter books- but I was soon back in Earthsea.
Still, there’s no denying that Harry Potter has a huge fan club. The other day I was going through King’s Cross Station and saw a load of people photographing a wall. Then I saw the sign they were photographing - platform 9 3/4, the platform from which Harry takes the Hogwarts Express.
You can now take a tour of Harry Potter’s London with London Taxi Tours. I can imagine this is something that will make a lot of kids happy. All the film locations are pointed out - though not all can be visited. The same outfit also does tours to other Harry Potter locations in the UK, at Oxford and Lacock.
The tours don’t come cheap, at £190 for up to five people sharing a taxi. But you do get 3 1/2 hours for that - and no hassle trying to find the sites or struggling on public transport.
There’s also a guide to the film sites on London Taxi Tours’ web site, if you want to try discovering London’s wizard wonders on your own.
Photo credit: Ann Biddle on Flickr
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By Andrea -- 0 comments
May 9th, 2008
If you’re from out of town, London is one of the most expensive capitals I know for public transport. A tube ticket now costs £4 even if you’re just going two stops. (By comparison, in Paris, I pay EUR 1.80 for any trip on the metro.)
The way round this is to get yourself an Oyster Card. You can get one at most tube stations and national railway stations. You need to fund it with £3, at least (Oysters can store up to £90), and you can top it up over the internet or at a station. (If you’re living in London for a while you can also use the Oyster to load up your season ticket.)
When you’re using the Oyster Card your fares will be cheaper - £1.50 instead of £4 for the tube in Zone 1. The system also keeps a running total of how much you use a day, and if you would have been better off buying a one day travelcard, at that point it will stop charging you for your journeys. So you are guaranteed to do better with the Oyster.
You do need to remember to “touch in” and “touch out” at each end of your journey. But apart from that, using your Oyster is pretty easy.
The Oyster Card also gives you access to some useful discounts on visitor attractions and shows, such as a 2 for 1 offer at Monty Python’s Spamalot, 25% off the bill at some restaurants, and even a 2 for 1 offer on the Fullers Brewery Tour. Check these out at Oyster Offers.
Photo credit: Max Warren on Flickr
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By Andrea -- 2 comments
May 9th, 2008
After all the excitement, the mudslinging, the namecalling and the voting, London has a new mayor. Ken Livingstone, for so long the public face of the city, has gone; Boris Johnson is now running the city.
With a major shift, from a secure Labour hold to a Conservative win, you might think it’s going to be all change. But I’m not so sure. It looks like normal service will be resumed.
- ‘Red Ken’ was renowned for being a maverick and an independent spirit. He was often on the outs with his own party and he was never a diplomatic type; if he could open his mouth wide enough to put his foot in it, he would. Oh, and he kept newts. Boris Johnson is exactly the same kind of guy - Conservative Party leader David Cameron is apparently rather worried about what Boris is going to get up to, fearing it might cost him the next election. So in terms of buffoonery and faux pas, nothing’s changed - we should get a lot of fun out of Boris.
- Public transport remains an ideological battleground. Boris wants to get rid of Ken’s bendy buses and bring back the Routemaster, or the “new Routemaster”. He doesn’t seem to be clear how much that will cost, though. Strangely, at no point during the campaign did I see the price of public transport mentioned. London is now one of the most expensive cities in the world for the out-of-town traveler (buy an Oyster Card to cut down on this). So, no real change here, either.
- The thing I personally found most disappointing about the whole campaign is that despite the apparent ideological and personal differences between Boris and Ken, neither of them really articulated an idea of what kind of city they wanted London to be. Or if they did, it didn’t come through to me. The whole campaign seems to have been fought on tiny issues, bit by bit, with no real ideas behind it.
I’ve been underwhelmed by Boris’s first two great ideas. Number one, tell the police to work harder. Number two, ban alcohol on public transport. Nice headlines - but I don’t know what it will actually do to improve life in London. Unless you ban people from drinking alcohol before they get on public transport, you’re still going to get drunks on the tube at 1130 in the evening. Or is Boris going to insist you take a breathalyser test before getting on the bus?
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By Andrea -- 0 comments
May 7th, 2008
I need to apologise straight away to our North American readers. I am, I suppose, a Norfolk Broad - born and bred a Norfolk girl.
But what we call ‘the Broads‘ you would call lakes, rivers, reedbeds. These expanses of water were made by medieval monks digging out peat in the low lying landscape, to use as fuel. When the peat diggings filled with water - hey presto, Norfolk Broads.
Now, Norfolk is not an easy day trip from London. Norwich, the county capital, is less than two hours from London by train, but to get to the Broads you’ll need to take further transport to Wroxham, Acle, Reedham or Yarmouth. And even then, many of the Broads are hidden unless you have your own transport - or walk.
This Bank Holiday weekend I chose to walk from Great Yarmouth to Norwich along the Wherryman’s Way. It’s a terrific walk - all the varieties of local landscape in one big hike of about 35 miles. Take two days over it, staying somewhere like Loddon, a charming markt town, and you’ll have the next best thing to a detox.
- Big skies - this is for the most part flat landscape, with mud flats, reed beds, huge views. The cloudscapes can be tremendous; sunrise and sunset sometimes melancholy, sometimes lurid.
- Green lanes - in the hillier, gentle landscape near Loddon, you’ll pass green lanes with fine ancient trees and hedges on both sides. One of the woods was full of bluebells, reflecting a blue haze under the trees.
- Ancient churches - the church at Heckingham goes all the way back to the Normans; a simple, peaceful whitewashed interior and a thatched roof give it a rural charm you’ll not find everywhere, and it’s usually open.
- Wildlife - a Muntjac deer bounded away from me as I passed a wood at twilight. A heron on a fence post regarded me sullenly before lazily flapping away across the river. You’ll hear birdsong everywhere - plaintive waterbirds’ cries or the chatter of wood birds.
- Pubs. One of the best, the Berney Arms, is the most remote pub on the walk - out in the middle of nowhere, though it does have its own railway station! Try Humpty Dumpty Brewery’s Golden Gorse or Little Sharpie. Many other real ale pubs line the route.
- Flat walking! Okay, if you’re looking for mountains this is not for you. But if you’re getting into training, or want to get fit without busting your hamstrings, it’s a great path to start out on.
I’d highly recommend the Broads as a weekend visit from London. There really is nowhere else quite like this landscape. Even though it was a bank holiday, I didn’t see all that many people on my way - many of the backroads were quite deserted - and although you’re never more than half an hour from a village, the countryside often felt incredibly remote and still.
Photo credit: Russell Smith on Flickr
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By Andrea -- 0 comments
May 6th, 2008
18th May will see the Shoot London event taking over Tate Modern for the day.
Shoot Experience runs photographic treasure hunts around London (and in other UK locations, like Liverpool). This one’s booked out already, though you could book yourself and friends on Shoot London Lite. You’ll follow clues around the South Bank to find ten sites, and take photographs. Teams need to be between two and four people - the more the merrier since the ticket price of £22 is per team, not per person.
And in September, Shoot Shoreditch will be back for the fourth year in a row - followed by Shoot Spitalfields. A chance for photographers to get creative in these edgy East End locations.
While photography is of course an interest you can pursue on your own, I know that often, I benefit from being with other photographers. You can see what turns them on - sometimes they have a completely different vision of the place from yours. It’s the different ways of seeing, rather than technical tips, that I really value whenever I go on a shoot like this.
And of course the competitive element is fun too. After the shoot, Shoot Experience prints out and exhibits the best photos - so you get a chance to see your work on the wall. That’s always gratifying, though it can be frustrating if your photos don’t stand out from the crowd. Still, that’s valuable feedback for next time!
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By Andrea -- 2 comments
