Dirty Old London  published by
Yale University Press (October 2014)

Wednesday 20 August 2014

Fitzrovia to Euston Station

Beginning in Bedford Square, I notice this grand Victorian edifice - I'd guess 1860s - on the corner of Bayley Street and Tottenham Court Road. What was it - answers below, if you know?




Rathbone place boasts what looks like a parish boundary marker, obscured by paint, but I'm not sure of the parishes, if so - anyone know?


This is a rather brilliant pub sign in 3D - note the projecting nose.


I tried to take this shot so it looked like the gaslight was photobombing its 20C cousin ...


Nearby, some decorative corbels again - this time with built-in pineapples ...


A parochial or borough bollard on Goodge Street. St Pancras?


Not a triumph of art, but nonetheless eminent figures of Fitzrovia, tower included, depicted on Goodge Place ...


Beautiful turret of the King and Queen public house, corner of Riding House Street ...


A pleasantly peculiar street name ...


The Post Office Tower remains, for all my love of things Victorian, perhaps my favourite London building ...


And here it is in close-up ...


Wondering when this pub sign might date from - 1930s-1950s?


Sorry; I just sniggered at the name. I am a bad person.


Various rather ominous-looking Greek Gods adorn a building in Bolsover Street ...


On the Hampstead Road, one of the few grand Victorian wrecks still in central London. Most have been converted into flats or offices or something - but this somehow malingers on - the LONDON TEMPERANCE HOSPITAL. So many things to photograph here ...















At the back of Euston Station, some rather attractive stairs


And a view of those Camden tower blocks which suggests a militarised zone ...


In the nearby park, formerly church burial ground, a Georgian memorial with some quirky biographical detail ...


On the old tube station, closed, opposite Euston, the sinuous ?1970s? letters above an abandoned advertising hoarding ...


Meanwhile, this shrieks 1980s to me ...


Whilst George Stephenson, relocated from the 19C, looks on in dismay ...


And finally a memorial to the largely forgotten 'Silver Jubilee Walkway' whose silver plaques still dot the South Bank (and perhaps a few other places) ...



Wednesday 13 August 2014

Covent Garden to Soho

Beginning in Sheffield Street, opposite the LSE's new student services building, there's a pleasing granularity to the dissolution of Hepburn & Cocks (box makers) ...


Across Kingsway, the crazily circular geometry of Wild Street modernity looms over the Edwardiana around it ...


Something quite pleasing about this corner on Kemble Street ...


The Theatre Royal's neon sign somehow looks rather shoddy and bare in the daylight ...


Nice use of tiling to name these blocks of flats ...


And a sign harking back to when 'hawkers' and 'traders' had bells ... can't have been many of them, these buildings are not *that* old ... the rag and bone man, perhaps?


I have no idea why the Church of Scotland should maintain a 'crown court' in London ... 
[oops, hang on, the street is called Crown Court]


The spirit of the Great Exhibition lives on in the former flower market, now Floral Hall of the Opera House on Bow Street ...


The famous magistrate's court remains, however, disused ...


The White Lion on Floral Street has some spiky rooftop defences ...


The market roof (a Victorian addition) catches the sun quite nicely ...


Meanwhile, the silver-costume statue man prepares for his day ...


No shortage of tourists ...


Some antique-looking electronics built into these reformed gas lights (I assume now electric ... hard to tell in daylight) ...


Odd design  for a warning notice, particularly the nice pic of the Church ... which is literally just behind it ...


I doubt Bedfordbury has any 'general builders' these days, although I may be wrong ...


A rather grumpy chap stuck in 1894 on New Row ...


Leicester Square is an ancient part of London but there's not much great architecture left there ... here's a few nice details on the rooftops ...


And there's the frankly eerie sculpture celebrating London's (meagre?) connections with Switzerland, which includes this ...


Lights off Oxendon Street ...


A sundial from the 1600s bolted onto an early 20C building ...


This is very rare ... semi-circular crown ?holders? on front step railings ... for putting something in, perhaps, but what? Lamps? 


I always like to see street numbering tackling in new ways ...


This naked lady soars above the Haymarket with a couple of similar friends. Tacky, yes, but also remarkable in the way it catches the light, and shines against different coloured skies. I actually quite like it ...


Like the cockroach, the Aberdeen Angus steakhouse will survive when all the rest of London is levelled to the ground ...


A dull-looking neglected bit of ironwork at the Trocadero ...


No idea why this lurks next to the Raymond Revue Bar in Soho ... spooky ...


St. Anne's church, Wardour Street, boasts a fountain from the late-Victorian Metropolitan Public Gardens Association ...


And opposite, grating musical ...


A decaying bike lock on Winnett Street has a certain appeal ...


Whilst above the strip club in Tisbury Court is a Rely-a-Bell ...


A reminder of how difficult it is to actually draw a car, on Archer Street ...


Brewer Street mixes Dry Cleaning with Manga ...


This was once a rather damaged Victorian street sign (see http://t.co/mBS3be9KVc)


Westminster signs always seem to acquire an appealing penumbra of filth/erosion around their edges ...


The Champion Pub on Eastcastle Street has some great stained-glass windows - I'm guessing 1920/30s, but could be earlier ... anyone know?


And finally, wandering through Fitzrovia, spotting a dragon in Cleveland Street ...