Take a tour and find out about the development plans for the Earls Court exhibition site

Playing catch-up again... I've just rediscovered the photos I took back in mid-February when I attended a tour of the Earl's Court site. I had booked the ticket back in Summer 2024. The tour starts at The Earls Court Development Company's offices at the end of Empress Place here, where information is freely available to anyone who wanders in.

On the day of the tour the weather was dull and overcast which I found quite apt seeing as I find it so sad that Howard Crane's truly unique Art Deco era exhibition hall was demolished before a definite plan was agreed about what was to replace it. 

This is the header pic from my Deco Demolished presentation that I was hosted through Lockdown and still continue to deliver as an in-person talk for history associations and the like*

But this the wide-open space that exists there now:

The tour is really good – the people leading it are the actual people working on the project and, as such, they can answer lots of questions about what's planned, the existing and new buildings, and how the area will be regenerated. 

The next few pics clearly show how vast the site is. The information boards are really helpful.

I left the site feeling less anxious about the future of this huge development, though it's going to be decades before it is anywhere near finished and many more before it feels established. As per Canary Wharf, I wonder if it will be just a live/work zone that's busy Mon-Fri and dead at the weekends. There will be shops and entertainment facilities etc but, as I have noticed at Battersea, there's barely anyone there most of the time. It's a tall order. Also, will the people who live in the surrounding streets of Fulham and Hamersmith make use of this new environment and how will that impact on the gg-to zones we have already, such as Westfield at ShepBush, Hammersmith and, don't froget, the new re-development currently taking shape at Olympia..?

The scale of how this Earls Court site will look is hard to imagine when you are looking at a wide open space – so, what is it actually going to look like? Well – part of the tour is a visit to a space within the old Met Police office that houses a scale model showing how a good percentage of the new build is being designed to echo the style of existing buildings in the area, and that the street pattern will not be a simple grid. 

The model is fab and it's a shame that this facility is only accessible when on a tour. I suggested that it ought to be open to the public perhaps one morning a week. However, I understand that they will open the facility for group visits on request.

I do think they've missed a trick as regards pulling in little more of the natural environment, specifically a hint to Counters Creek, the river that once ran through here, later replaced by a canal and then filled in to create the Overground line all the way to Chelsea Harbour as Chelsea Creek. Surely a raised rill or similar could have been installed above the tracks below...?

Also in this zone –  the houses on the right/East side of Empress Place are currently home to a variety of talented artists as Empress Studios with open days one weekend  a month

Book your own tour of the Earls Court site here

* This talk comprises over 60 slides, mostly my own photos, of this site and other interwar gems such as The Firestone Building, The Gainsborough, the ABC bakery and The Essoldo cinema on Bethnal Green.  The pic is an adapted uncredited illustration that I found in an old guide book of London.  

Telegraph Place and Tokenhouse Yard

Hearing Telegram Sam by Marc Bolan on the radio yesterday, it reminded that I'd taken a series of photos in and around Telegraph Place almost a year ago whilst wandering in the City of London.

These narrow little streets are accessed via Moorgate as in the pics above, or via Throgmorton Street, and they are full of architectural delights:

A hydraulic power access point outside The Telegraph public house – this might have been for the beer pumps. Further along a teeny tiny access point for the sewers. I've not seen one of these anywhere else so I am keen to know the purpose of it. Perhaps it was manually released for temporary ventilation..?

The street is so named because this is where London's first telegraph office was sited on 1845when it was originally called Founders Court (hmm ponder ponder, suggest the land is owned by the Founders Livery Co). More telegraph and telegram references here. 

The barbershop at the looks good but, until a few years ago there was a marvellous multi-layered hand-painted sign on the mirror within its Whalebone Court entrance. It's such a shame that they saw fit to scrape off all those layers of history. As you can from my 2013 photo, the letterform was a delight. It advertised a few earlier companies here including a manicule pointing down to the chiropodist below. The blue script possibly says 'hairdressers' but might have been 'shirtdressers' where you could get your collars and cuffs replaced.

Near the barbershop, two groups of stepped windows above allow light onto a stairwell, and below them an alley beneath that building leads into Tokenhouse Yard:

There are a couple of elaborate doorways in this enclosed and evocative space and both are entrances to the old GII* listed 1872 bank building – some impressive lions flank the entrance to No.12 and a similar doorway at No.11 sports a couple of fearsome fellas. I've found some pics of the interior.

Tokenhouse Yard was where the exchanging of [small value] tokens took place. Read more about the history of this thoroughfare c/o IanVisits here – I love it when someone else has done all the homework!

Farringdon station – why no escalator from the Thameslink platforms?

This is the southbound Thameslink platform at Farringdon. It's huge. To get to street level you are required either climb these stairs, or the others at the far end, or take one of the two lifts between them. Hmmm.  

What's the good reason for not installing a moving staircase here?

Pre-2012 the area opposite the Farringdon Metropolitan Line tube station entrance looked like this retrospective Google streetview – an elegant 1920's building echoing the style of the station opposite designed by Charles Walter Clark which also served the Thameslink routes. 

Then the Elizabeth Line came to town and a swanky new box was created with an enormous concourse to delineate the train services on one side of the street and the tube services on the other.

Within this vast bland cavern they installed escalators for the Elizabeth Line, but not for the Thameslink platforms – why? 

My friend, who often works nearby suffers from claustrophobia and she hates this station if she is carrying luggage. If she arrives with a colleague they can take her bags in the lift whilst she climbs the stairs, but if she's travelling alone she has to rely on the kindness of strangers or lug the stuff up step by exhausting step. 

Read what I think about the Elizabeth Line's shoddy design here.

Clerkenwell Design Week 2025 – let there be lights and

CDW – what's not to like?!  I keep telling people that this design festival is not just for people in the industry as there is so much to learn about innovations in flooring, upholstery, lighting, soundproofing, sanitary ware and more. If you are ever thinking of doing some home improvements this 3-day event is pack full of ideas.

Last Wednesday 21st I reached Clerkenwell shortly after midday and, after collecting my badge and lanyard from the booth outside Farringdon stsion, I headed at first to The Charterhouse, keen to see how this collection of historic buildings was being used.

The inner quadrangle contains some lovely ventilation made with layered roof tiles. 

Most of the exhibitors here were offering sanitaryware and other bathroom fittings and I was amused at the juxtaposition between that and the centures-old painting that looked down on them, including Sir Richard Sutton and his dog:

I went out into the gardens outside to admire Alex Chinnecks' A Week At The Knees – undulating brick façade, possibly the most recognisable and most photographed artwork here this year. Incidentally, Charterhouse is an English corruption/mis-pronunciation of Chartreuse which is where the Carthusian monks came from. 

At the junction of Goswell Road I noticed that The Hat & Feathers pub has been renovated. It has reopened for business this week. This reminds me that approx two years ago the gilded signage around the building had been removed revealing the name of a completely different type of business – I will endeavour to dig out the many pics I took of that. At the St john Street junction of Clerkenwell Rd there is a marvellous scale model (I think it was in the windows of Solus):

This echoes Jool's Holland's own model railway complex as used in the opening credits of Later on BBCTV and the marvellous scale models at Kings Cross Model Railway Club which I visited earlier this year but don't appear to have shared on Jane's London yet – that's another thing that's slipped through the net! As they say, 'life gets in the way' – when I find a parallel universe I will attend to my bulging To Do folder.

Lunchtime – to the showroom of Actiu International in Seward Street to see my friend Thomas who works there. I took the opportunity to partake of the food and drink on offer whilst I read their literature, and discovered that Actiu was one of the first companies to design specific office furniture, something that I think they should boast about rather than bury within their literature. I watched as people were clearly enjoying their outdoors-inside pod clad in eco plants.

The next two pics are simply a bit of compare and contrast – 1950's architecture on Old Street and tutti-frutti style surfaces in Cesar Ceramics on Gt Sutton Street...

... where branded bright pink tables lined the Street. The ventilation tile within the elegant exterior is one of many on what was built as Pollards shopfitters HQ on St John Street. 

Above, bottom left is within Wagstaff in Brewery Yard where I learned about sustainable fabrics, recycled plastics, natural textiles, Italian design and more. The chandeliers were within the old prison cells which, as per previous CDWs, is used to showcase light fittings. Here I enjoyed some interactive pieces courtesy of PixelArtworks – these next two pics are of me, you can make out my eyes and then see my arms. Great fun!

It was here I got talking to another attendee and we then visited a few other places together, including views from the roof of The Sessions House and a couple of church crypts, where the range of products and innovations, such as recycled floor coverings and sustainable yarns was almost too much to absorb.

We weren't the only people to find this pale pink vase rather amusing. I have paired it with a paint splattered wall that I saw in St John Street. Keeping to the phallic theme, near Cowcross Street there are what I think are repurposed cannons as bollards. Three of them are marked 'St Sepulchre Midd' which is the church on Holborn Viaduct (there are often free concerts), the parish then being in what was then Middlesex (c.1820s). 

I ended my day at EH Smith where I went to collect a brick that I will decorate and return by the end of June. You can do this too – just pop in ad pick up a brick yourself. The bricks come supplied in a neat fitted cardboard carrier. Here's my effort from 2023 which got through to the final but I didn't win the big prize to Venice – again, I really thought I'd written about this on here, but nope. You can see me on the extreme left of this pic and the awards evening. 

I stayed there until almost 10pm quaffing wine and chatting. Thanks EH Smith – an excellent end to an inspiring day!

Day 2 –  I hadn't planned to see more but, with a few free hours after a meeting in Smithfield, it seemed daft not to... 

Most of my time was spent around the junction of St John Street and Clerkenwell Rd. I popped into Ascot to learn about way marking and signage and then, as I was walking along Albermarle Way, I spotted a huge multi-tiled dome inside Jung's window so I popped in to investigate:

 

The dome is made up from 100s of light and control switches - there was a competition to guess how many tiles, but I didn't bother. A wonderful surprise is walking round to the other side of the sphere to see that is has a fabulous concave mirrored interior. I also liked all the coloured switches (see below) and the pun-tastic stickers. Oh, and the music playing in this space was all based on the the phrases and slogans on those stickers. An absolute delight and possibly my favourite showroom at the CDW2025. Lots of good chats.

Sophie suggested I visit Toto round the corner where she'd said a product was a bit over the top. Ah yes - the famous Japanese automated toilets. I watched incredulously as they demonstrated the nozzle jets, lights and flushing system activated by a hand-held remote control. Weird! Give me a dock leaf any day!  

I returned to Sophie for a debrief and more chats and a beer and a bit of bad singing and then continued along the street. But I didn't get far because nest door a man offered me a pulled pork bun outside Magscapes and this in turn led to a conversation with the owner/inventor Jerry about Clerkenwell Showrooms and so much more and the next thing I knew he was leading me up to the flat roof at the rear of the building to give me a better view of the three Ancient Lights signs that overlook the church gardens below. I'll be staying in touch with Jerry – he's given me a few ideas – watch this space.

I'll stop now!

Here's my experience of CDW2023 – I didn't write it up last year – good grief, I am sounding like a cracked record!

A walk from Ealing Broadway to Acton Central

Last Tuesday I met my friend Sue for a wander in West London. We met outside Ealing Broadway station and, before we set off along the Uxbridge Rd towards central London, I wanted to show her a lovely shop I had discovered a while ago when I was out on one of my 'where does this bus go to' mystery routes. Just north of the station, facing Haven Green, passing a sign for squash courts that sits above an earlier hand-painted sign for squash courts, there is a beautiful old chemist's shop: 

36 The Broadway still bears the name of D. L. Lewis set in metal across the granite front and within a panel in the entrance way. There is also a more recent neon sign within the window.

The sinuous letterbox is also lovely, as are the flourishy figures used for the door numbers at either side of the entrance. It all screams fin-de-siecle Art Nouveau.

When I had been there last year, the shop had been closed and I could only peer in through the plate glass, but this time it was possible to go inside – and what a treat!

Much of the front part of the shop is original as regards the shelving, storage and display areas. The floor has been cleverly covered in a herringbone wood effect lino and this continues to the rear section where a faux panelled ceiling is also in place, no doubt evoking what used to be there in the 1900s. The shelves showcase many old bottles that once contained all sorts of poisons and potions no longer available to us, and I particularly like the huge blue and green droplet-shaped bottles.

We walked back past the station and found another shop of particular note – Paddy Power's betting shop at 7 The Mall is absolutely gorgeous and clearly dates from the same era as the chemist's shop:

It's sublime – the central threshold contains a terrazzo 5-pointed star motif flanked by carved and bent wood and curved glass, with a mirror'd ceiling in six sections that I have tried my best to photograph without being the star attraction myself. 

However, many of the other shops further along the terrace are empty and in a poor state of repair such as these four here and I am concerned about their future. Many of the coal hole cover plates along this stretch bear the name of White & Son of Oxford Street which dates them to the late 1880s – read more within here.

We crossed the road walked towards Ealing Common where, on the northern edge, there is a marker telling us we are 6 miles from London (Charing Cross) and 9 miles from Uxbridge.

I wrote about a similar metal mile marker here. This Ealing one dating from 1832 appears to have lost a motif in the top section.

We continued across the common, admired the handsome trees, had a half of ale in the garden of The Grange public house, investigated the exterior of the nearby church and pondered at the relevance of this gateway to Warwick Dene:

We wondered if Fraser's Patent Disinfecting Apparatus was something to do with farming and sheep dips. But I now think it's more likely linked to laundry, this being a hanging mechanism to suspend large items in a large vat underneath it. I've spent ten mins looking for decent info and I give up, though I have found this about a similar manufacturer.

The residential properties that abut the common on the south side, along and around Elm Avenue, remind me of similar estates in Gidea Park, indeed many of the street names are similar. Man hole cover plates in the roads show the name of pre-LCC 'Corporation of Ealing'.

 

At Ealing Common tube station we stopped to admire the gorgeous octagonal Art Deco interior (detail, above left) and, opposite the station, we found a green plaque for computer-whizz and poet's daughter Ada Lovelace, this being near to a house she lived in, since demolished. 

Approaching Acton Central's shopping zone Sue peeled off to catch the tube. I continued along to The Vale and then back again to see if much had changed since I last visited. The ghostsign for Dadd's boots store has gone, the space now cleverly filled in with a building of the same Victorian design. 

I then made my way to the overground line via Churchfield Road, a street that still retains hints of its middle class Victorian past including another large slab of York stone outside No 35 and the carved and gilded, yet faded, sign for C. Wright, ladies' and children's outfitter at No. 31:

Another nice day!

You might also like this piece about another ghostsign in Acton.