Mr Cranston's Waverley Temperance Hotels – a link between Edinburgh and London

I've just returned from a long weekend in Edinburgh. Lots of walking. Lots to see. And, of course, I took lots of photos. 

As I was walking back towards the Old Town along Spring Gardens last Friday I noticed a ghostsign on the side of a building overlooking the railway line, the largest visible words 'WAVERLEY HOTELS'. 

Although I'd spotted lots of old hand-painted signs across the city I'd decided to restrict myself to just looking at them. But this sign was so huge and inviting – I had to try and get closer!

This end wall sits a little over a metre from the viaduct that carries the tracks and with my back pressed against the railway wall I managed to take a couple of oblique upwards shots but my old phone isn't really the best device for taking pics like this. 

I have today tried find a better quality image, because surely someone must have got there first, but I can't find reference of it anywhere which is probably because trees obliterate the sign for most of the year.

I have therefore done my best to enhance and stretch one of my dodgy pics in order to read the content:

CRANSTON'S

WAVERLEY

Temperance

HOTELS

EDINBURGH

Princes Street

AND

Waterloo Place

GLASGOW

WAVERLEY

182(?) Sauchiehall Street

LONDON

WAVERLEY

37 Kings St, Cheapside

(CRA.... ALL.... NO... S)

(Bottom left)

FOR TEA

DINNER 2/-

ROOM 1/-

(Bottom right)

PRIVATE PARLOURS 3/-

SERVICE 1/-

STOCK ROOMS From 2/-

(and two more lines full length across the bottom edge that I can't decipher)

The London Waverley hotel at the corner of Cheapside is no longer there but it reminded me that I'd found this ad in a 1935 Ward Lock London guidebook for three Temperance hotels near the British Museum, one of which was called The Waverley. You'll can still find it today at 130-134 Southampton Row, near Russell Square, though no longer part of the temperance movement, ditto The Ivanhoe and The Kenilworth which sit opposite each other at the junction of Gt Russell St and Gower Street the former since rebranded The Bloomsbury Street Hotel.

But who was Mr Cranston? Well, it turns out we have another link between Edinburgh and London because Abney Park's website makes good mention of Robert Cranston within this entry for Elizabeth Elliott Scott who worked at one his hotels in Lawrence Lane, Cheapside – it includes a marvellous 151 advertisement for Cranston's hotels 

As for the Waverley Hotel in Edinburgh – on Monday, with time spare before my train back to London, I'd stood opposite the building and wondered whether I should go for a look inside to see if there was anything left of its Victorian interior. Having not started this research until today, I had not at that time made the connection to the Temperance movement and simply thought that t was named after Edinburgh's Waverley railway station. I instead sat on a bench in the sunshine and did a bit of people watching. Having googled the hotel's history, I can now see that I would have been disappointed –the hotel's fancy, albeit grubby, façade belies its interior which has been stripped of all historical decoration, making it almost indiscernible from many other hotels of this ilk.

Robert Cranston is buried in Grange Cemetery, Edinburgh.

Almost forgot – the sign is painted on the side of a Victorian social housing block at 10 Brand Place which retains its access from the street via an open staircase, very similar in design to the developments erected by Sidney Waterlow and his IIDC friends in London.  

Happy birthday to me – Memories of Edinburgh Festival 2002 and pre-selfie selfies

Blimey doen't time fly?!
Someone told me recently that they were going to the Edinburgh festival this year and it reminded me of 15 years ago when I was there as a Perrier Awards comedy judge.
Yes folks, you read that right. I won one of the two 'members of the public' London positions (there was also a winner from Scotland) in a Time Out competition – the brief was to write a letter explaining why I was the best candidate for the job. My opening line began with, "my friends say I have an opinion on everything..." and I just knew when I sent it in that I was onto a winner. I had a gut feeling and I was right. I beat thousands of people to the post.

Top centre: me with my VIP awards night ticket and wandering about in Edinburgh. 
Middle row: Daniel Kitson accepting the winner's awards, me with Reg D. Hunter and his friend, and with Trevor and Simon (our pants are swinging just out of shot).
Bottom row: two comedians (oops, I have forgotten their names; a young Canadian and an America) and the lovely, shy and very clever Mr Rich Hall

Us judges were given lovely rented homes for the fortnight with VIP entrance to all the evening dos and backstage bars, travel expenses etc.
Seeing all those comedy shows was hard work though – it involved running back and forth across Edinburgh seeing five or six shows a day, and many of them not in the least bit amusing. At times I started to think I had forgotten how to laugh with my face stuck in rictus.
The thing is though, it was fifteen years ago. Eh? How did that happen? And whilst I was there I turned 40 – what a great way to celebrate – I thought winning that judging gig was one of my best birthday presents ever.
OK... now for the next batch of photos... You'll notice they all have something in common, and I don't just mean how some of the people in them have, er, changed over the years...

Me and... Dave Gorman, Nina Conti, Dara O'Briain, Hal Cruttenden, Jimmy Carr, Phil Nichol, Noel Fielding, Stephen Frost and Brendan Burns. (How did I not get a pic of lovely Sean Lock?!)

... notice that they are all close-ups and I am in every photo – that's because I am taking the photos – in other words, these are selfies before the word was invented.
For decades I have been using regular cameras to take photos of myself alongside friends or places without the need of a viewfinder/screen. Also, note that all the pics above are taken with a film camera – one shot, no deletes, no retakes, no post-production, no editing. Good aren't they?
I will dig out some earlier 'old-school selfies' when I get a mo.
Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me....