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The Gentle Author’s Marylebone Pub Crawl
While in Marylebone preparing for my MAGIC LANTERN SHOW at the beautiful Daunt Books, Marylebone High St, on Thursday 20th March, I could not resist the resist the selfless task of visiting all the...
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Viscountess Boudica’s St Patrick’s Day
Beannachtaí na Féile Pádraig oraibh In the East End, we owe a debt of gratitude to Viscountess Boudica of Bethnal Green for her inspirational example in observing each of the festivals of the year...
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New Season For Carters Steam Fair
Joby Carter In Berkshire, the blossom is on the thorn and the chestnut buds are bursting – reliable indicators that it is the season for Carter’s Steam Fair to leave the yard in White Waltham on the...
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At 31 Fournier St
You may recall my account of meeting Rodney Archer the Aesthete in Fournier St who has Oscar Wilde’s fireplace installed in his first floor drawing room. Now you can visit and see it with your own...
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A Brief Survey Of East End Garden History
Celebrating the publication of her new book The Gardens of the British Working Class by Yale University Press, Margaret Willes offers this brief horticultural history of the East End. Early twentieth...
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At The Blind Beggar
David Dobson, Landlord of the Blind Beggar Henry VIII at the gaming machine – a rare image of this infamous monarch not recorded by Holbein yet a familiar sight in Whitechapel, where David Dobson...
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Thierry Noir, Street Artist
When I arrived to interview the celebrated street artist Thierry Noir, who won international fame and a place in history for his paintings on the Berlin Wall, I encountered an empty gallery apart from...
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A New Quill For Old John Stow
Let me confess, I am a biro writer. I get through so many pens at such a rate that there really is no alternative. Yet in the case of my illustrious predecessor, John Stow, one the earliest historians...
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Hillary Hayden, Brother at Charterhouse
Unlike the hermit monks of the medieval priory that once stood upon this site, the current Brothers at the Charterhouse are a sociable bunch and thus I was able to pay a visit upon Hillary Hayden, the...
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Blogs Spawned
One of the great joys of recent years has been teaching courses encouraging others to write blogs. Without exception, the participants always come up with wonderful ideas and here are just a handful of...
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On The Buses With Colin O’Brien
The restored prototype RT1 of 1939 in Piccadilly Circus A magical time warp appeared to manifest itself in London yesterday, when Saturday shoppers were surprised by buses of past eras – many more...
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Victory For East End Preservation Society!
On the eve of the Easter Holiday, it fills me with great delight to announce that the old terrace in Whitechapel, comprising the last fragment of the nineteenth century Pavilion Theatre complex, has...
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Widow’s Buns At Bow
It is Good Friday and time for another Hot Cross Bun to go in the basket at the Widow’s Son in Devons Rd, Bow, as part of the East End’s most-celebrated Easter tradition. Festivities reach their climax...
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Liam O’Farrell, Artist
Brick Lane at the corner of Bacon St Liam O’Farrell delights in painting East End markets in all their shambolic minutiae, often returning to the same subject many times to explore the mutable nature...
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Viscountess Boudica’s Easter
She may be no Spring chicken but that does not stop the indefatigable Viscountess Boudica of Bethnal Green from dressing up as an Easter chick! As is her custom at each of the festivals which mark our...
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At The Charterhouse
Brick buildings of 1531 in Preacher’s Court with the Barbican beyond Desirous of a second visit to view the magnificence of the Charterhouse more closely, I made another call upon my new friend...
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Nicholas Borden’s Winter Paintings
Junction of Vallance Rd & Three Colts Lane (Click to enlarge) This new picture by Nicholas Borden from last Winter shows the exact spot I first met him in Vallance Rd, painting in the snow, over a...
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Yet More Drypoint Etchings By Peta Bridle
This week Peta Bridle sent me her latest additions to the growing portfolio of drypoint etchings she has been working on for more than year, many inspired by stories and characters from the pages of...
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Return Of The East London Group
In 2012, David Buckman published From Bow to Biennale which recovered the lost history of The East London Group, one of the major artistic movements to come out of the East End in the last century yet...
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In Mile End Old Town
Much of the streetscape of the East End was broken in the last century, with fine squares lost in Stepney, Spitalfields and Haggerston, yet in Mile End an entire quarter of early-nineetenth century...
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