17/08/2023
Billy Smart's Circus Elephants with riders and trainers march along Queenstown Road in South London with Battersea Power Station behind (1968 circa).
Nine Elms Heritage Walks
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26/04/2023
Bob Marley is one of the greatest singers, musicians, and songwriters of all times. At the peak of his career, he survived an assassination attempt in his own home in Jamaica, which prompted him to relocate to London in Chalsea (in a four-storey terraced house at 42 Oakley Street). He liked to cross the nearby Albert bridge in the morning and get to Battersea Park to play football with his band “the Wailers”. During that period, he recorded ‘Jamming’, ‘Waiting in Vain’, ‘Three Little Birds’, ‘One Love’ and others, all part of the album Exodus that made him a global star. He left in June 1977. A month later he was diagnosed with a cancer that led to his death four years later.
P.S.: not sure if he was aware but he played football in the very birthplace of modern football. Battersea Park in fact held the first football match/exhibition with the rules of the recently formed Football Association in January 1864.
25/04/2023
Brunswick house (originally Belmont House) is a Georgian building established in 1758 while Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens was in full swing. It’s the oldest building in the area predating Vauxhall bridge. In 1820s saw the birth of Reverend Henry Williams Baker who wrote illustrious hymns from “The King of Love my Shepherd is” to “Lord Thy Word Abideth”. Had its own river jetty and five and a half acres of parkland surrounding it. Went through several phases: railway offices (as the long lost Nine Elms train station was built next to it), library, concert hall, billiards room, and the meeting location for MI6 agents who were concerned their adjacent headquarters was bugged. In 2002 the new owners left the building empty and soon after it became home to squatters who hosted illegal raves, vandalized and almost burnt the building down. Fireplaces, doors, windows, radiators had all been stolen or vandalized; archive of minutes, photographs, newspaper clippings had disappeared, used either to light fires or stolen. That’s probably why there’s no known pictures of Queen Victoria’s Nine Elms Royal private train station (this has been confirmed to us by both National Railway Museum in York and Royal Collection Trust at Windsor Castle). As a result, it ended up on the English Heritage register of Buildings at Risk. It is now a restaurant packed with chandeliers, antiques, curiosities and vintage paraphernalia. Check the old picture with Nine Elms Cold Store on the back (built in 1964, abandoned in 1979 but not demolished until the late 1990s).
24/04/2023
Facts on the four iconic chimneys of Battersea Power Station:
• Architect Sir Giles Gilbert Scott who designed BPS in the late ‘20s proposed them to be square instead of circular.
• The original design contained the four of them despite they were built in two separate phases 20 years a part and WWII in between.
• RAF pilots used plumes from the chimneys to guide them in the mist. For the same reason, N**i Luftwaffe did not bomb them during The Blitz.
• The chimneys are as symmetrically tall as the rest of the building: 50m.
• The reinforcement inside the chimneys was corroded and irreparable, therefore they were demolished and rebuilt (2017) ensuring a “like for like” under English Heritage scrutiny: 375 litres of colour-matched painting was utilized too.
• Pink Floyd's 1977 “Animals” album cover is a photo of a pink pig inflatable tethered to one of the power station's southern chimneys. It broke loose from its moorings and drifted into the flight path of Heathrow Airport. Flights were diverted. It finally landed off the coast of Kent.
23/04/2023
British commander Arthur Wellesley otherwise known as 1st Duke of Wellington is well remembered for having ended Napoleonic wars, having defeated Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. You may know the Wellington Arch at Hyde Park corner, grade I listed triumphal arch erected in his honour to celebrate his victory while he was still alive and living in Apsley House that sits just in front of it. The 1st Duke of Wellington was also twice British prime minister. During his first mandate he was prompted to settle a matter of honour defending a pro-catholic bill (his Tory Government had passed the Catholic Relief Bill, a legislative move towards Catholic emancipation that would allow Catholics to take a seat in parliament) and called for a duel. It was the last duel involving a British Prime Minister. The duel took place near the Red House in Battersea park, at the time known as Battersea Fields or Battersea Common. No one was injured.
22/04/2023
Royal Vauxhall Tavern (1860) is a Grade II listed building that sits at the north-west corner of the Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens (the legendary public entertainment venue with two centuries of activity). RVT is at the core of the so called "Vauxhall Gay Village". Lambeth is the local authority with the highest relative gay or le***an population in the UK, at 5.5%. RVT is the UK's first building to be listed in recognition of its importance to LGBTQ community history and oldest surviving LGBTQ venue in London. Previously called Vauxhall Tavern, “Royal” was added after rumours that Freddie Mercury “smuggled” Princes Diana disguised as a man.
22/04/2023
Welcome to Nine Elms Heritage Walks page (walks to be announced soon)
This is a 5 miles/3 hours socio-historical and cultural walking (or cycling) tour of Nine Elms surrounding areas starting at Battersea Park and ending at Vauxhall.
With its 227 hectares, the Vauxhall-Nine Elms-Battersea area is by far the largest regeneration zone in central London: at its core, the £9bn renovation of Grade II* listed Battersea Power Station with its riverfront piazza as new town center giving Nine Elms community a new lease of life. Often described as a post-industrial brownfield and former slum with no history it’s surprising to discover hidden treasures and an incredible world heritage. From archaeological discoveries like one of the most significant pieces of ancient Celtic art (Battersea Shield) to 6500 years old London's oldest structure (London’s first bridge/jetty) just in front of MI6.
Hidden gems of pop culture are disseminated around the area: from the more obvious Pink Floyd’s “Animals” cover album spot to The Who’s Quadrophenia studios and the locations of the A-ha’s “Take on me” music video café and Daniel Day-Lewis’ “My Beautiful Laundrette” movie.
With a focus on social aspects of the regeneration urban planning, described by Donald Trump as “lousy, off location” and dubbed Dubai-on-Thames or Singapore-on-Thames, the area has been a magnet for negative press in recent years portraited time and time again as “everything that is wrong with housing in London”. The tour gives an insight into Nine Elms newly forming community.
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