Around The City
Following the Billingsgate pictures I published earlier this week, these City photographs are a second selection from a cache of transparencies of unknown origin, recently acquired by the Bishopsgate Institute. We believe they date from the nineteen sixties but the photographer is unidentified. Can anyone tell us more?
Mappin & Webb, Poultry
Bishopsgate
Church of Allhallows The Great, Allhallows Lane
Figure of an Apprentice, Vinters Hall
Lincolns Inn Fields, window sign, 1693
Bollard at entrance to Fenchurch StStation, ‘London & Blackwall Railway’
Lincolns Inn Fields
Gas lamp off Castle Court outside Simpsons Tavern, Ball Court
Clock, St Dunstans-in-the-West, Fleet St
Prince Henry’s house, Fleet St
Lincolns Inn Fields, Bishops Court sign, July 1868
Staple Inn, Holborn
Old Cheshire Cheese, Fleet St
The King Lud, Ludgate Circus
Holborn Viaduct
Gas lamp in Amen Court
St Andrew’s House, St Andrew’s-by-the-Wardrobe Church, St Andrew’s Hill
Hydrant in St Mary Athill churchyard, 1841
Simpsons Tavern, Ball Court
Old shop, Eastcheap
Bin in Gracechurch St for gravel and litter, c.1920
Tobacconist in Castle Court
Barclays Bank, Gracechurch St
Old Blue Last, Great Eastern St
Images courtesy Bishopsgate Institute
You may like to take a look at more of these pictures
Judging by the fashions, I think it is early 70s. Had a wet look coat not dissimilar to one sported in one of the photos…
I know it is all a bit grubby but Bishopsgate looks much more inherently interesting then than it does now. Human scale makes it much more immediate. If you know what I mean. Love the 1920s rubbish bin!
As always, look at thcar make/model , & registrations if after 1962/3. Also, look at the skirt-lengths (or absence thereof) in the penultimate picture .. 1963 – 67 I’d guess.
That’s what makes London so special. It is so full of rich history, wherever you look at, there is always something quirky, quaint, quizzical and quintessentially London that is impossibly difficult to copy anywhere in the world. Only London has it. Is it any wonder why so many people want to come here and have a bite of it?
I love that the photographer mainly chose sunny days to work.
And that Regency (?) costume appeared to be fairly unremarkable in Lincolns Inn Fields!
That delights me again! See the delivery van at the second picture: I still have it as a pickup truck from “MATCHBOX”!
Yes, these are the Roaring Sixties — and they regrettably won’t come back…!
Love & Peace
ACHIM
About 1966 judging by the clothes, cars and motorcycles.
What wonderful photos, thanks for sharing! Valerie
Fantastic – crying out for a ‘Then and Now’ photograph comparison – I’d love to know what we still have and what has been lost. I lament the loss of King Lud – the pub I went to when I got my first job across the road at the bottom of Fleet Street. Thank you!
Enjoyed these photos, can someone enlighten me-what tube station is that in the top photo (Mappin & Webb) ?
What a fascinating treasure trove of transparencies here with enough detail to absorb those of us of a certain age. I too remember the delights of ‘The King Lud’ and the alleyways and courts off Fleet Street. It’s a shame that, with age, some are losing their original colour (though that can be rescued to a degree with Photoshop), but the important thing is that they are being preserved – thanks to the Bishopsgate Institute – well done!
Truly magnificent Architecture, to be cherished and celebrated.
My first job in December 1979, after graduating from university, was in an office in Carter Lane. There was a café at the corner of Carter Lane and Deans Court that had a very 30’s/40’s feel to it (I just looked on Google Maps Street View and see there is still a café at that location, Café Vita). I can’t recall its name but I remember going to the original café after work one evening (in 1986) to find it closed and occupied by a film crew who were filming a scene from Colin MacInnes’ novel, ‘Absolute Beginners’. Like Alison and Philip I, too, remember ‘The King Lud’ which makes an appearance in another novel of 1950’s London bohemian, Iris Murdoch’s ‘Under the Net’.
I remember walking past Mappin & Webb in the first photo. The modern replacement is pretty ugly in my ‘umble opinion.
And I have supped a pint in the Old King Lud, sadly no longer with us…
Great photos, thanks.