List Of Shops Open For Business
Fishmonger, Commercial Rd, by Anthony Cairns
Every Wednesday, I publish the up to date list of stalwarts that remain open in Spitalfields. Readers are especially encouraged to support small independent businesses who offer an invaluable service to the community. This list confirms that it is possible to source all essential supplies locally without recourse to supermarkets.
Be advised many shops are operating limited opening hours at present, so I recommend you call in advance to avoid risking a wasted journey. Please send any additions or amendments for next week’s list to spitalfieldslife@gmail.com
This week’s illustrations are photographs of closed shops taken by Anthony Cairns using the Van Dyke process. See the full set here
The Handy Shop, Ruskin Ave, E12 by Anthony Cairns
GROCERS & FOOD SHOPS
The Albion, 2/4 Boundary St
Ali’s Mini Superstore, 50d Greatorex St
AM2PM, 210 Brick Lane
As Nature Intended, 132 Commercial St
Banglatown Cash & Carry, 67 Hanbury St
Breid Bakery, Arch 72, Dunbridge St
Brick Lane Minimarket, 100 Brick Lane
The Butchery Ltd, 6a Lamb St (Open Thursdays only)
City Supermarket, 10 Quaker St
Costprice Minimarket, 41 Brick Lane
Faizah Minimarket, 2 Old Montague St
JB Foodstore, 97 Brick Lane
Haajang’s Corner, 78 Wentworth St
Hackney Essentials, 146 Columbia Road
Leila’s Shop, 17 Calvert Avenue (Call 0207 729 9789 between 10am-noon on Tuesday-Saturdays to place your order and collect on the same day from 2pm-4pm)
The Melusine Fish Shop, St Katharine Docks
Nisa Local, 92 Whitechapel High St
Pavilion Bakery, 130 Columbia Rd
Rinkoff’s Bakery, 224 Jubilee Street & 79 Vallance Road
Spitalfields City Farm, Buxton St (Order through website)
Sylhet Sweet Shop, 109 Hanbury St
Taj Stores, 112 Brick Lane
Zaman Brothers, Fish & Meat Bazaar, 19 Brick Lane
Unknown shop, Mile End, E1, by Anthony Cairns
TAKE AWAY FOOD SHOPS
Before you order from a delivery app, why not call the take away or restaurant direct?
Absurd Bird Fried Chicken, 54 Commercial St
Al Badam Fried Chicken, 37 Brick Lane
Allpress Coffee, 58 Redchurch St
Band of Burgers, 22 Osborn St
Beef & Birds, Brick Lane
Beigel Bake, 159 Brick Lane
Beigel Shop, 155 Brick Lane
Bellboi Coffee, 104 Sclater St
Bengal Village, 75 Brick Lane
Big Moe’s Diner, 95 Whitechapel High St
Burro E Salvia Pastificio, 52 Redchurch St
The Carpenters Arms, 73 Cheshire St (Open for take away beers)
China Feng, 43 Commercial St
Circle & Slice Pizza, 11 Whitechapel Rd
Dark Sugars, 45a Hanbury St (Take away ice cream and deliveries of chocolate)
Donburi & Co, Korean & Japanese, 13 Artillery Passage
Duke of Wellington, 12 Toynbee St (Open for take away beers)
Eastern Eye Balti House, 63a Brick Lane
Enso Thai & Japanese, 94 Brick Lane
Exmouth Coffee Shop, 83 Whitechapel High St
Grounded Coffee Shop, 9 Whitechapel Rd
Holy Shot Coffee, 155 Bethnal Green Rd
Hotbox Smoked Meats, 46-48 Commercial St
Jack The Chipper, 74 Whitechapel High St
Jonestown Coffee, 215 Bethnal Green Rd
Laboratorio Pizza, 79 Brick Lane
La Cucina, 96 Brick Lane
Leon, 3 Crispin Place, Spitalfields Market
Madhubon Sweets, 42 Brick Lane
Mooshies Vegan Burgers, 104 Brick Lane
Nude Expresso, The Roastery, 25 Hanbury St
E. Pellicci, 332 Bethnal Green Rd
Pepe’s Peri Peri, 82 Brick Lane
Peter’s Cafe, 73 Aldgate High St
Picky Wops Vegan Pizza, 53 Brick Lane
Polo Bar, 176 Bishopsgate
Quaker St Cafe, 10 Quaker St
Rajmahal Sweets, 57 Brick Lane
Rosa’s Thai Cafe, 12 Hanbury St
Shawarma Lebanese, 84 Brick Lane
Shoreditch Fish & Chips, 117 Redchurch St
Sichuan Folk, 32 Hanbury St
String Ray Globe Cafe, 109 Columbia Road
Sushi Show, 136 Bethnal Green Rd
Ten Bells, 84 Commercial St (Takeway beer on Thursday, Friday & Saturday)
Vegan Yes, Italian & Thai Fusion, 64 Brick Lane
White Horse Kebab, 336 Bethnal Green Rd
Yuriko Sushi & Bento, 48 Brick Lane
Unknown shops by Anthony Cairns
OTHER SHOPS & SERVICES
Boots the Chemist, 200 Bishopsgate
Brick Lane Bookshop, 166 Brick Lane (Books ordered by phone or email are delivered free locally)
Brick Lane Bikes, 118 Bethnal Green Rd
Brick Lane Off Licence, 114/116 Brick Lane
Day Lewis Pharmacy, 14 Old Montague St
E1 Cycles, 4 Commercial St
Eden Floral Designs, 10 Wentworth St (Order fresh flowers online for free delivery)
Flashback Records, 131 Bethnal Green Rd (Order records online for delivery)
Harry Brand, 122 Columbia Road (Order gifts online for delivery)
Hussain Tailoring, 64 Hanbury St
iRepair, Phones & Computer, 94 Whitechapel High St
GH Cityprint, 58-60 Middlesex St
Leyland Hardware, 2-4 Great Eastern St
Mobile Clinic & Laptop Repairs, 7 Osborne St
Post Office, 160a Brick Lane
Quality Dry Clean, 151 Bethnal Green Rd
Rose Locksmith & DIY, 149 Bethnal Green Rd
Sid’s DIY, 2 Commercial St
Spitalfields Dry Cleaners, 12 Whites Row
Gricks Jellied Eels, Rosebery Ave, E12 by Anthony Cairns
ELSEWHERE
E5 Bakehouse, Arch 395, Mentmore Terrace (Customers are encouraged to order online and collect in person)
Gold Star Dry Cleaning & Laundry, 330 Burdett Rd
Hackney Essentials, 235 Victoria Park Rd
Quality Dry Cleaners, 16a White Church Lane
Newham Books, 747 Barking Rd (Books ordered by phone or email are posted out)
Region Choice Chemist, 68 Cambridge Heath Rd
Symposium Italian Restaurant, 363 Roman Road (Take away service available)
Thompsons DIY, 442-444 Roman Rd
Arber & Co Ltd, 459 Roman Rd, E3 by Anthony Cairns
Photographs copyright © Anthony Cairns
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William Morris In The East End
William Morris spoke at Speakers’ Corner in Victoria Park on 26th July & 11th October 1885, 8th August 1886, 27th March & 21st May 1888
If you spotted someone hauling an old wooden Spitalfields Market orange crate around the East End, that was me undertaking a pilgrimage to some of the places William Morris spoke in the hope he might return for one last oration.
The presence of William Morris in the East End is almost forgotten today. Yet he took the District Line from his home in Hammersmith regularly to speak here through the last years of his life, despite persistent ill-health. Ultimately disappointed that the production of his own designs had catered only to the rich, Morris dedicated himself increasingly to politics and in 1884 he became editor of The Commonweal, newspaper of the Socialist League, using the coach house at Kelsmcott House in Hammersmith as its headquarters.
As an activist, Morris spoke at the funeral of Alfred Linnell, who was killed by police during a free speech rally in Trafalgar Sq in 1887, on behalf of the Match Girls’ Strike in 1888 and in the Dock Strike of 1889. His final appearance in the East End was on Mile End Waste on 1st November 1890, on which occasion he spoke at a protest against the brutal treatment of Jewish people in Russia.
When William Morris died of tuberculosis in 1896, his doctor said, ‘he died a victim to his enthusiasm for spreading the principles of Socialism.’ Morris deserves to be remembered for his commitment to the people of the East End in those years of political turmoil as for the first time unions struggled to assert the right to seek justice for their workers.
8th April 1884, St Jude’s Church, Commercial St – Morris gave a speech at the opening of the annual art exhibition on behalf of Vicar Samuel Barnett who subsequently founded Toynbee Hall and the Whitechapel Gallery.
During 1885, volunteers distributed William Morris’ What Socialists Want outside the Salmon & Ball in Bethnal Green
1st September 1885, 103 Mile End Rd
20th September 1885, Dod St, Limehouse – When police launched a violent attack on speakers of the Socialist League who defended the right to free speech at this traditional spot for open air meetings, William Morris spoke on their behalf in court on 22nd September in Stepney.
10th November 1886 & 3rd July 1887, Broadway, London Fields
November 20th 1887, Bow Cemetery – Morris spoke at the burial of Alfred Linnell, a clerk who was killed by police during a free speech rally in Trafalgar Sq. ‘Our friend who lies here has had a hard life and met with a hard death, and if our society had been constituted differently his life might have been a delightful one. We are engaged in a most holy war, trying to prevent our rulers making this great town of London into nothing more than a prison.’
9th April 1889, Toynbee Hall, Commercial St – Morris gave a magic lantern show on the subject of ‘Gothic Architecture’
1st November 1890, Mile End Waste – Morris spoke in protest against the persecution of Jews in Russia
William Morris in the East End
3rd January & 27th April 1884, Tee-To-Tum Coffee House, 166 Bethnal Green Rd
8th April 1884, St Jude’s Church, Commercial St
29th October 1884, Dod St, Limehouse
9th November 1884, 13 Redman’s Row
11th January & 12th April 1885, Hoxton Academy Schools
29th March 24th May 1885, Stepney Socialist League, 110 White Horse St
26th July & 11th October 1885, Victoria Park
8th August 1885, Socialist League Stratford
16th August 1885, Exchange Coffee House, Pitfield St, Hoxton
1st September 1885, Swaby’s Coffee House, 103 Mile End Rd
22nd September 1885, Thames Police court, Stepney (Before Magistrate Sanders)
24th January 1886, Hackney Branch Rooms, 21 Audrey St, Hackney Rd
2nd February 1886, International Working Men’s Educational Club, 40 Berners St
5th June 1886, Socialist League Stratford
11th July 1886, Hoxton Branch of the Socialist League, 2 Crondel St
24th August 1886, Socialist League Mile End Branch, 108 Bridge St
13th October 1886, Congregational Schools, Swanscombe St, Barking Rd
10th November 1886, Broadway, London Fields
6th March 1887, Hoxton Branch of the Socialist League, 2 Crondel St
13th March & 12th June 1887, Hackney Branch Rooms, 21 Audrey St, Hackney Rd
27th March 1887, Borough of Hackney Club, Haggerston
27th March, 21st May, 23rd July, 21st August & 11th September, 1887 Victoria Park
24th April 1887, Morley Coffee Tavern Lecture Hall, Mare St
3rd July 1887, Broadway, London Fields
21st August 1887, Globe Coffee House, High St, Hoxton
25th September 1887, Hoxton Church
27th September 1887, Mile End Waste
18th December 1887, Bow Cemetery, Southern Grove
17th April 1888, Mile End Socialist Hall, 95 Boston St
17th April 1888, Working Men’s Radical Club, 108 Bridge St, Burdett Rd
16th June 1888, International Club, 23 Princes Sq, Cable St
17th June 1888, Victoria Park
30th June 1888, Epping Forest Picnic
22nd September 1888, International Working Men’s Education Club, 40 Berners St
9th April 1889, Toynbee Hall, Commercial St
27th June 1889, New Labour Club, 5 Victoria Park Sq, Bethnal Green
8th June 1889, International Working Men’s Education Club, 40 Berners St
1st November 1890, Mile End Waste
This feature draws upon the research of Rosemary Taylor as published in her article in The Journal of William Morris Studies. Click here to join the William Morris Society
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In Search Of The Relics Of Old St Pauls
Looking through into the whispering gallery
Sir Christopher Wren’s success at St Paul’s Cathedral is to have envisaged architecture of such absolute assurance that it is impossible to imagine it could ever have been any different than it is today. Yet Wren was once surveyor of Old St Paul’s, confronted daily with a tottering gothic pile and carrying the onerous responsibility for this vast medieval shambles upon his shoulders, until the Great Fire took it away three hundred and fifty years ago.
The spire of Old St Paul’s collapsed in 1561 and, in Wren’s, time wooden scaffolding was necessary to hold up the poorly-built Cathedral. Parts of the cloister were carried off to build Somerset House and even a fancy new portico designed in the classical style by Inigo Jones failed to ameliorate the general picture of decay and dereliction.
When the Great Fire of London began in the summer of 1666, the Stationers Company stored their books and paper in the crypt of the Cathedral for safe-keeping and residents piled their precious furniture in the churchyard – one of the few open spaces in the City – so that it might be safe even if they lost their homes in the conflagration. These prudent measures only exacerbated the catastrophe when a spark set fire to the wooden roof of the Cathedral which collapsed into the crypt, sending a river of molten lead running down Ludgate Hill, igniting a violent inferno of paper that brought down the entire building and consumed all the furniture in the churchyard as well.
After the pyre of Old St Paul’s was at last extinguished in September, weeks after the Fire had been quenched elsewhere in the City, it became a popular pastime to scavenge through the ruins for souvenirs. You might assume nothing survived but, if you know where to look and what to look for, there are relics scattered throughout New St Paul’s.
There are Roman tiles, an Anglo-Saxon hog’s back tomb, a Viking grave marker and multiple stone fragments of the Cathedral itself, catalogued in the nineteenth century – although I was most fascinated by seventeenth-century effigies that withstood the Fire.
Medieval monuments and statuary were destroyed in the Reformation, and Oliver Cromwell famously stabled his horses in the Cathedral at the time of the English Revolution, but there was a brief period when new monuments and figures were installed prior to the Great Fire of London and a handful of these remain today.
John Donne would have conjured an astute sonnet upon the metaphysical irony of his monument being the only one surviving intact. In his last days, he insisted upon modelling for his own effigy, wrapped in a shroud, and the resultant sculpture is distinguished by remarkably naturalistic drapery. Yet, in spite of this, I can only see it as an image of a flame in which the great poet glimmers eternally.
A small collection of seventeenth-century human effigies rest down in the crypt, burnt black by the Fire. Carved from pale marble or alabaster, they have been transfigured by the furnace-like temperature of the conflagration and emerged charcoal-black, glistening and broken, as if they had been excavated like coal – as if they were creatures of another time, as remote as prehistoric creatures. But, even as they were ravaged by apocalyptic lfire and damaged beyond recognition, some have retained fine detail of armour and clothing, and all have acquired presence. These compelling fragmentary forms are worthy of Henry Moore, charmed stones that manifest an eternal spirit forged in fire.
Unsurprisingly, Christopher Wren had little interest in the relics of Old St Paul’s because he was looking to the future. Wary of medieval foundations, he had his New St Paul’s re-aligned to avoid them. Yet, although Wren had most of the ancient stone broken up to use as infill for New St Paul’s, there are a couple of spots in the crypt where you can see fragments of detailed Romanesque carving sticking out from the wall, hidden in plain sight, to remind us that – even though Old St Paul’s has gone – it is still with us.
Roman tiles and Anglo-Saxon grave cover in the triforium
Hogback grave cover, dating from 1000-1050 AD, possibly from the grave of King Athelstan
Viking grave marker, dating from 1125-50AD, dug up in 1852 in the churchyard
Twelfth century Romanesque carving of foliage in the wall of the crypt
Twelfth century Romanesque carving of foliage in the wall of the crypt
Ledger stone of Brian Walton, Bishop of Chester, died 1661
Sir John & Eliza Wolley
Sir John Wolley, Latin Secretary to Elizabeth I, died 1596
Eliza Wolley, Lady of the Privy Chamber to Elizabeth I, died 1600
Sir Thomas Heneage Vice-Chamberlain to Elizabeth I, died 1594, & Anna Heneage, died 1592
Unknown effigy
Unknown effigy
William Cokain, Mayor of London 1619, died 1626
William Cokain, Mayor of London 1619, died 1626
John Donne, Poet & Dean of St Paul’s (1572-1631), monument by Nicholas Stone
Caen & Reigate stones from Old St Paul’s (1180-1666 AD) excavated by Francis Penrose, Cathedral Surveyor in the nineteenth century
This lion is a fragment of Inigo Jones portal to St Paul’s which inspired Christopher Wren
Click to enlarge this comparative plan of 1872 which superimposes the outlines of Old and New St Paul’s (Reproduced courtesy of St Paul’s)
You may also like to read my other stories of St Paul’s Cathedral
The East End Flower Women Of 2020
We are keen to support these local growers who are offering Spitalfields Life readers a weekly bunch of flowers fresh from the field to lift your spirits in the lockdown.
Click here to subscribe for eight weeks of locally-grown seasonal flowers
Portrait by Rachel Ferriman
East End flower women have been recurring feature for centuries on this side of the capital. I am thinking not simply of Liza Doolittle, but of the itinerant herb women who sold homemade remedies and the famous watercress sellers of Shoreditch who were celebrated for their independent spirits.
Historically, this was always the garden of London. Before all the terraces were built, it was occupied by nurseries and market gardens tended by growers who rose at dawn, walking into the city and crying their produce through the densely populated streets. Today this horticultural tradition persists in Columbia Rd Market which boasts some notable female traders.
Yet even as the pandemic has closed down the market it has created a new breed of East End flower sellers or plantswomen, as I should call them, because they grow their own produce too. Let me introduce Lulu Cox, Jess Blume and Olivia Wetherley Wilson.
Working separately, all three supplied flowers under commission for weddings and other events until the pandemic took away their business and left them high and dry with their nurseries of lovingly nurtured flowers coming into bloom. Working in collaboration as the Spring Summer Autumn Winter Collective, they have adapted to this new situation by offering subscriptions for a weekly bunch of locally-grown seasonal flowers to brighten people’s homes during the lockdown.
The trio describe themselves as ‘florists’ and they fulfil the older meaning of this word which was used in a broader sense in the eighteenth century to mean plant enthusiasts. This is the usage intended in the naming of The Florists Arms in Bethnal Green, a rare legacy of the plant culture that once flourished across East London.
I was jealous of Contributing Photographer Rachel Ferriman who got to visit the flower nurseries and take pictures of the blooms, but at least I was able to meet with two of the florist trio, Olivia & Jess, for a socially-distanced interview in the garden surrounding the bandstand at Arnold Circus – which is perhaps the next best thing.
Olivia – I have always wanted to be involved in floristry and I didn’t understand why until my grandmother told me that her mother had been a florist at a large house. My grandmother always kept a beautiful garden so I feel that it is in my genes that I am drawn to flowers.
Jess – I think many people have an affinity with plants – I know I do – but a lot don’t allow themselves the time to tap into it. These last two months have allowed people that opportunity. The more you become involved with plants, the more you realise it is a slow way of working. You are at the mercy of the seasons and you might plant something in January that does not flower until the next year.
Olivia – Before this month, we were events florists but just this month we have launched our collective with Lulu Cox, selling our flowers together. She was a chef at the Rochelle Canteen but now she is a grower. By growing the flowers ourselves, we want to celebrate the seasons, yet we each realised it is difficult to do this on our own.
Jess – I worked in advertising but I became tired of working in an office. Looking back, I realise that my mother was guide at Kew Gardens and she used to take me with her several times each week. I walked the tour with her while she was practising. Initially, it did not have an effect on me but I have always needed to work with my hands and I was very drawn to working outdoors in nature. Growing started as a hobby and became all encompassing, so I realised I had to make it work. I made the break and became a florist five years ago. I don’t think many people realise how far their flowers have travelled, so I realised I needed to grow my own and support producers here in the United Kingdom.
Olivia – It’s not just the distances that flowers are flown, it is the whole industry, the unregulated pesticide use in other countries which adversely affects the women who pick those flowers. It became untenable for me to work in floristry without growing my own flowers here in this country.
Jess – It all comes back to people’s expectations and the speed at which they want things, demanding flowers out of season. Few people think about it – where their flowers come from and the repercussions of that – so this is definitely a time for a rethink.
Dead-heading sweet peas
Jess Blume
Olivia Wetherly Wilson
Lulu Cox
Jess and Olivia outside Leila’s Shop
Photographs copyright © Rachel Ferriman
At present, orders from the Spring Summer Autumn Winter Collective can be collected from Leila’s Shop, 15 Calvert Avenue E2, London Borough of Jam, 51d Chatsworth Rd E15, and Popham’s Bakery, 19 Prebend St, N1.
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Mortlake Jugs
Once, every household in London possessed an ale jug, in the days before it was safe to drink water or tea became widely affordable. These cheaply-produced salt-glazed stoneware items, that could be bought for a shilling or less, were prized for their sprigged decoration and often painstakingly repaired to extend their lives, and even prized for their visual appeal when broken and no longer of use.
All these jugs from the collection of Philip Mernick were produced in Mortlake, when potteries were being set up around London to supply the growing market for these household wares throughout the eighteenth century. The first of the Mortlake potteries was begun by John Sanders and taken over by his son William Sanders in 1745, while the second was opened by Benjamin Kishere who had worked for Sanders, and this was taken over by his son William Kishere in 1834.
These jugs appeal to me with their rich brown colouration that evokes the tones of crusty bread and their lively intricate decoration, mixing images of English country life with Classical motifs reminiscent of Wedgwood. Eighteenth-century Mortlake jugs are distinguished by the attenuated baluster shape that follows the form of ceramics in the medieval world yet is replaced in the early-nineteenth century by the more bulbous form of a jug which is still common today.
There is an attractive organic quality to these highly-wrought yet utilitarian artefacts, encrusted with decorative sprigs like barnacles upon a ship’s hull. They were once universally-familiar objects in homes and ale houses, and in daily use by Londoners of all classes.
1790s ale jug repaired with brass handle and engraved steel rim
A panel of “The Midnight Conversation” after a print by Hogarth
Classical motifs mixed with rural images
A panel of “Cupid’s Procession”
A woman on horseback portrayed on this jug
Agricultural implements and women riders
Toby Fillpot
Panel of Racehorses
Cupid’s procession with George III & Queen Charlotte and Prince of Wales & Caroline of Brunswick
Panel of “Cockerell on the Dungheap”
Panel of “The Two Boors”
Square- based jug of 1800/1810
Toby Fillpot
William Kishere, Pottery Mortlake, Surrey
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Adam Dant’s Map Of Viral London
Contributing Cartographer Adam Dant has kept himself occupied during the lockdown by drawing this map of contagion in the capital
Click to enlarge
ADAM DANT INTRODUCES HIS VIRAL LONDON MAP
“In my studio next to Liverpool St Station, I was colouring a busy cityscape of Leicester Sq. The drawing was finished in early March but, looking at it now, it struck me that I had created a scene I may not encounter again for a long time – a panorama from a pre-Coronavirus age.
My Viral London is a cartographic representation of how the capital has been assaulted by epidemics throughout history. From the plague of 664AD which struck monastic communities, destabilised the church, to the AIDS crisis and ‘The London Patient’ who was the second case to be cured.
The effect of fifteen hundred years of epidemics, transforming Londoners’ behaviour and their landscape, is characterised not by major social projects but by incidents that are commonly anecdotal and poignant. Walking home through a deserted City of London by night, the narrator of Daniel Defoe’s A Journal of The Plague Year, witnesses a woman open her window to cry, ‘Death, Death, Death!’. Erasmus, visiting London during an outbreak of the Sweyting Sickness, was too scared to enter his lodgings to collect his boots for fear of catching the illness. In 1918, Londoners celebrating the Armistice were unaware that the deadly Spanish Flu was being spread amongst the revellers.
I started wondering how pandemics might have coloured the sensibilities of artists in the past. We always imagine life was much nastier back then.
Many of my artistic predecessors witnessed episodes of viral assault. Brueghel’s The Triumph of Death is underpinned by the ever present risk of plague, Hollar engraved views of London before and after the Great Fire which had followed the pestilence like a purgative, and no Renaissance artist working in Venice was ever safe from the French Pox, also known as Neapolitan bone-ache or syphilis, to give its modern name. Among those paintings by Canaletto teeming with people, La Serenissima contains a masked and wigged figure wearing a beaked mask filled with herbs to ward off the pestilence.
I am wondering if my depictions of packed public spaces will serve as perpetual descriptions of ‘how we used to be’ and whether I should now be drawing more classical crowd scenes in which figures waft past each other at arms’ length, with a courtly grace conferring mandatory social distancing.
Perhaps Leicester Sq, Sloane Sq, Berkley Sq, the Royal Exchange or any of the other teeming centres of life that I have portrayed may never appear the same again after the war on Covid-19, any more than they did after the Blitz?”
Adam Dant’s Viral London Map was commissioned by The Critic
CLICK TO ORDER A COPY OF MAPS OF LONDON & BEYOND BY ADAM DANT
Adam Dant’s MAPS OF LONDON & BEYOND is a mighty monograph collecting together all your favourite works by Spitalfields Life‘s Contributing Cartographer in a beautiful big hardback book.
Including a map of London riots, the locations of early coffee houses and a colourful depiction of slang through the centuries, Adam Dant’s vision of city life and our prevailing obsessions with money, power and the pursuit of pleasure may genuinely be described as ‘Hogarthian.’
Unparalleled in his draughtsmanship and inventiveness, Adam Dant explores the byways of London’s cultural history in his ingenious drawings, annotated with erudite commentary and offering hours of fascination for the curious.
The book includes an extensive interview with Adam Dant by The Gentle Author.
Adam Dant’s limited edition prints including the VIRAL LONDON MAP are available to purchase through TAG Fine Arts
Wonderful London
It is my pleasure to publish these dignified and characterful portraits of Londoners, believed to be by photographer Donald McLeish (1879-1950), selected from the three volumes of Wonderful London edited by St John Adcock and produced by The Fleetway House in the nineteen-twenties.
Telescope Man on Westminster Bridge
Old woman who inhabited the alleys off Fleet St
Breton Onion Seller
Costermonger and child
Cats’ Meat Man
Knife Grinder
Charwoman
Islington Window Cleaner
Flower Seller
Concertina Player
Hurdy-Gurdy Man
Gramophone Man
Escapologist
Wandering Harpist
Street Sweeper
Scavenger
District Messenger
Telephone Messenger
Railway Fireman
Railway Engine Driver
Carman
Railway Porter
Gold Beaters
Gas Fitters
Chimney Sweep
Telephone Cable Man
Photographs courtesy Bishopsgate Institute
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