Views Of Christ Church, Spitalfields
This church is so big that I can hardly see it. Omnipresent and looming over my existence – as I go about my daily business in the surrounding streets – Nicholas Hawksmoor’s towering masterpiece of English baroque, Christ Church, Spitalfields, has become so deeply integrated into my perception that I do not see it anymore. Yet I can never forget it either, because it continually interposes upon my conscious by surprise, appearing on the skyline in places where I am not expecting it.
Equally, I can never get accustomed to the size of it, and it never ceases to startle me when I turn the corner from Bishopsgate into Brushfield St and spy it there across Commercial St – always bigger than I expect, bigger than I remember it. The church’s gargantuan scale makes it appear it closer than it is and – even though my mind’s eye diminishes it – the reality of it always surpasses my expectation.
In this sense, Nicholas Hawksmoor’s masterpiece still fulfils its original function superlatively, which was to be an monumental marker pointing heavenwards and inducing awe among all those who dwell in its shadow. Constructed between 1714 and 1729 – by Act of Parliament – as one of an intended fifty new churches to serve London’s new communities, at a time when the population of Spitalfields was dominated by Huguenot immigrants, Christ Church’s superhuman scale embodied a majestic flourish of power.
Three centuries later this effect is undiminished, though now the nature of its presence is less bombastic and more elusive. Sometimes, especially at night, I look up at the great cliff face of it stretching up into the dark sky and I feel like an ant, but when I walk out from the portico and the vista of Brushfield St opens to me ahead, I experience a moment of elevation as if the world were a spectacle for my sole disposal. Mostly though, it is through the punctuations in my consciousness that I know it, like the finger of God poking into a painting in an illuminated manuscript. According to my own mood and the meteorological conditions, it conjures different meanings – whether berating me, instructing me, reminding me, teasing me or beckoning me – although the precise nature of the signal remains ever ambiguous, beyond the imperative to lift up my eyes to the sky.
Taking a stroll around the territory, I set out to photograph Christ Church from different places and record its ubiquitous nature in Spitalfields. Upon my circular walk, which I undertook clockwise, travelling south then west then north then east and south again, my path traced each of the contrasted social environments that exist within the bounds of this small parish. In turn, these locations proposed different relationships with my subject which I photographed through the window of a sushi bar, from an orange grove and rising from the ruins of a demolition site.
Once upon a time the spire of Christ Church had no competition – existing as the sole pinnacle – yet although it rises now to face its much taller neighbours in the City, it holds its own as undaunted and heroic as David facing Goliath. So this is how I choose to interpret this extraordinary building which is so big that I cannot see it anymore, as the manifestation of an indomitable spirit. A sentinel to inspire me in my own equivocal day-to-day existence.
From Bangla Town Cash & Carry
From the former Bangla City Continental Supermarket, Brick Lane
From the Seven Stars
From an orange grove in Flower & Dean St
From Petticoat Lane in the City of London
From Thrawl St
From Bell Lane
From Bishops Sq
From Itsu Sushi, Broadgate
From Shoreditch High St
From Quaker St
From the Truman Brewery
From Corbet Place
From Hanbury St
From Fournier St
From the ruins of the Fruit & Wool Exchange
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The Creeping Plague Of Ghastly Facadism
As if I were being poked repeatedly in the eye with a blunt stick, I cannot avoid becoming increasingly aware of a painfully cynical trend in London architecture which threatens to turn the city into the backlot of an abandoned movie studio. If walls could speak, these would tell tales of bad compromises and angry developers who, dissatisfied with the meagre notion of repair and reuse, are driven solely by remorseless greed.
Meanwhile, bullied into sacrificing historic buildings of merit, cowed planning authorities must take consolation in the small mercy of retaining a facade. The result is that architects are humiliated into creating passive-aggressive structures, like the examples you see below – gross hybrids of conflicted intentions that scream ‘Look what you made me do!’ in bitter petulant resentment.
‘A kind of authenticity’ is British Land’s oxymoronical attempt to sell this approach in their Norton Folgate publicity, as if there were fifty-seven varieties of authenticity, when ‘authentic’ is not a relative term – something is either authentic or it is phoney.
An affront in Spitalfields
Shameless in Artillery Lane
Not even pretending in Gun St either
A sham marriage in Chiswell St
Lonely and full of dread in Smithfield
Can you spot the join in Fitzrovia?
Looming intimations of ugliness in Oxford St
A fracture in Hanway St
A hollow excuse in Central London
The veneer of luxury in the West End
A prize-winning abomination on the Caledonian Rd
Barely keeping up appearances at UCL Student Housing
In Gracechurch St, City of London
St Giles High St, Off Tottenham Court Rd
‘A kind of authenticity’ – the shape of things to come in Norton Folgate according to British Land
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John Thomas Smith’s Antient Topography
Bethelem Hospital with London Wall in Foreground – Drawn June 1812
Two centuries ago, John Thomas Smith set out to record the last vestiges of ancient London that survived from before the Great Fire of 1666 but which were vanishing in his lifetime. Click on any of the images published here to enlarge them and study the tender human detail that Smith recorded in these splendid etchings he made from his own drawings, published as Antient Topography of London, 1815. My passion for John Thomas Smith’s work was first ignited by his portraits of raffish street sellers published as Vagabondiana and I was delighted to spot several of those familiar characters included here in these vivid streets scenes of long ago.
Bethel Hospital seen from London Wall – Drawn August 1844
Old House in Sweedon’s Passage, Grub St – Drawn July 1791, Taken Down March 1805
Old House in Sweedon’s Passage, Grub St – Drawn July 1791, Taken Down March 1805
London Wall in Churchyard of St Giles’ Cripplegate – Drawn 1793, Taken Down 1803
Houses on the Corner of Chancery Lane & Fleet St – Drawn August 1789, Taken Down May 1799
Houses in Leadenhall St – Drawn July 1796
Duke St, West Smithfield – Drawn July 1807, Taken Down October 1809
Corner of Hosier Lane, West Smithfield – Drawn April 1795
Houses on the South Side of London Wall – Drawn March 1808
Houses on West Side of Little Moorfields – Drawn May 1810
Magnificent Mansion in Hart St, Crutched Friars – Drawn May 1792, Taken Down 1801
Walls of the Convent of St Clare, Minories – Drawn April 1797
Watch Tower Discovered Near Ludgate Hill – Drawn June 1792
An Arch of London Bridge in the Great Frost – Drawn February 5th 1814
Images courtesy Bishopsgate Institute
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John Thomas Smith’s Vagabondiana
Oranges & Lemons Churches
First published in 1722, there has been enormous speculation around the identity of the churches in ‘Oranges & Lemons.’ But since St Clement’s Eastcheap once stood in close proximity to St Martin Ongar within an area traditionally inhabited by moneylenders in the City of Lond0n, I deduce these are the two churches featured in the opening lines.
From here, the locations spiral out and around the City like a peal of bells blowing on the wind. The third line refers to St Sepulcre-without-Newgate which stands opposite the Old Bailey and close to the location of the Fleet Prison where debtors were held. The fourth line features St Leonard’s, Shoreditch, while the church in the fifth line is St Dunstan’s, Stepney, and rhyme culminates back in the City of London at St Mary-le-Bow, Cheapside.
St Clement’s, Eastcheap
“Oranges and lemons,” say the bells of St. Clement’s
Site of St Martin Orgar, Martin Lane
“You owe me five farthings,” say the bells of St. Martin’s
St Sepulchre-without-Newgate
“When will you pay me?” say the bells of Old Bailey
St Leonard’s, Shoreditch
“When I grow rich,” say the bells of Shoreditch
St Dunstan’s, Stepney
“When will that be?” say the bells of Stepney
St Mary Le Bow, Cheapside
“I do not know,” says the great bell of Bow
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The Cries Of Old London
My CRIES OF LONDON exhibition designed by Adam Tuck at Bishopsgate Institute closed yesterday, so I am publishing some of the panels from the show today for those who were unable to visit. Meanwhile, there are just a few tickets left for my illustrated lecture at Wanstead Tap on Tuesday 9th February. (This event is now sold out but I will be giving a lecture at the National Portrait Gallery in the summer at a date yet to be announced.)
(Click on this image to enlarge and read the text)
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(Click on this image to enlarge and read the text)
(Click on this image to enlarge and read the text)
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CLICK TO BUY A SIGNED COPY OF CRIES OF LONDON FOR £20
Beware The Curse Of Norton Folgate!
Click on Adam Dant’s map to enlarge
After Henry VIII destroyed the Priory of St Mary Spital, the Spanish Mystic, Dona Luisa de Carvajal y Mendoza who resided in Spital Sq, placed a curse upon anyone who might seek to despoil Norton Folgate in future and this week the ancient curse is making itself felt.
Ever since Boris Johnson waved through British Land’s proposal to obliterate Norton Folgate under a hideous corporate plaza last week, there has been a cloud of gloom hanging over Spitalfields, as downcast residents trudge the streets with their eyes to the pavement and hands deep in pockets.
No-one was surprised when the Mayor overturned the Council’s unanimous decision in favour of the developer, since he has done it a dozen times before, yet everyone was sickened by his vanity and the British Land executives high-fiving each other in the chamber once they got their desired result.
But yesterday there was a sudden break in the cloud, as the joyous news circulated that The Spitalfields Trust has been granted a Judicial Review to challenge Boris Johnson on of each of the four grounds upon which they believe the Mayor erred in law by intervening in the Norton Folgate case in favour of British Land’s plans to destroy more than 70% of the fabric of their site in a Conservation Area.
As our shameless Mayor approaches the end of his tenure, we await the full hearing at the High Court in the Spring – but in the meantime you can read the full text of the Judicial Review documentation by clicking here.
Boris Johnson & British Land, Beware the Curse of Norton Folgate!
Adam Dant is producing a limited edition of thirty copies of his Map of Norton Folgate at £500 each – sized 30” x 22” and all hand-tinted by the artist. Contact AdamDant@gmail.com for purchase enquiries.
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At The London Chest Hospital
Plans for the future of the former London Chest Hospital next to Victoria Park are revealed at an exhibition which opens 3-8pm today and 10-2pm on Saturday at the Methodist Church in Approach Rd, Bethnal Green. Circle Housing bought the site from the National Health Service for forty-seven million pounds and we wait to see what their scheme will offer to the 22,000 families on the housing list in the borough – and whether the ancient Mulberry which bears the distinction of being the oldest tree in the East End will survive the redevelopment.
Thanks to an invitation from a reader last year, I had the opportunity of making the acquaintance of the oldest tree in the East End, a dignified tottering specimen known as the Bethnal Green Mulberry. Imported from Persia by James I in the sixteenth century, it is more than five hundred years old and once served to feed the silkworms cultivated by local weavers.
The Mulberry originally grew in the grounds of Bishop Bonner’s Palace that stood on this site and an inkwell in the museum of the Royal London Hospital, carved from a bough in 1915, has a brass plate engraved with the sardonic yarn that the Bishop sat beneath it to enjoy shelter in the cool of the evening while deciding which heretics to execute.
My visit was a poignant occasion since the Mulberry stands today in the grounds of the London Chest Hospital which opened in 1855 and closed forever last April prior to being put up for sale by the National Health Service in advance of redevelopment. My only previous visit to the Hospital was as a patient struggling with pneumonia, when I was grateful to come here for treatment and feel reassured by its gracious architecture surrounded by trees. Of palatial design, the London Chest Hospital is a magnificent Victorian philanthropic institution where the successful campaign to rid the East End of tuberculosis in the last century was masterminded.
It was a sombre spectacle to see workmen carrying out desks and stripping the Hospital of its furniture, and when a security guard informed me that building had been sold for millions and would be demolished since “it’s not listed,” I was shocked at the potential loss of this beloved structure and the threat to the historic tree too. So now we await the developers’ plans for this much-loved East End institution and, since the Mulberry is subject to a Tree Preservation Order, we hope this will be sufficient to save it.
Gainly supported by struts that have become absorbed into the fibre of the tree over the years, it was heartening to see this ancient organism renewing itself again after five centuries. The Bethnal Green Mulberry has seen palaces and hospitals come and go, but it continues to bear fruit every summer regardless.
The Mulberry narrowly escaped destruction in World War II and charring from a bomb is still visible
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