The Punch & Judy Festival in Covent Garden
Today I preview the annual Punch & Judy Festival which is held this year on Sunday 10th May
Carmen Baggs with figures made by her father
On 9th May 1662, Samuel Pepys wrote in his diary “Thence to Covent Garden… to see an Italian puppet play that is within the rayles there, which is very pretty, the best that ever I saw, and a great resort of gallants …” It was the first record of a Punch & Judy show in London and, as a consequence, May 9th has become celebrated as Mr Punch’s birthday – when the all Punch & Judy “professors” gather each year upon the leafy green behind the church.
After an early morning shower on the day of my visit, the sun broke through to impart a lustre to the branches of may blossom growing in the churchyard, which create an elegant foliate surround to the freshly sprouting lawn, where the Punch & Judy booths were being assembled as the centrepiece of the Covent Garden May Fayre. As they set up their booths, the professors were constantly interrupted by the arrival of yet another member of their clan, and emotional greetings were exchanged as they reunited after another year on the road. Yet before long, a whole line of booths encircled the lawn and vibrant red stripes filled my vision whichever direction I chose to turn.
Peter Batty, a Punch & Judy professor of forty years, who has been coming here for thirty years, could not help feeling a touch of melancholy in the churchyard in spite of the beauty of the morn. “We go from one box to another,” he said, reaching up with the hand that was not holding Mr Punch to touch his booth protectively, and recalling those professors who will not be seen upon this green again. “I think of Joe Beeby, Percy Press – the first and the second, Hugh Cecil and Smoky the Clown,” he confided to me regretfully – “People keep getting old.”
Yet Peter works in partnership with his youthful wife, Mariake, and their fourteen year old son, Martin, who is just starting out with his own shows. “It’s such a lovely way of life, we’re really lucky when so many people have to do proper jobs, and it’s a brilliant way to bring up children.” she assured me, cradling Judy, while Martin nodded in agreement, holding the Policeman. “We play together and have a fantastic time – it suits us very well and it’s completely stress free.” she declared. They were an appealing paradox, this contented family who had found happiness in performing Mr Punch and his bizarre drama of domestic violence.
“I was just a bored housewife,” recalled Mrs Back to Front, a lively Punch & Judy professor with her brightly coloured clothes reversed, “twenty-nine years ago, I had a six month old baby and a three year old son, and I was asked to do a puppet show for a fete at his school and I was converted to it. I came here to Covent Garden and I bought a set of Punch & Judy puppets, and I got a swozzle too and found I could use it straightaway.” Then, with a chuckle of satisfaction at the exuberant life she has invented for herself and batting her glittery eyelashes in pleasure, she announced – “My six month old baby is now Dizzy Lolly – she does magic and she’s very good with a monkey puppet too.”
My next encounter was with Geoff Felix, an experienced puppeteer with a background in film, television and theatre who has been doing Punch & Judy since 1982.“I was influenced by Joe Beeby,” he explained, revealing his source of inspiration, “he saw a show in 1926, which the player learnt from someone in the nineteenth century, and Joe kept it going. And that’s how the oral tradition has been preserved.” Geoff explained that the Punch & Judy characters we recognise today, both in appearance and in the story, are based upon those of Giovanni Piccini whose play was transcribed by John Payne Collier in 1828 and illustrated by George Cruikshank. Casting his eyes around at his peers, “It is the swozzle that unites us,” he whispered to me, as if it were a sacred bond, when referring to the metal instrument in the mouth used to make the shrill voice of Mr Punch – “it forces us to create shows based in action.”
Then, Alix Booth, a feisty Scotswoman in a top hat, who has been a Punch & Judy professor for thirty-seven years, told me, “When I was eleven, I inherited a set of paper mache figures. I started working with them and in the end I was doing small shows in Lanark. I still have the figures, over a hundred years old, and although I had to replace Mr Punch’s coat, his waistcoat and trousers are perfect. My figures are based on the Piccini book of 1828, they have their mouths turned down at the ends and huge staring eyes – nowadays Mr Punch is sometimes given a smile, but I prefer him with his mouth turned down, it’s more realistic.”
“I have learnt my craft, and I can keep a children’s party happy for an hour and a half without any trouble at all.” she informed me plainly. “But it was very much for adults originally – entertainment for the Georgian man in the street and it’s full of laughs – it’s all in the timing.”
After my conversations with the professors, I was delighted to stand and enjoy the surreal quality of all the booths lined up like buses at a terminus when I have only ever seen them alone before – yet what was fascinating were the differences in spite of the common qualities. There were short fat ones and tall skinny ones, plain and fancy, with the height defined by the reach of each individual puppeteer. And while the red and white theatres standing under the great chestnut tree awaited their audiences, the professors enjoyed the quiet of the morning to catch up and swap stories.
“It has established a club, brought us all together and kept the tradition alive,” Alix asserted, turning impassioned in her enthusiasm, “And that’s so important, because every year new young performers come along and join us.” But then we were interrupted by the brass band heralding the arrival of Mr Punch and we realised that, as we had been talking, crowds of people had gathered. It was a perfect moment of early Summer in London, but for Punch & Judy professors it was the highlight of the year.
Professor David Wilde has the largest collection of Punch & Judy puppets – over six hundred.
Professor Geoffrey Felix, scenery based upon a design by Jesson and Mr Punch in the style of Piccini.
Professor James Arnott restores and repaints old figures.
Mrs Back To Front
Professor Alix Booth, thirty-seven years doing Punch & Judy professionally.
The Batty Family of Puppeteers, Mariake, Martin and Peter.
Professor Brian Baggs, also known as “Bagsie.”
Professor Paul Tuck – “I’ve only been let out for today – I’m really a ladies’ hairdresser.”
Parade to celebrate the arrival of Mr Punch in Covent Garden.
With grateful thanks to the Punch & Judy Fellowship for making the introductions
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Clare Winsten’s Drawings At 31 Fournier St
I dropped by to visit Rodney Archer, the Aesthete of Fournier St, yesterday for a Saturday afternoon cup of tea and to admire the new exhibition of drawings by Clare Winsten (born Clara Birnberg in 1894) who was the only woman artist among the so-called ‘Whitechapel Boys.’
Studying at the Slade between 1910 and 1912, with Isaac Rosenberg and David Bomberg, Clare was the sole female exhibitor in the 1914 exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery which marked the formation of the group. After her marriage to fellow artist Stephen Weinstein, she and her husband changed their names to Winsten.
This new exhibition offers a poignant opportunity to appreciate the work of an unjustly-neglected artist, whose occasional drawings reveal a lively talent and a keen observer of personality. Dating from Clare’s art school years until her death in 1989, these drawings and portrait sketches comprise the contents of a portfolio accumulated throughout a lifetime and they look at home displayed together upon the panelled rooms of Rodney’s old house on Fournier St.
Clare Winston’s Drawings are at 31 Fournier St from next Tuesday 5th until Saturday 16th May. Numbers are limited and visits are by appointment only.
To receive an invitation, please email info@31fournierstreet.london saying when exactly you would like to visit and how many will be in your party.
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The Spitalfields Trust presents ELECTION HUSTINGS with Parliamentary Candidates at 7pm on Tuesday 5th May at Toynbee Hall, Commercial St – discussing the proposed developments at Bishopsgate Goodsyard, in Norton Folgate, and on the Holland Estate. Admission free & all welcome.
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At Barn The Spoon’s Green Wood Guild
Barn the Spoon makes a May Day whistle
Taking advantage of the spring sunshine, I wandered over to Stepney City Farm to visit Barn the Spoon’s Green Wood Guild, where ancient wood working techniques are taught. Clouds of smoke were emerging from the forge and inside, Nic Westermann, a Bladesmith was teaching his students how to make knives for spoon carving. They were hammering strips of metal to forge the blades, carving wooden handles and then burning the blades into the handles to fit them in place.
Barn the Spoon and I decided to leave the noisy workshop and seek a quiet corner of the farm, where he showed me how to make a sycamore whistle – a traditional instrument to celebrate May Day and the arrival of summer.
Working quickly with practiced skill and using a straight knife of the kind I had seen being forged, Barn cut a short section from a sycamore branch. First he carved out the mouthpiece at one end and then incised a line in the bark around the circumference of the branch.
“At this time of year, there’s a lot of activity in the tree with the sap moving,” Barn informed me, while tapping his branch with the handle of his knife playfully,“so you can pull the bark from the tree.” The new year’s growth takes place where the trunk meets the bark, known as the ‘cambium,’ which allows you to slide off a neat cylinder of bark – as Barn did, once he had loosened it by tapping. It was an impressive trick.
Barn’s final step was to carve out the sound chamber for his whistle before sliding the bark back into place. Then, in a moment of expectation, he raised the whistle to his lips and, to our shared amazement, it worked. Justly proud, Barn sat there beneath the tree with his pipe at the ready to welcome summer, just like a character of legend.
Nic Westermann, Bladesmith
Nick hammers a blade
One of the students burns the knife into the wooden handle
A straight knife and a spoon knife
Barn carves the mouthpiece of his sycamore whistle
Barn demonstrates how the loose bark can be slid off the branch
Barn carves the sound chamber of the whistle
Barn tests his whistle
A sycamore whistle
[vimeo 126100072 nolink]
Barn the Spoon’s Green Wood Guild is running a MAY DAY WHISTLE WORKSHOP tomorrow Saturday 2nd May at Stepney City Farm. Anyone is welcome to come along and learn how to make a whistle during the day.
Barn the Spoon’s shop is at 260 Hackney Rd, E2 7SJ. (10am-5pm, Friday-Sunday)
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The Whitechapel Mulberry
In a narrow hidden yard behind the Good Samaritan public house at the back of the Royal London Hospital grows the ancient Whitechapel Mulberry. Roy Emmins, the sculptor, who has lived in the flats next door for more than thirty years told me about it and opened the locked wooden gates to usher me inside this week.
Overshadowed on three sides by high walls, the yard is barely used by residents but – in the middle of the day – it functions as a sun trap, and this is sufficient encouragement for the Mulberry to flourish. Entering the quiet of the yard and leaving the clamour of Whitechapel behind you, it is astonishing to encounter the venerable Mulberry sequestered there, like a mythical beast lurking in a secret den. At six feet above ground, the twisted trunk divides into three branches, angled like a candelabre and lifting up the crown towards the light. Of indeterminate age, gnarled and supported by props, the Whitechapel Mulberry still produces fruit and Roy remembers harvesting the crop with his father to make wine thirty years ago.
Once we had paid due horticultural homage , Roy took me upstairs to show me the new water features in his rooftop sculpture garden and introduce to me to his three-legged cat, Sid, who has joined the household since I last visited. From here, we were able to peer down upon the Mulberry from above and raise our eyes to enjoy the view across the Whitechapel rooftops on a perfect spring day.
The Whitechapel Mulberry
The Whitechapel Mulberry seen from Roy’s roof garden
Looking east from Roy’s roof garden
Sid, Roy’s three-legged cat, dozes in the spring sunshine
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Spiegelhalters Is Saved
In response to the campaign launched by David Collard and supported by readers of Spitalfields Life, the developers have decided to retain the facade of Spiegelhalters so that the legend may live on
Spiegelhalters, Mile End Rd
Five years ago, you could look through the metal shutter and see Spiegelhalters’ nineteenth century shopfront intact with its curved glass window and mosaic entrance floor spelling out “Spiegelhalters.” Since then, with disdainful arrogance, the owners of the building have destroyed this, leaving just the front wall of the building – and were ready to proceed with demolition to create a glass atrium when the campaign to Save Speigelhalters was launched in January of this year.
At first, the developers claimed fatuously that the void in the terrace left by the demolition would be a ‘homage’ to Speigelhalters but – after a petition signed by two thousand seven hundred people and objections by the East End Preservation Society, Victorian Society and English Heritage – Resolution Property have revised their planning application as you see below.
Demonstrating modesty worthy of Uriah Heep, the architects’ spokesman admitted, “we are not arrogant enough to believe we are right and everyone else is wrong,” then qualifed his statement by adding, “we still feel it is a slightly missed opportunity to create something more interesting.” So, although the development that is proposed for Wickham’s itself remains hideously overblown and the nineteenth century fabric of the Spiegelhalter building and its beautiful shopfront should never have been destroyed, we have been granted this small mercy.
Resolution Property have abandoned their proposal to replace the historic Spiegelhalters with a void
The revised proposal for Spiegelhalters by architects Buckley Gray Yeoman
Resolution Property’s scheme for Wickham’s
THE STORY OF SPIEGELHALTERS
Observe how the gap-toothed smile of this building undermines the pompous ambition of its classical design. Without this gaping flaw, it would be just another example of debased classicism but, thanks to the hole in the middle, it transcends its own thwarted architectural ambitions to become a work of unintentional genius.
Built in 1927, Wickham’s Department Store in the Mile End Rd was meant to be the “Harrods of East London.” The hubris of its developers was such that they simply assumed the small shopkeepers in this terrace would all fall into line and agree to move out, so the masterplan to build the new department store could proceed. But they met their match in the Spiegelhalters at 81 Mile End Rd, the shop you see sandwiched in the middle. The first Mr Spiegelhalter had set up his jewellery business in Whitechapel in 1828 when he emigrated from Germany, and his descendants moved to 81 Mile End Rd in 1880, where the business was run by three Spiegelhalter brother who had been born on the premises. These brothers refused all inducements to sell.
I wish I could have been a fly on the wall of the office of those developers because there must have been words – before they came to the painful, compromised decision to go ahead and build around the Spiegelhalters. Maybe they comforted themselves with the belief that eventually the gap could be closed and their ambitions fully realised at some later date? If so, it was a short-lived consolation because the position of the Spiegelhalters’ property was such that the central tower of Wickham’s Department Store had to be contructed off-centre with seven window bays on the left and nine on the right, rather than nine on either side. This must have been the final crushing humiliation for the developers – how the Spiegelhalter brothers must have laughed.
The presence of the word “halter” within the name Spiegelhalter cannot have escaped the notice of bystanders – “Spiegel-halter by name, halter by nature!” they surely observed. Those stubborn Spiegelhalters had the last laugh too, because the lopsided department store which opened in 1927, closed in the nineteen sixties, while the Spiegelhalters waited until 1988 to sell out, over a century after they opened. I think they made their point.
As self-evident testimony to the story of its own construction, the Wickham’s conglomeration is simultaneously a towering monument to the relentless ambition that needs to be forever modernising, and also to the contrary stick-in-the-mud instinct that sees no point in any change. Willpower turned back on itself created this unique edifice. The paradoxical architecture of Wickham’s Department Store inadvertently achieves what many architects dream of – because in its very form and structure, it expresses something profound about the contradictory nature of what it means to be human.
Wickhams seen from Whitechapel
Spiegelhalters in 1900
The Spitalfields Trust presents ELECTION HUSTINGS at 7pm on Tuesday 5th May at Toynbee Hall, Commercial St – discussing British Land’s proposals for Norton Folgate with Parliamentary Candidates. No booking required
The East End Preservation Society presents HERITAGE ACTIVISM, A FORCE FOR GOOD a talk by Loyd Grossman at St Botolph’s Church Hall, Bishopsgate at 6:30pm on Tuesday 26th May. Admission is free but email eastendpsociety@virginmedia.com to reserve your place
Huguenot Summer
The wooden spools that you see hanging in the streets of Spitalfields indicate houses where Huguenots once resided. These symbols were put there in 1985, commemorating the tercentenary of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes which brought the Huguenots to London and introduced the word ‘refugee’ into the English language. Inspired by the forthcoming Huguenot Summer which runs from May to September, I set out in search of what other visual evidence remains of the many thousands that once passed through these narrow streets and Dr Robin Gwynn, author of The Huguenots of London, explained to me how they came here.
“Spitalfields was the most concentrated Huguenot settlement in England, there was nowhere else in 1700 where you would expect to hear French spoken in the street. If you compare Spitalfields with Westminster, it was the gentry that stayed in Westminster and the working folk who came to Spitalfields – there was a significant class difference. And whereas half the churches in Westminster followed the French style of worship, in Spitalfields they were not interested in holding services in English.
The Huguenots were religious refugees, all they needed to do to stop the persecution in France was to sign a piece of paper that acknowledged the errors of John Calvin and turn up at church each Sunday. Yet if they tried to leave they were subject to Draconian punishments. It was not a planned immigration, it was about getting out when you could. And, because their skills were in their hands, weavers could leave whereas those whose livelihood was tied up in property or land couldn’t go.
Those who left couldn’t choose where they were going, it was wherever the ship happened to be bound – whether Dover or Falmouth. Turning up on the South Coast, they would head for a place where there were other French people to gain employment. Many sought a place where they could set their conscience at rest, because they may have been forced to take communion in France and needed to atone.
The best-known church was “L’Eglise Protestant” in Threadneedle St in the City of London, it dealt with the first wave of refugees by building an annexe, “L’Eglise de l’Hôpital,” in Brick Lane on the corner of Fournier St. This opened in 1743, sixty years after a temporary wooden shack was first built there. There were at least nine other Huguenot Chapels in Spitalfields by then, yet they needed this huge church – it was an indicator of how large the French community was. I don’t think you could have built a French Church of that size anywhere else in Britain at that time.The church was run by elders who made sure the religious and the secular sides tied up so, if you arrived at the church in Threadneedle St, they would send you over to Spitalfields and find you work.
It was such a big migration, estimated now at between twenty to twenty-five thousand, that among the population in the South East more than 90% have Huguenot ancestors.“
Sundial in Fournier St recording the date of the building of the Huguenot Church.
Brick Lane Mosque was originally built in 1743 as a Huguenot Church, “L’Eglise de l’Hôpital,” replacing an earlier wooden chapel on the same site, and constructed with capacious vaults which could be rented out to brewers or vintners to subsidise running costs.
Water head from 1725 at 27 Fournier St with the initials of Pierre Bourdain, a wealthy Huguenot weaver who became Headborough and had the house built for him.
The Hanbury Hall in Hanbury St was built in 1719 as a Huguenot Church, standing back from the road behind a courtyard with a pump. The building was extended in 1864 and is now the church hall for Christ Church, Spitalfields.
Coat of arms in the Hanbury Hall dating from 1740, when “La Patente” Church moved into the building, signifying the patent originally granted by James II.
In Artillery Lane, one of London oldest shop fronts, occupied from 1720 by Nicholas Jourdain, Huguenot Silk Mercer and Director of the French Hospital.
Memorial in Christ Church.
Memorial in Christ Church.
At Dennis Severs’ House in Folgate St.
Graffiti in French recently uncovered in a weavers’ loft in Elder St
Former Huguenot residence in Elder St.
The Fleur de Lis was adopted as the symbol of the Huguenots.
Sandys Row Synagogue was originally built by the Huguenots as “L’Eglise de l’Artillerie” in 1766.
Sandys Row Photograph copyright © Jeremy Freedman
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