This had been a good day, not a great day, but there were several moments which I believe will remain memorable,
I begin by explaining that for the second time in two years I have lost an expensive pair of spectacle. I forgot to claim off travel insurance for the first pair a year ago and in order to do so this time I have been following up every possible location for the loss. Prior to the visit I had contacted Travel Lodge and have been given the telephone number of the hotel and they phoned back within 24 hours to say that as described the glasses had not been registered in the lost property. The O2 arena had done a similar check although I am note sure if this also covered the Slug and Lettuce. London Underground have promised a reply within ten days and for London Buses there is a central location when a downloaded form can be posted or a visit made. I had forgotten about the National Express coach which I added to my list for this trip which also included the Cineworld at the Trocadero and the Lost Property centre of London buses. I mention all this because the one thing I did not do is keep a record of all the buses numbers and routes which I used on the previous visit.
This morning I was determined to do so and held a small note pad and pen for this purpose although I did not anticipate I would be making such great use of the bus system. I discovered there was a bus from Kings Cross to Knightsbridge and Kensington High Street (10) and which I believed was the correct location of the new Saatchi Gallery. Given that only last year I looked up and visited the new location for the Saatchi Gallery. I should have remembered better. One problem of previously making use of the faster Tube service buying the one Travel cards which provided travel throughout greater London on trains and the Tube, as well as buses is that one rises from the depths at most central destinations and this does not provide a sense of geography of the relationship of the place with the whole. After today I have a clear sense of the location of Victoria, Sloan Square and the Kings Road, and the Fulham Road, of Knightsbridge, The Brompton Road and the Oratory and on to South Kensington and the Exhibition centres for the Victoria and Albert( Art and Design) and Natural History and the Science Museums, the West side of Hyde Park through to Kensington Gardens and Kensington High Street passing the Albert Memorial and the Royal Albert Hall. This would not have been achieved without using the bus system and making the initial mistake underlining the poor decision not to bring a street map and guide. My trip to Knightsbridge in the morning and getting 30 bus from Oxford Street to Kings Cross on the way back meant that I passed the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in the morning and the Royal School of Art and design in the later afternoon. There was also the centre for Tropical Medicine and the splendid establishment on several floors for umbrellas and sticks at the junction with New Oxford Street, James Smith and Sons was established in 1830 and the store retains its Victorian fittings. It also reminds that close to the Royal Scott on the way to Kings Cross is the Luggage centre also offering up to 50% discounts.
The bus route took me through Gower Street Bedford and Bloomsbury and Great Russell all areas associated with Social Work, the Association of Child Care Officers and Hotels used on trip involving the local authority and its Councillors. I do not think I have previously mentioned that part of the Centre Point building complex houses the 101 project, however nothing related to my work alas.
It was the sight of Knightsbridge and Harrods that on impulse I decided to get off and walk through the store. The last occasion I had visited was to sign to condolence book for loss of Dodi Al Fayed. Usually I could only afford to visit the super loos although I did visit to but a pair of small silver doves. Later I saw one of the tradition small Harrods delivery vehicles with their drives in top had and morning dress.
Harrods is located on a road which leads to the Brompton Oratory, to South Kensington Station and Exhibition Road. Whenever I have passed the Oratory I remember a former work colleague from Middlesex House, also in his first job, but older and engaged to be married. They were Italian Catholics and he had attended the Oratory school and I had joined him with a school friend of mine and others for a picnic in Epping Forest one weekend. I lost contact after leaving Middlesex House in 1957 but I have often wondered what kind of lives the couple had over the past 50 years. I continued to have contact with my other colleague who had introduced me to the Soho jazz world for a few years afterwards and in 1964, seven years after leaving, I met one of the secretarial staff, in the staff restaurant of Norfolk County Council. She now worked for that Council, while I was undertaking a three month practical work placement in the Children’s Department before finishing my course at Birmingham University and qualifying for the Home Office Certificate.
Arriving at the Exhibition road I decided to visit the Victoria and Albert Museum of Art and design which I cannot recall visiting before. This is an extraordinary building with fine staircases and a magnificent courtyard on one side of which there is the extraordinary restaurant area. This comprise a central area where is located various food bars which some of the largest scones I have seen as well as giant breads with meal size fillings. These cost £5. The range for cream scone teas appears unlimited. I paid £1.50 at Azda for a prepared scone with a slice of strawberry and DIY cup of tea which was excellent. You received a separate large pot of lightly whipped cream but the tea was in a plastic cup for £2.30 at Nottingham cricket ground. It is £2.50 at Durham cricket Ground and was £6.50 at Saatchi. If you want a selection of fine sandwich quarters, a slice of cake, even a mini sausage roll in addition the total price is also variable with £4 special offer at M and S, £4.50 at Durham and £10.50 and Saatchi. Price is not an indicator of quantity or quality.
I am not good and at having a slow systematic view of exhibitions, rather rush around looking for an object which excites, interests and engages and makes me say Wow. This was my reaction at he V A to rooms of the art and designs of other cultures including the Jamaal gallery of Islamic art. I am looking forward to going back after the knew Medieval and Renaissance area is opened this Winter I did enjoy the two floors on the British History of Design and art and spent half an hour in one of the film rooms where there are hour long collections of films shown throughout the day. I saw a collection of pre 1900 films together with one on the Great Exhibition of 1851 and the burning down of the Crystal Palace location, not at Crystal Palace, but in Hyde Park. I noted that the best crowd with many families and also students with sketch pads was on the design history of British clothing.
By the time I left the crowds were arriving and there was a great queue for the bag search at the Natural History Museum but a small one outside the science museum. I was still confused about my sense of direction and wondered more in the direction of Knightsbridge than Kensington admiring the University building, the terraces of for former private family homes, some still with their proximity to Hyde Park. Many of those fronting the Park are embassies or homes for the Ambassadors. It was at this point I got on a 452 bus to Kensington High Street, not realising that I had I got on the same route in the opposite direction I would have been taken to Sloane Square nearby the Saatchi Gallery in the Kings Road. The trip to Kensington High Street was not wasted as I went into Marks and Spencer’s and bought a carton of sticky chicken wings for £2,99 and a packet of Pain au chocolate for £1.99 and went to look for a pleasant square in which there a seat.
Thinking this was most likely to be outside Saatchi I doubled back to where the 452 had dropped me off, as the reverse route was to Sloane Square having remembered that the gallery was along the Kings Cross a short way from Sloane Square. Crossing over the road and approaching the corner I spied a lane described as a walk and where I could see some greenery and seating at one end. In fact there were four separate small gardens with seating opened by the Mayor two decades before with funds from a group of interests. Although there were four separate garden areas, there were no more than a dozen benches but I found one unoccupied where I enjoyed the chicken wings and two of pains, placing the other two in small container brought for the very purpose. Eating the chicken wings was messy business but I had also brought with sheets of kitchen role to dry the fingers after licking them and also using to wipe my face. About a couple of dozen other with their M and S bags or of other supermarkets came to enjoy their lunch in these pleasant surroundings. Afterwards I followed the walk which led to a church and also to an interesting row of small shops including one which sold coloured hats for men. Eventually I came out the road where as suspected there was a bus stop for required bus and we went back along the side of Hyde Park to Knightsbridge.
I was once more struck by the gold of the Prince Albert Statue opposite the Hall which also bears his name. The son was fully out and there were many people in Gardens as the bus passed Kensington Palace and Barracks.
Sloane continues to hold memories because this where my one and only play written after prison in 1960 had been sent to the English Stage Company and their readers had found the writing of interest and asked to see what else I had written and of course I had not, and then went off to Ruskin and into Child Care Social Work.
I had not enjoyed my precious visit to Saatchi for the China exhibition so that on American Abstract was expected to interest me more. Alas it did not and there was no WOW in the way the Saatchi 100 works which changed British art had done and where most if not all the works had been destroyed in the warehouse fire. There was one exhibit left from the China show in the basement display area there is the work of Sun Yuan and Peng You as the collection of world leaders as old men move around the room endlessly in their wheel chairs nearly colliding but now harmless where as previously they drove their peoples into near annihilation. This remaining exhibit from the Revolution continues is worth making a visit on its own account. The works that attracted my longest attention were not part of American Abstract but the Phillips De Pury Gallery show case of Korean Contemporary art. The Saatchi on line Gallery with links remains the best reminder of past triumphs and of being my first time lucky.
Although I had eaten I rested tired on a bench outside in the sunshine opposite the restaurant and looked at the two latest editions of Art and Music and the glossy Sloane Square Magazine. It was an advert for a free lunchtime concert at Cadogan Hall caught my eye as did two local young women, complete with docile dog eating at the restaurant opposite who leapt out at one as if having come straight of a plane from the Cannes film festival or off some society bash pictured in OK magazine. This reminds of a conversation heard in the Marks and Spencer’s Food Hall High Street Ken when a young make voice enquired what his companion had been doing since completing A levels and she said I had a week in New York and their voices tailed as turned to catch sight of two young people who one would put into the category of Sloanes.
I walked the comparatively short length of the Kings Road from Sloane to the cinema and Library, the full length of the road is two miles and was struck by its gentrification and that it lacked any distinctive character and could be interchanged with Kensington High Street and Knightsbridge. The days when the Kings Road was an integral part of the swinging sixties have long gone but I did reminisce over an expensive diet coke at the Chelsea Potter, which remains the same as in the days when frequented by Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones. I once came on a foray to the Chelsea Jazz club but where it was located I no longer remember and is not to be confused with 606 the present with club renowned for food as well as jazz which commenced life only in 1976.
It was time to go in search of my missing glasses and I found a bus which took me to Victoria Coach station. I have made a note of the number somewhere but this ceases to have the importance it had the time. At the station I was directed from the bus information point at the entrance to the National Express customer service area which involved crossing the entrance where the coaches arrived and was advised that anything found on coaches from the North East was held at Durham and give the phone number. From the coach station there number 38 bus took me to outside the Victoria Railway station, worth remembering for the return home journey. I could have arrange to from Golders Green but this would have meant taking an available aisle seat with all the best seats taken. At Victoria I could have taken the double bendy bus all the way to Kings Cross (73) but wanted to call in at the Cineworld Trocadero. I passed the Royal Academy which features much in the series on Millais, Hunt, Rossetti and co and thought that the Summer exhibition was a good idea for Thursday.
The ticket cashier phone through but could not get in contact with the duty manager and advised that I speak to a member of staff with a Walkie Talkie Radio which before doing I encountered the duty manger directing someone with a trolley of ice creams an drinks for some party she was entertaining. She was startled by my approach and I was ordered to wait where I was standing while she completed the task in hand with a colleague and when off for what seemed a long time. Then a young man advised that the item as described had not been found and apologised for my loss, a nice touch.
Back on the Street distributors of the two free evening newspapers pressed hundreds of thousands of copies into the hands of every passer by. Both announced that the Troc was yet to have another reincarnation since the days when it was the home of L Lyons tea houses. This time part was to be converted into a pod hotel, Japanese style of inexpensive rooms without windows which some people seem to like. The price would set around £40 a night compared to my £9 for a fully ensuite facility.
I then got a bus to Selfridges where I knew I would get another bus to Kings Cross. There was opportunity to visit the M and S Food Hall opposite when I bought two bread rolls, Duck Pate, Olives, Grapes and a bottle of cold still water, most of which I consumed outside before going for the bus to the Hotel. I considered myself to have become an expert at getting across London by bus. I spent the rest of the evening drinking tea and Diet Pepsi Coke as well as making full use of the fan which I kept going over my body all night.
I begin by explaining that for the second time in two years I have lost an expensive pair of spectacle. I forgot to claim off travel insurance for the first pair a year ago and in order to do so this time I have been following up every possible location for the loss. Prior to the visit I had contacted Travel Lodge and have been given the telephone number of the hotel and they phoned back within 24 hours to say that as described the glasses had not been registered in the lost property. The O2 arena had done a similar check although I am note sure if this also covered the Slug and Lettuce. London Underground have promised a reply within ten days and for London Buses there is a central location when a downloaded form can be posted or a visit made. I had forgotten about the National Express coach which I added to my list for this trip which also included the Cineworld at the Trocadero and the Lost Property centre of London buses. I mention all this because the one thing I did not do is keep a record of all the buses numbers and routes which I used on the previous visit.
This morning I was determined to do so and held a small note pad and pen for this purpose although I did not anticipate I would be making such great use of the bus system. I discovered there was a bus from Kings Cross to Knightsbridge and Kensington High Street (10) and which I believed was the correct location of the new Saatchi Gallery. Given that only last year I looked up and visited the new location for the Saatchi Gallery. I should have remembered better. One problem of previously making use of the faster Tube service buying the one Travel cards which provided travel throughout greater London on trains and the Tube, as well as buses is that one rises from the depths at most central destinations and this does not provide a sense of geography of the relationship of the place with the whole. After today I have a clear sense of the location of Victoria, Sloan Square and the Kings Road, and the Fulham Road, of Knightsbridge, The Brompton Road and the Oratory and on to South Kensington and the Exhibition centres for the Victoria and Albert( Art and Design) and Natural History and the Science Museums, the West side of Hyde Park through to Kensington Gardens and Kensington High Street passing the Albert Memorial and the Royal Albert Hall. This would not have been achieved without using the bus system and making the initial mistake underlining the poor decision not to bring a street map and guide. My trip to Knightsbridge in the morning and getting 30 bus from Oxford Street to Kings Cross on the way back meant that I passed the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in the morning and the Royal School of Art and design in the later afternoon. There was also the centre for Tropical Medicine and the splendid establishment on several floors for umbrellas and sticks at the junction with New Oxford Street, James Smith and Sons was established in 1830 and the store retains its Victorian fittings. It also reminds that close to the Royal Scott on the way to Kings Cross is the Luggage centre also offering up to 50% discounts.
The bus route took me through Gower Street Bedford and Bloomsbury and Great Russell all areas associated with Social Work, the Association of Child Care Officers and Hotels used on trip involving the local authority and its Councillors. I do not think I have previously mentioned that part of the Centre Point building complex houses the 101 project, however nothing related to my work alas.
It was the sight of Knightsbridge and Harrods that on impulse I decided to get off and walk through the store. The last occasion I had visited was to sign to condolence book for loss of Dodi Al Fayed. Usually I could only afford to visit the super loos although I did visit to but a pair of small silver doves. Later I saw one of the tradition small Harrods delivery vehicles with their drives in top had and morning dress.
Harrods is located on a road which leads to the Brompton Oratory, to South Kensington Station and Exhibition Road. Whenever I have passed the Oratory I remember a former work colleague from Middlesex House, also in his first job, but older and engaged to be married. They were Italian Catholics and he had attended the Oratory school and I had joined him with a school friend of mine and others for a picnic in Epping Forest one weekend. I lost contact after leaving Middlesex House in 1957 but I have often wondered what kind of lives the couple had over the past 50 years. I continued to have contact with my other colleague who had introduced me to the Soho jazz world for a few years afterwards and in 1964, seven years after leaving, I met one of the secretarial staff, in the staff restaurant of Norfolk County Council. She now worked for that Council, while I was undertaking a three month practical work placement in the Children’s Department before finishing my course at Birmingham University and qualifying for the Home Office Certificate.
Arriving at the Exhibition road I decided to visit the Victoria and Albert Museum of Art and design which I cannot recall visiting before. This is an extraordinary building with fine staircases and a magnificent courtyard on one side of which there is the extraordinary restaurant area. This comprise a central area where is located various food bars which some of the largest scones I have seen as well as giant breads with meal size fillings. These cost £5. The range for cream scone teas appears unlimited. I paid £1.50 at Azda for a prepared scone with a slice of strawberry and DIY cup of tea which was excellent. You received a separate large pot of lightly whipped cream but the tea was in a plastic cup for £2.30 at Nottingham cricket ground. It is £2.50 at Durham cricket Ground and was £6.50 at Saatchi. If you want a selection of fine sandwich quarters, a slice of cake, even a mini sausage roll in addition the total price is also variable with £4 special offer at M and S, £4.50 at Durham and £10.50 and Saatchi. Price is not an indicator of quantity or quality.
I am not good and at having a slow systematic view of exhibitions, rather rush around looking for an object which excites, interests and engages and makes me say Wow. This was my reaction at he V A to rooms of the art and designs of other cultures including the Jamaal gallery of Islamic art. I am looking forward to going back after the knew Medieval and Renaissance area is opened this Winter I did enjoy the two floors on the British History of Design and art and spent half an hour in one of the film rooms where there are hour long collections of films shown throughout the day. I saw a collection of pre 1900 films together with one on the Great Exhibition of 1851 and the burning down of the Crystal Palace location, not at Crystal Palace, but in Hyde Park. I noted that the best crowd with many families and also students with sketch pads was on the design history of British clothing.
By the time I left the crowds were arriving and there was a great queue for the bag search at the Natural History Museum but a small one outside the science museum. I was still confused about my sense of direction and wondered more in the direction of Knightsbridge than Kensington admiring the University building, the terraces of for former private family homes, some still with their proximity to Hyde Park. Many of those fronting the Park are embassies or homes for the Ambassadors. It was at this point I got on a 452 bus to Kensington High Street, not realising that I had I got on the same route in the opposite direction I would have been taken to Sloane Square nearby the Saatchi Gallery in the Kings Road. The trip to Kensington High Street was not wasted as I went into Marks and Spencer’s and bought a carton of sticky chicken wings for £2,99 and a packet of Pain au chocolate for £1.99 and went to look for a pleasant square in which there a seat.
Thinking this was most likely to be outside Saatchi I doubled back to where the 452 had dropped me off, as the reverse route was to Sloane Square having remembered that the gallery was along the Kings Cross a short way from Sloane Square. Crossing over the road and approaching the corner I spied a lane described as a walk and where I could see some greenery and seating at one end. In fact there were four separate small gardens with seating opened by the Mayor two decades before with funds from a group of interests. Although there were four separate garden areas, there were no more than a dozen benches but I found one unoccupied where I enjoyed the chicken wings and two of pains, placing the other two in small container brought for the very purpose. Eating the chicken wings was messy business but I had also brought with sheets of kitchen role to dry the fingers after licking them and also using to wipe my face. About a couple of dozen other with their M and S bags or of other supermarkets came to enjoy their lunch in these pleasant surroundings. Afterwards I followed the walk which led to a church and also to an interesting row of small shops including one which sold coloured hats for men. Eventually I came out the road where as suspected there was a bus stop for required bus and we went back along the side of Hyde Park to Knightsbridge.
I was once more struck by the gold of the Prince Albert Statue opposite the Hall which also bears his name. The son was fully out and there were many people in Gardens as the bus passed Kensington Palace and Barracks.
Sloane continues to hold memories because this where my one and only play written after prison in 1960 had been sent to the English Stage Company and their readers had found the writing of interest and asked to see what else I had written and of course I had not, and then went off to Ruskin and into Child Care Social Work.
I had not enjoyed my precious visit to Saatchi for the China exhibition so that on American Abstract was expected to interest me more. Alas it did not and there was no WOW in the way the Saatchi 100 works which changed British art had done and where most if not all the works had been destroyed in the warehouse fire. There was one exhibit left from the China show in the basement display area there is the work of Sun Yuan and Peng You as the collection of world leaders as old men move around the room endlessly in their wheel chairs nearly colliding but now harmless where as previously they drove their peoples into near annihilation. This remaining exhibit from the Revolution continues is worth making a visit on its own account. The works that attracted my longest attention were not part of American Abstract but the Phillips De Pury Gallery show case of Korean Contemporary art. The Saatchi on line Gallery with links remains the best reminder of past triumphs and of being my first time lucky.
Although I had eaten I rested tired on a bench outside in the sunshine opposite the restaurant and looked at the two latest editions of Art and Music and the glossy Sloane Square Magazine. It was an advert for a free lunchtime concert at Cadogan Hall caught my eye as did two local young women, complete with docile dog eating at the restaurant opposite who leapt out at one as if having come straight of a plane from the Cannes film festival or off some society bash pictured in OK magazine. This reminds of a conversation heard in the Marks and Spencer’s Food Hall High Street Ken when a young make voice enquired what his companion had been doing since completing A levels and she said I had a week in New York and their voices tailed as turned to catch sight of two young people who one would put into the category of Sloanes.
I walked the comparatively short length of the Kings Road from Sloane to the cinema and Library, the full length of the road is two miles and was struck by its gentrification and that it lacked any distinctive character and could be interchanged with Kensington High Street and Knightsbridge. The days when the Kings Road was an integral part of the swinging sixties have long gone but I did reminisce over an expensive diet coke at the Chelsea Potter, which remains the same as in the days when frequented by Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones. I once came on a foray to the Chelsea Jazz club but where it was located I no longer remember and is not to be confused with 606 the present with club renowned for food as well as jazz which commenced life only in 1976.
It was time to go in search of my missing glasses and I found a bus which took me to Victoria Coach station. I have made a note of the number somewhere but this ceases to have the importance it had the time. At the station I was directed from the bus information point at the entrance to the National Express customer service area which involved crossing the entrance where the coaches arrived and was advised that anything found on coaches from the North East was held at Durham and give the phone number. From the coach station there number 38 bus took me to outside the Victoria Railway station, worth remembering for the return home journey. I could have arrange to from Golders Green but this would have meant taking an available aisle seat with all the best seats taken. At Victoria I could have taken the double bendy bus all the way to Kings Cross (73) but wanted to call in at the Cineworld Trocadero. I passed the Royal Academy which features much in the series on Millais, Hunt, Rossetti and co and thought that the Summer exhibition was a good idea for Thursday.
The ticket cashier phone through but could not get in contact with the duty manager and advised that I speak to a member of staff with a Walkie Talkie Radio which before doing I encountered the duty manger directing someone with a trolley of ice creams an drinks for some party she was entertaining. She was startled by my approach and I was ordered to wait where I was standing while she completed the task in hand with a colleague and when off for what seemed a long time. Then a young man advised that the item as described had not been found and apologised for my loss, a nice touch.
Back on the Street distributors of the two free evening newspapers pressed hundreds of thousands of copies into the hands of every passer by. Both announced that the Troc was yet to have another reincarnation since the days when it was the home of L Lyons tea houses. This time part was to be converted into a pod hotel, Japanese style of inexpensive rooms without windows which some people seem to like. The price would set around £40 a night compared to my £9 for a fully ensuite facility.
I then got a bus to Selfridges where I knew I would get another bus to Kings Cross. There was opportunity to visit the M and S Food Hall opposite when I bought two bread rolls, Duck Pate, Olives, Grapes and a bottle of cold still water, most of which I consumed outside before going for the bus to the Hotel. I considered myself to have become an expert at getting across London by bus. I spent the rest of the evening drinking tea and Diet Pepsi Coke as well as making full use of the fan which I kept going over my body all night.
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