STREET FURNITURE

 

See Also: THE CITY OF LONDON The Sentinel Dragons; COAL Coal Holes; COAL Coal Tax Posts; NOT CHOCOLATE; WATERGATES

 

Benches

The Camden Bench

The Camden Bench was commissioned by Camden Council. Its design is supposed to discourage 22 types of behaviour that are deemed to be anti-social. It is angular and made of concrete. The critic Frank Swain dubbed it 'the perfect anti-object'.

The Victoria Embankment Benches

The adornments to the benches along the Victoria Embankment. To the east, in the City of London, they are pairs of camels and to the west, in the City of Westminster, trios of sphinxes.

See Also: THE THAMES The Embankment and Sir Joseph Bazalgette

 

Boot Scrapers

After 1760 boot scrapers began to be placed by doors. This was because streets were being paved and gentry were walking rather than go everywhere by carriage or sedan chair.

See Also: FOOTWEAR RELATED; STREET FURNITURE Paving

 

Bus Shelters

Adshel erects bus shelters for local authorities in return for the right to display advertising on them. The company was set up in 1969 by the billboard companies More O'Ferrall and London & Provincial.

See Also: BUSES Bus Stops, Bus Shelters

 

Gates

See Also: DOWNING STREET The Downing Street Gates

The Green Park Gates

The Green Park Gates (c.1735) were made of wrought iron for what became the 1st Lord Heathfield's house at Turnham Green.1 In 1837 they were re-erected a short distance away at Chiswick House, the Dukes of Devonshire's Middlesex country house. In 1898 the gates were moved to stand in front of their graces London townhouse - Devonshire House in Piccadilly. In 1921 they were re-re-erected where they now stand.

Looking southwards through the Gates it is possible to view a vista at the far southern end of which is the Queen Victoria Memorial (1911), which stands in front of Buckingham Palace.

Location: Opposite 92 Piccadilly, c.W1J 8HX (purple, orange)

See Also: THE ROYAL PARKS Green Park; TOWNHOUSES, DISAPPEARED Beaufort House

1. Lord Heathfield was a senior Army officer who was very fond of cats.

 

House Numbers

As part of a campaign to encourage householders to adopt house numbers, the 1st Duke of Wellington (d.1852) agreed that Apsley House should be given the address of No. 1 London, Hyde Park Corner. The thinking behind this allocation seems to have been that the property was the first building to the east of the Hyde Park Corner turnpike toll gate. (A sign to the left of the townhouse's main door gives the building's address as being not No. 1 London but rather No. 149 Piccadilly.)

Location: Apsley House, 149 Piccadilly, W1J 7NT (red, brown)

See Also: CLUBLAND Brooks's; TOWNHOUSES Apsley House

 

Lampposts

See Also: HORSES Rotten Row; LIGHTING Street Lighting

Sewer Light

The methane in the sewer system used to build up to such dangerously high levels that some tunnels became potentially fatal for people to work in. Therefore, it became a practice to lead off some of the gas. However, to have released large amounts of it into central London would have been unacceptable. Therefore, the methane was fed upwards into specially engineered lampposts. These provided some streets with lighting 24 hours a day. The sewer street lights in central London were installed by the Gas Light & Coke Company.

In Carting Street there is a Webb Patent Sewer Gas Lamp. It is an Iron Lily that was made in the 1880s. It has Grade II heritage status.

Location: The Patent Sewer Ventilating Lamp, Carting Lane, WC2R 0BN (brown, yellow)

See Also: GAS; LAVATORIES Convenience Combustibility; LIGHTING Gas Lighting; SEWAGE

 

The London Stone

It is possible that the London Stone was a Roman mile stone. For centuries it stood in the middle of Cannon Street. There is also a tradition of legends and stories that are associated with the object. The first literary reference to it dates from the early 10thC. In the 12thC it was a notable enough feature to be referred to on maps. It became a place where people would make formal declarations. These they would solemnise by striking the Stone with something that they held in their hands.

In 1798 there was a proposal that the London Stone should be removed because it was a hindrance to traffic. However, Thomas Maiden, a printer, led a successful campaign for it to be retained in the vicinity. The Stone was then set into the wall of St Swithin's Church.

In 1941 the church was damaged by an aerial bomb. However, the Stone was relatively undamaged.

Location: 111 Cannon Street, EC4N 5AR (blue, brown)

See Also: CITY LIVERY COMPANIES The Spectacle Makers Company; FOLK TRADITIONS Legends

Website: https://londonstone.org.uk

 

Manhole Covers

To American eyes British manhole covers can seem to lack pizazz.

 

The Milestone Society

The Milestone Society was founded in 2000. The organisation endeavours to help preserve milestones in situ.

Website: www.milestonesociety.co.uk

 

Parking Meters

Foreign diplomats in the U.K. are exempt from taxes but not tolls. This is why some claim that they do not need to pay their parking fines.

 

Paving

Following the Great Fire of 1666 the City of London started paving its streets and roads with stone.

The willingness to pay for paving streets derived in part from a wish to trap in the soil what were believed to be miasma gases that were held to cause disease.

See Also: BUILDING MATERIALS Stone; THE GREAT FIRE OF LONDON The Rebuilding of London; ROADS; STREET FURNITURE Boot Scrapers

The Chewing Gum That Isn t

Lecanora muralis is a light grey-coloured lichen that looks like chewing gum that has been discarded onto a pavement and trodden on. At its edges it is much more frayed than flattened gum is.

See Also: CONFECTIONERY Chewing Gum

Website: www.britishlichensociety.org.uk (The British Lichen Society)

The Paviors' Company

In 1479 the City Corporation endorsed the Paviors' Company's ordinances thereby bestowing upon the guild the right to control road maintenance in the City of London. In 1515 the Lord Mayor gave the Company the 56th place in the livery companies order of precedence. In 1672 the body wished that it should be granted a royal charter, however, the City's Court of Aldermen vetoed the idea. During the 19thC there was a surge in construction, the Company had little control over this. A royal charter was granted finally in 2004.

See Also: CITY LIVERY COMPANIES

Website: www.paviors.org.uk

Rubber

Horse carts had metal wheels. These made an immense amount of noise when they ran over cobbles.

In 1930 Parliament discussed an experimental rubber pavement that had been lain in the City four years earlier. Repeated repairs had had to be made. The scheme was not extended. After the Second World War there were far fewer horse carts.

Location: New Bridge Street, EC4V 6AL (purple, blue)

The Westminster Paving Commission

Outside of the City of London, paving used to be the responsibility of individual householders. It was one that most people shirked.

The Westminster Paving Commissioners was established by the Westminster Paving Act of 1762, which vested the body a range of statutory powers. The first streets that it paved were Parliament Street, Charing Cross, Pall Mall, and Cockspur Street. Squared blocks of Aberdeen granite were used. From this start the process spread out across the neighbouring districts.

In 1771 an Act provided scope for some of the Commission's powers to be transferred to the local vestries. The local authorities assumed these slowly. In 1835 the body was formally wound up.

Location: Cockspur Street, SW1Y 5BL (orange, turquoise)

See Also: LIGHTING Gas Lighting; LOCAL GOVERNMENT Vestries; THE ROYAL PARKS The Regent's Park, The Crown Estate Paving Commission

Wooden Blocks

In the early 19thC the Admiralty maintained a Fungus Pit at Woolwich to test wood preservatives

John Kyan (1774-1850) developed a wood preservative that based upon bichloride of mercury. In 1828 an oak block that had been treated with it was placed by the Admiralty in its Fungus Pit at Woolwich. Three years later it was retrieved and was found to be sound. Cyanisation became a term for preserving wood. However, it corroded iron. The physician Sir William Burnett (1779-1861) devised Burnett's Liquid, a zinc chloride wood preservative that did not corrode iron. He patented it in 1838.

Until 1839 granite blocs were used. They created a lot of noise and wore away the metal of wheel rims.

After 1839 cyanised wood was used for paving wood. Started in the Old Bailey. The Improved Wood Pavement Company was the dominant business by the 1880s. The 02 site was where millions of wood blocks were made.

Wood was less wearing on the horses than asphalt.

After the Second World War, the wooden blocks were taken up.

See Also: BUILDING MATERIALS Timber

 

Pillar Boxes

Anthony Trollope was sent to the Channel Islands to inspect their postal services. He concluded that they could be improved if receptacles for letters were placed on side-street of St Helier, Jersey. The first pillar boxes were installed on the island in 1852. In 1855 London's first ones were put in place. The original post-boxes were black and gold.

In the U.K. there are only seven Edward VIII boxes. One is sited at Hermitage Road, Beulah.

Post boxes are and made of cast iron and are painted red. They carry the initials of whichever monarch is reigning at the time of their erection.

Sir Ron Dearing

Sir Ron Dearing was an able, self-effacing person who had a successful career as a Whitehall mandarin. During the early and mid-1980s he served as the chairman of the Post Office. It is reputed that, during the years that he led the Office, he used to keep a tin of red paint in the boot of his car. Whenever he saw a pillar box that had been defaced he would stop his vehicle and repair the damage to his charge.

See Also: CHRISTMAS Christmas Cards, Robins; CIVIL SERVANTS Mandarins, Sir Ron Dearing

Hexagonal Posting Boxes

The Penfold letterbox is hexagonal. It was designed by J.W. Penfold and started to be installed in 1865. Fourteen years later the design was dropped in favour of the cylindrical design. Letter boxes only started to be painted red in 1874

A number of hexagonal Victorian pillar boxes survive in West London.

Location: 276-280 Kensington High Street, W8 6ND (purple, orange)

(In front of) 32 St Leonard's Terrace, SW3 4QH (red, turquoise)

 

Pillories

Being placed in the pillory could be fatal for people who were profoundly unpopular with the public. In 1731 Mother Needham, a brothelkeeper, was stoned while secured in a pillory close to Park Place. She died three days later. She had been due to have a second spell in the stocks.

The use of pillories was abolished by legislation in 1837.

Location: Park Place, SW1A 1LP (red, yellow)

See Also: PLACES OF EXECUTION; PRISONS, DISAPPEARED

 

The Policeman's Hook

A hook was placed on 4 Great Newport Street during the 1930s. This was so that policeman who were directing traffic could have somewhere to hang their capes.

Location: 4 Great Newport Street, WC2H 7JB (red, blue)

See Also: TRAFFIC CONTROL

 

The Porters' Bar

The porters' rest (1861), opposite No. 127 Piccadilly, on the southern side of the road, was constructed to enable foot porters to have an opportunity to relieve the strain of the weight of the burdens that they were carrying. The loads could be rested upon the board that topped the structure.

It was erected at the suggestion of Robert Slaney (1792-1862), who was an M.P. for Shrewsbury. He was a Liberal who was interested in the poor and the growing towns and cities. The Vestry of St George Hanover Square put it up in 1861.

Location: Piccadilly, W1J 7PX. The bar. (orange, yellow)

 

Postal Districts

N.E. was ascribed to Hackney. In 1867 Hackney lost its N.E. designation, which was assigned to Newcastle. It survives on some road signs.

 

Railings

In 1941 most of London's squares were stripped of their railings in order to provide metal for the war effort. However, this seems to have been done principally in order to try to boost people's morale. They had too high a carbon content to be of use. It is reputed that vast piles of railings were left to rust. Sixty years later many of them had not been replaced.

There is a story that when it was appreciated that the railings were not useful for anything they were dumped in the Thames. The site it meant to be marked out by buoys. It is supposed to be next to an arms dump.

See Also: MOVIES Dr Roget's Deception

Pineapples

Some of the railings in front of pre-20thC houses are topped by what look pine cones. They are meant to be leafless pineapples.

See Also: FRUIT Pineapples

 

Signs

In a society with high rates of illiteracy, and in which glass, was very expensive, signs enabled businesses to make their trade known to passing members of the public. Pub signs, barbers red and white poles, and the three golden orbs of pawnbrokers are the only ones that are still widely recognised in Britain. In 1762 a sign fell and killed four passers-by. Subsequently, an Act of Parliament banned signs being hung over public thoroughfares in the City and Westminster.

The frying pan was a sign for ironmongers.

Location: Artillery Passage, E1 7LJ. (The passage is adorned with placard signs.) (blue, brown)

See Also: GROOMING Barbers; PUBS

Chinatown

In Chinatown the colour red is very evident. This is because people of Chinese culture traditionally associate it with good fortune and prosperity.

Location: Gerrard Street, W1D 5PR (blue, yellow)

Lombard Street

Extending out over the pavements from both sides of Lombard Street are a series of street signs: a grasshopper; an anchor; a cat and fiddle (or cello, depending in the size of the cat); a castle front; and a man with a large wig and a crown. These were hung in celebration of King Edward VII's 1902 coronation.

Location: Lombard Street, EC4N 7BJ (blue, pink)

The Martin's Cat

The Black Cat was the sign of Martins Bank. The company was acquired by Barclays in 1969.

Location: 72 Kensington High Street, W8 4PE (purple, orange)

Pawnbrokers

For many years pawnbroking was a secondary trade that was carried out by individuals who had another principal trade. In 1751 publicans were banned from taking pledges.

The original sign of pawnbrokers was the Three Bowls. Variants of it were Three Blue Bowls and the Three Blue Balls. The first known instance of Three Golden Balls dates from 1731. However, after 1760 it developed considerable popularity.

Location: Fetter Lane, EC4A 1BX. In the 16thC the street was renowned for its pawnbrokers. (orange, yellow)

 

Street Signs

See Also: LONDON Street Names and Place Names

Chinatown

Chinatown's signs contain Chinese characters. Quite why there should be a character for 'Macclesfield,' as in 'Macclesfield Street', may well be a mystery.

Location: Gerrard Street, W1D 5PR (blue, yellow)

Macclesfield Street, W1D 6AX (blue, red)

See Also: CHINESE FOOD; SOHO Peoples & Cultures

Typefaces

In 1967 Sir Misha Black changed the typeface that Westminster used for its street signs. He adopted Univers, which had been designed the Swiss typographer Adreian Frutiger (1928-2015). The latter had appreciated that the letters in serif typefaces were hard to read at a distance.

Other typefaces that Frutiger's designed included: Avenir, Frutiger, and Méridien.

Whitehall's End

On the western side of Whitehall, to the south of Downing Street, there is a street sign name that reads 'Whitehall SW1' on one half and 'Parliament Street SW1' on the other.

Parliament Square seems to have a particular effect on streets that run into it - they suddenly assume new identities - Birdcage Walk assumes the nom de route Great George Street, while Whitehall metamorphoses into being Parliament Street, and Victoria Street changes into Broad Sanctuary.

The cause of such name changes usually lies in the different sections of street lying on different properties. Prior to the burning down of Whitehall Palace in 1698, 'Whitehall' and 'Parliament Street' were separated from one another by Whitehall Palace's Holbein Gate (c.1532-1759).1

Location: Parliament Street, SW1A 2NS (purple, red)

Whitehall, SW1A 2NP (purple, red)

See Also: DEVELOPMENTS Queen Anne s Gate; PALACES DISAPPEARED & FORMER Whitehall Palace; WALLS & GATEWAYS The Holbein Gate

1. King Street used to be parallel to Parliament Street to its west.

 

Telephone Boxes

The K1 was introduced after First World War. It was concrete. It, the K2, K3, and K4 had a Soanian dome supposedly based on Sir John Soane's tomb.

The General Post Office (the G.P.O.) held a competition for the design of a telephone kiosk. Sir Giles Gilbert Scott won it with his Kiosk No. 2 design (K2). He used the shape of the ceiling of the dining room of the Sir John Soane Museum as the basis for the external shape of the roof of his telephone box. The architect wished that the kiosk should be silver-coloured. The Post Office determined that it should be red. His design went into production in 1927. Eight years later he produced a simplified version of it, the K6, which became ubiquitous.

In 2007 there were about 14,000 K6s left.1

Location: Burlington House, 50 Piccadilly, W1J 0BD. The kiosks in the entrance to Burlington House are Scott's original wooden models. (orange, brown)

Bow Street, WC2E 7AW. A cluster of telephone boxes that survives for reasons of tourism rather than telephony. (purple, turquoise)

St Pancras Church Graveyard, Pancras, NW1 1UL. Soane's grave is topped by the shape. (purple, pink)

See Also: MUSEUMS The Sir John Soane Museum

Website: https://avoncroft.org.uk/avoncrofts-work/special-collections1

1. The National Telephone Kiosk Collection is at The Avoncroft Museum of Buildings, Bromsgrove, Hereford & Worcester. (Available for weddings - https://avoncroft.org.uk/hospitality/weddings-at-avoncroft)

The K8

The K7 was designed by Neville Conder (1922-2003), an architect. However, it proved to be unable to withstand British weather conditions. Therefore, it was scrapped.

In 1965 the General Post Office invited three architects to submit proposals for the K8 telephone kiosk. The following year Tony Benn the Postmaster-General selected Bruce Martin's (1917-2015) design.

Martin had studied at the Architectural Association. Prior to the Second World War, he had visited Sweden on a travelling scholarship. There, he had been particularly impressed by Erik Gunnar Apslund's Modernist Göteborg Town Hall Extension (1937). During the war he had worked for Short Brothers in Rochester. He considered whether the precision manufacturing processes that he witnessed could be transferred to the construction industry. Following the conflict's end, he had worked for Hertfordshire County Council's Architecture Department. He had designed school buildings. This had led him to become interested in modular construction. The resulting structures were admired technically but tended not to be liked by the people who worked in them. His engagement in the field prompted him to take a job with the British Standards Institution in 1953. In the 1960s he had returned to being a practising architect and had taught part-time at the Cambridge School of Architecture.

Martin's interest in modular design informed the K8. It was made from 183 just components. Previously, 450 had been used. It could be assembled on-site, whereas its predecessors had been produced in factories. He envisaged used aluminium and fibreglass. The Post Office was concerned about rigidity. Therefore, cast iron was used although the door continued to be made from aluminium so that it could be opened with ease. The door's hinges could be placed on either of the doorframe's two vertices. This meant that access to a given kiosk could be tailored to its immediate circumstances. The colour was tweaked from Post Office Red to Poppy Red.

11,000 K8s were manufactured during the late 1960s and the 1970s. In 1984 BT started decommissioning many of its kiosks. There was a public outcry when the public appreciated what was happening. As a result, 3000 telephone boxes were listed. However, the rule that meant that nothing that was less than 30 years could be protected meant that none of them were K8s.

In 2007 it was claimed that less than a dozen K8s were still in use. The Twentieth Century Society responded to this report by launching a campaign that sought to list them. English Heritage granted Grade II status to ten of the kiosks.

Heddon Street

A telephone box in Heddon Street was used in the cover photograph of David Bowie's The Rise and Fall Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders From Mars (1972) album.

Location: Heddon Street, W1B 4BE (purple, yellow)

David Backhouse 2024