Brixton Station art

 

Red and black tile mural on the platform at Brixton station. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

The history of Brixton station, on the platform. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

In Station Road, neon lights in red, or blue, or green, light up the trees at night. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

You see more art in the tunnels under the overhead lines on Station Road. See my other posts.

Useful Websites on Underground Art

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_on_the_Underground

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Brixton, bustling, bohemian

 

The streets thronging with people

Old and new architecture. Art deco. Neon.

Mural and music at the station. And the aroma of marihuana. 

Everything and everyone all around you. Happy smiling youngsters. Sad, shuffling old people. Beggars lying propped up against the wall with signs. Groups gaily greeting each other. Singles and couples dancing along. McDonalds for fast food. Morleys department store opposite the station for fashion and big name brands. Wide pavements crowded with people.  It feels like you have got in free to a festival. Or a hairdressing contest. Just like the rest of London. But more so.

We changed from train to bus here, in busy Brixton. We were on our way to quiet, elegant, empty Dulwich, a complete contrast.

Strings of red double decker red buses take you from Brixton back into London and onwards around the area and out of London. 

Useful website on Brixton

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brixton

Brixton Station and colourful, crowded, noisy, lively streets

 

Brixton station has delightful artwork. As do an increasing number of London stations.

Come out of the crowded underground station from Euston and look right. A seething mass of people, musicians with music blaring from portable loudspeaker. Happy couples, families, groups, laughing loners, people sleeping on the ground, beggars, and major international chain stores and supermarkets. All life, all the world, from all round the world, is here.  Above them on the right you'll see the bridge with murals carrying the overground. Walk towards it and take the first road right.  Now you are amongst the small shops and pushcarts selling ethnic food, clothes, and what looks like parties.

It's not all cheap. Lots of it is bling and pricey.

Take the tunnel adorened with more murals on your left. You pass the entrance/exit to the overground rain line going south. 

Now the murals are so gigantic there's no room for more graffiti.

More shops are every few steps. you come out into another street with more shops. All along under the overhead railway are arches filled with shops and eating places. One giant disco complex blrares music. Depending on the time of day, in the evening you see the market shutting up with a few leftover stall. You might see wheeled kiosks selling clothes, and open sided vans serving fast food.  

Beyond, towards the houses, are trees lit not just around the crown as in London's supposedly wealthier northern suburbs, but lights, bright blue, neon green, electric pink, down the drunk to the ground. Each tree transformed into a city artwork.

See more pictures in my other blog posts on Brixton.

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Brixton's Brightly Coloured Side Streets

 

Colourful Brixton under the arches. Photo by Angela Lasnbury. Copyright.

Under the railway arches in Station Road and along the alleyway underneath the bridge are small shops, bars, eating places and colourful arched murals.

Get there from Euston on the Victoria line.

Useful Websites

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brixton

https://tfl.gov.uk/tube/stop/940GZZLUBXN/brixton-underground-station

A Joyful BYO Evening At The Laundry Restaurant Near Brixton station

The Laundry is a restaurant in an old laundry building, as we learned on our first visit. Then I was interested in the history of the building. But on my second visit I was more concerned with the restaurant's food and drink.

The Beauty of BYO

A friend who lives near The Laundry Restaurant in Brixton suggested this restaurant as a venue for a group outing on a Tuesday, because that is the day when the restaurant offers bring your own bottle. No corkage charge. BYO Tuesday. We were seven diners and each perso brought a different bottle. We had a white starter, a white dessert wine, and reds to go with the starter and main course. At the end of the meal we voted on our favourite wine and found out what the wines cost and where to buy them. 

The restaurant provided a flute glass for the starter Champagne which one diner brought, and one wine glass, and a water glass for each person. We asked for a spittoon in which to pour any leftover wine before starting on the next one. Our meeting was the monthly BYO restaurant meeting of the Central London Wine Society which holds meetings at the Civil Service Club in London.

The Laundry's food menu, which you can read online, was supplemented by daily specials written on a blackboard.

Advantages Of the Basement Table

I wrote about this restaurant previously, when the descent down the spiral staircase to the toilet was unnerving. However, on this return visit, despite my usually feeling a trifle claustrophobic in basements, I was delighted by the large table, on the same level as the toilets.  We were behind glass sliding doors giving a convivial view of diners in the main larger seating areas. Yet the privacy of our table separated from any noise from others.

On our way out we stopped to speak to people at another table whose conversation, we gathered from one overheard word, was about wine. Another group of wine connoisseurs, at the restaurant because of the BYO night.

 On the way back to the station, I paused to admire the fun in all the distinctive restaurants under the arches of the railway running into bustling Brixton.

more pictures shortly.

Useful Websites

https://thelaundrybrixton.com/food-and-drink

Service is now included.

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Brixton's Beautiful Murals

 

Angela Lansbury framed by the rainbow mural in Brixton, south London, England. Photo by Trevor Sharot. Copyright.

Getting There

Brixton is near central London, only a 8 stops from Euston and four Victoria station. On the Victoria line.

Come out of the underground railway station, turn right, and ahead of you, across the main road, is a railway arch wwith a message about peace. 

Turn right again down the side road. You will find a street of murals, and 

Shops and restaurants under the railway arches. You can buy all kinds of bright, colurful clothes, as well as snacks and food from around the world.

At night the trees are lit in red and and other colours. Very jolly.

Angela Lansbury under the lit up tree, Brixton. Photo by Trevor Sharot. Copyright.

A tunnel across under the overhead railway passes more in the wall shops and kiosks and murals. A flight of steps leads up to the mainline railway station overhead. A large mural is at the top of the stree stairs.

A local printed newspaper is Brixton Bugle, which is monthly also has a blog.

Useful Websites and contacts

https://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com/2023/06/brixton-bridge-with-peace-message.html

Chocolate Museum in Brixton, London

https://www.thechocolatemuseum.co.uk/

Update on Tues 9 April 2024, they are moving, now in Peckham, South London, a short distance away by road or train,  and say they will update me.

https://my.matterport.com/show/?m=FdSXMoj7CEM

Brixton blog

brixtonblog.com/about-us. 

Lidl in Brixton

https://www.lidl.co.uk/s/en-GB/store-finder/london/brixton/acre-lane-71-73/

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Brixton Bridge With Peace Message

 

Brixton Bridge. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

The bridge is across the road right by Brixton underground railway station. From the street I noticed only the red and green colours. it wasn't until I saw the photo later that I realised the design was not just traingles of colour but spelled out the message Stay In Peace. 

The Laundry restaurant, Brixton, London, UK

Meat main course. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

 The restaurant is called the laundry because it is in a building which used to be a laundry. It is a short walk up a side street from Brixton underground station which is a few train stops, about fifteen minutes from central Euston.

The area is very lively and colourful, with market stalls selling clothes by day, thronging streets, Superdrug and other multiple stores opposite the station. From the station the arches of the bridges run back with small shops, bars and restaurants blaring music and people sitting on the pavement on chairs, or on the ground and groups of youngsters in wacky colourful clothes and sometimes Afro hairstyles parading up and down, talking, shouting, singing. Like a non stop fiesta even midweek in summer.

Down a spiral staircase are the toilets and an underground room you can hire for a private party or event.

We went there on a day when there is no corkage charge. The high service charge annoyed us on arrival in principal, although the final bill seemed quite reasonable.

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The Chocolate Museum in Brixton

Problem
After you've seen London and done all the major sights such as St Paul's and Madame Tussaud's and the Sherlock Holmes Museum, what else is there to do that's small or out in the suburbs and less well known?

Answer
If you are sporty, crocket and tennis museums. What about chocolate?


My last new year wish is to add another chocolate museum or two or three to my travel plans.

My latest find is the chocolate museum in Brixton. If you go to Streatham Wine House (see one of my posts), combine it with a trip to the chocolate museum in Brixton.

As you will see from the website, there's a cafe with pictures of old chocolate advertisements, a museum covering British chocolate and the origins of chocolate over in America, a section on slavery and chocolate, and you can join a chocolate workshop for adults or children. See the website for details.

ADDRESS
The Chocolate Museum
187 Ferndale Road
Brixton, SW9 8BA
London, UK
OPEN TO THE PUBLIC:
Wednesday to Friday: 2-7pm
Saturday: 11am-6pm

http://www.thechocolatemuseum.co.uk/collection

EMAIL
info@thechocolatemuseum.co.uk

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer,a author and speaker. See my other posts on this blog, my other blogs on blogger.com on subjects such as spelling and grammar and public speaking; see my profiles and posts on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram and videos of me talking about etiquette and spelling and reading my comic poetry on YouTube. You can also take a peek at my books on Amazon.com and Lulu.com and buy them pristine new new or bargain price second hand. If you meet me, naturally I can sign books for you and write you an amusing message, maybe a rhyming couplet. Please share my posts.

Fish and Chips, Fabulous, at Kennedy's of Streatham

We arrived in Streatham by bus via Brixton.

Brixton
I was invited to the opening of a wine bar in Streatham and travelled there via Brixton, infamous for the Brixton riots a while back. I was quite nervous about visiting Brixton. I spent part of the day on the internet reading about protective clothing, none of which could be delivered in time for my evening excursion.

I imagined Brixton to be a place where unemployed people sat around drinking on doorsteps, taking drugs, wild-eyed, talking some kind of patois like in a rap song, and eyeing you suspiciously as you walked past. Scary. Fortunately, Brixton was nothing like that, just extremely crowded. It reminding me of my recent trip to Hong Kong, but easier for me to get around, because instead of the tiny Chinese speaking incomprehensible Cantonese, Brixton was all English signs and with large numbers of multi-national but mainly mixed race and black English people - just like Harrow and the rest of London, all well built and well dressed, speaking fluent, British English.

On a Friday night it was rush hour on both the roads and pavements, everywhere busy with large numbers of people hurrying about their business. More like sales day in Oxford street, or the more affluent buildings of seafront Hong Kong, wide roads, wide pavements full of people.

We hurried along past three bus stops outside the station where the bus stop posts had numbers showing about nine buses stopped at each stop. We jumped on our bus and were lucky to get seats. The roads were four lanes wide, two lanes in either direction, widening to three lanes at junctions, then narrowing back to four lanes.

The bus filled up below and upstairs. Off we went, buses overtaking each other, giant supermarkets, stores a block long. We left behind the shops, passing housing estates and large parks which would have been lovely were it not for lots of litter. Ah, at the end of the next park, there were three lads, or down and outs, hard to tell at a distance, sitting on benches smoking. Then we passed a church the size of a cathedral. The bus was still standing room only.

On the bus, our driver shouted through the microphone instructions about moving down the bus, and letting people off. A well-dressed, loud-voiced woman, bantering constantly with her three friends, retorted loudly, "People going only three stops should not go upstairs and then rush down and have to push past everybody!"

The bus stopped at a junction, raced on and soon we were back to the next bustling high street of Streatham, which looked much the same as Brixton.

We got off and found we had made a mistake. We were in Streatham, but our wine shop was not here, because we should have been in Streatham Hill, so back we went.

I was impressed with the state of the art bus communication with passengers. At the bus stops electric signs above eye level were constantly changing, and told us which four buses were arriving in the next five minutes, and how many minutes, like on a railway station. So we knew how many minutes to wait for each bus. Then on our bus a state of the art recording told us the number of the bus and which direction it was taking.

Large and Small Evening Attractions
A giant block of art deco columns, now apparently a bingo hall, was changing colour from red to green. Opposite was our destination, a newly opened little wine bar. Cocooned in our wine bar (newly opened Streatham Wine House - see next post) we passed a pleasant evening drinking bubbly and eating nibbles of salami and cubes of cheese and pickles. We asked where we could grab a snack supper of fast food before heading home on the train.

Fish And Chips at Kennedy's
Fish and chips - by Streatham Hill Station. Kennedy's was just what we wanted. About to close. They had cod on display in the case keeping food warm. In a few seconds we had our food. Luckily another person left, vacating a bar stool by the window, so we perched at our small table for two just right for sharing, eating our filling fish and chips.

Fish
I was delighted to find that the fish seemed more like soft melt in the mouth plaice, my favourite, which is even better than chunky cod. I don't know if they made a mistake, or if what passes for cod nowadays is some hybrid fish as cod stocks are running low. Whatever. I was happy.

Chips
The chips were proper big British chips, soft potato, the thickness of thumbs. Maybe bad for a diet, but better than those pencil-thin, fat-laden, cooked to a crisp French fries which you get in hamburger bars. I love big British chips. Doesn't everybody!

Price
The price was under ten pounds. I went back to the counter to ask for the receipt. My companion had not taken it and the assistant has already thrown it away, but was able and willing to give me an address card.

Worth A Detour
If you are not visiting that area but have a travel card, you could divert to the station to get fish and chips. Only a couple of seats, probably for people waiting for food at busy times. Fast, friendly service.

Salad
The board showed a huge selection of fish, fish cakes and pies. As we tipped our debris into their bin, I saw from somebody else's leftovers that the shop also served salad. If I ever get the chance to go back, I must remember to order a salad.

Lunch
By the door a chalk board showed they served a lunch time special of lamb steak, lamb chop or rump steak. You could get a take away one course lunch, for under £5. Good value.

Leftovers
Our portion was ample. I though we'd have enough to eat for lunch next day, but it got finished off on the way home (an hour's journey by train). We kept the plastic cutlery.

Kennedy
The name Kennedy's is easy to remember because of American President Kennedy. Kennedy is an Irish name. But Kennedy's fish and chips for me fits the slogan, best of British.

Kennedy's of Streatham, 5 Leigh Court Road, Streatham Hill, London SW16 2ND. Tel 020 8769 1003 (orders taken) open 7 days a week.
www.kennedyspies.com

Photos by Angela Lansbury, copyright, 2016.
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

Bowie, the Brixton Boy and the Bowie statue and mural

London landmarks include those to Shakespeare and heroes of the old days as well as museums and statues and monuments to the heroes and celebrities of our century. The latest is the mural to Bowie in Brixton which has received protected status. Discussions are taking place with his family about the possibility of adding a statue.

London Landmark List
Beatles' zebra crossing, St Johns Wood
Bowie mural, Brixton
Amy Winehouse Statue, Camden
Jimi Hendrix Museum

You can also take walking tours taking in sites associated with the Beatles and Shakespeare. More on these landmarks in my previous posts.

Bowie

Other monuments to Bowie are a statue in Aylesbury. 

A star is in the Hollywood walk of Fame, Los Angeles, California, USA.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer.

Chocolate delights discovered today: chocolate chickens to buy, and Museums in Minsk and London

Where can you buy and try chocolate eggs, and chocolate chickens? Which came first, the chocolate chicken or the chocolate egg?

Chocolate hen and eggs, according to the ad in today's UK Metro newspaper, (which is free at London underground stations most mornings), £2.99 from Lidl supermarket. (The small print informs you: 250 grams, selected stores, £1.20 /100g.

Nestle Smarties Egg, an egg filled with Smarties, costs £1.50 for the (122g egg, but only £1.35 with a MyWaitrose card.

You can join and get a card from waitrose.com/mywaitrose - also 10% off Easter confectionery. Small print on their ad reads: Selected stores and lines. Offer ends March 22nd.

Asda's ad in yesterday's Metro suggested get egg-cited for Easter and offered three eggs for £10. The five varies are Mars and friends egg containing three bars, Snickers, Mars and Twix, £5 each 327g.
The Galaxy Minstrels contains three Minstrels. The Maltesers teasers contains three Teasers. The Twirl contains 2 Twirls (I needed a magnifying class to check the small print on the box, but the box picture accurately shows the number you receive). The Cadbury Heroes contains a variety of miniatures.  Click and collect ASDA.com/clickandcollect

If you want to visit a chocolate museum and cafe in London, England, there's one in Brixton, south London:
The Chocolate Museum

187 Ferndale Road, 

Brixton

London, UK SW9 8BA

United Kingdom
www.thechocolatemuseum.co.uk

Other chocolate museums are in Belgium, Belarus, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and the USA and more countries. Just a few:

Choco-story, Bruges, Belgium.

Chocolate Museum, Minsk, Belarus.

Chocolate Museum, Minsk, Belarus. According to Metro, the Chocolate Museum in Minsk, Belarus asked visitors to stop eating the displays, otherwise there would soon by nothing left. Better visit it soon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_chocolate_museums
You can read reviews of chocolate museums on Tripadvisor.

Angela Lansbury B A Hons, chocoholic author, photographer, speaker.