LONDON A-Z An alphabetical journey through the capital's museums Pollocks Toy Museum
Location: 1 Scala Street, W1T 2HL [map] Open: 10am - 5pm (closed Sundays and bank holidays) Admission: £5 Brief summary: vintage miniature toybox Website:www.pollockstoymuseum.com Time to set aside: about an hour
If you've got kids and want to take them round a museum full of toys, go to the Museum of Childhood in Bethnal Green. But if you're child-free and would like to remember your own far distant childhood, try Pollocks. The museum's tucked away in the backstreets of Fitzrovia, in the shadow of the BT Tower. Two characterful houses, one Georgian, the other Victorian, have been interlinked and packed with long-past playthings. Every nook and cranny has some childlike treasure crammed inside. It's a bit like Emily's shop from Bagpuss, except that nothing springs to life while you're not watching.
On stepping through the front door, I thought I did a fantastic job of ignoring the Eurovision personality stood chatting to the bloke on the till. Yes, that was definitely, you know... but I politely avoided enquiring about bloc voting and instead passed to the right through the shopkeeper's magic portal. The staircase was lined with glass cases, all the way up to the second floor and beyond, including a selection of American toys (North, South and Central) and some early 20th century card and boardgames. Most looked charmingly old, but a few were disturbingly familiar. I deduced that some of the games my grandparents had got out whenever the young me came to visit were far older than they looked. They don't make ludo boards like that now, but they did then, right down to the tiny mis-shapen dice. As for the archaic Pik-a-Styk box, many's the time I'd played with the clump of painted pointed wooden rods inside.
First room, boys' toys. A case of things to build with (anyone else remember Bayko?), another of shiny metal spacecraft-y robot things, and a third of miniature locomotives. The Ever Ready Electric Train set, for example, included a Morden-bound tube train for 66 shillings and ninepence (battery not included). In another case was a selection of penny toys bashed out in tin for a few marketplace coppers, while rather more traditional was the care-worn rockinghorse resting above the fireplace. Young scientists would no doubt have preferred playing with a twirly gyrospcope, or else some of the fine collection of magic lanterns and zoetropes - for the more visually inclined.
Upstairs again, to a room filled with Mr Pollock's trademark toytheatres. Benjamin Pollock lived in premises on Hoxton Street in pre-trendy Shoreditch, and fed a thriving market in miniature stagecraft during the long years before the dawn of wireless. His renowned toy shop moved from Hoxton to Scala Street in the 1950s, evolving more into a museum, which is why you'll now find Sooty, Sweep and Sue alongside scenes from tiny Shakespeare. I lingered awhile in this room, because I suspected that there were quite a lot of dolls coming up beyond the next set of stairs. I was right.
Wax dolls, rag dolls and china dolls - each no doubt delightful in their own way, but two roomsful all staringforward through glassy beady eyes were quite sufficient to give me the shivers. Rather more endearing were the Edwardian teddy bears, their owners long since passed away, as well as an unthreatening uncensored shelf of jet blackgolliwogs. The intricacy of dolls house design drew some admiring glances, although more from passing adults than passing children. Modern youngsters seemed keen to drag their parents around the museum as quickly as possible (or maybe they assumed there'd have to be a room containing a Wii and PSP eventually, although there wasn't).
The museum contains a wonderfully diverse collection of old toys, both historically and geographically, all with an emphasis on the traditional rather than the perfect. If you're of a certain age there's plenty here to stir the memory (ooh look, a Tri-ang kitchenette) (oh boy, a Chad Valley Give-a-Show Projector). And there's a rather nice toyshop at the end, which I suspect I'll be returning to before Christmas in search of unusual stocking fillers. As it was I left Pollocks feeling unexpectedly old, and yet also delightfully young. by tube: Goodge Street
LONDON A-Z An alphabetical journey through the capital's museums Queen's Gallery / Royal Mews
Location: Buckingham Palace Road, SW1A 1AA [map] Open: 10am - 5:30pm Admission: £14.50 (combined) (or about £8 each) Brief summary: Art and horses in the Queen's back garden Website:www.royalcollection.org.uk Time to set aside: half a day
In need of a museum I'd never visited before beginning with Q, there was only one option. Even better, nextdoor was a museum I'd never visited before beginning with R. So I visited them both. And I also visited the big house nextdoor, but I'll tell you about that tomorrow.
Q The Queen's Gallery is where HRH ERII displays her art collection to her humble citizens. Being the monarch of a once world-dominant nation she has a heck of a lot of art in her possession, and only a very small building in which to show it off. It's located along the southern edge of Buck House, in what used to be the Palace's private chapel until German bombs hit home, and was later refurbished as an exhibition space. It's all very grand, both on the way in and inside, with a sort of classical vibe to complement the centuries-old artefacts within. Therefore it seems slightly incongruous to see all the visitors wandering around wearing ugly modern headphones. But the audio guide (and its evocative minute-long descriptions) is crucial to enjoyment of the works on show, because without it you'd be in and out of the Gallery far too quickly.
When you're a rich ruler, two things happen. Firstly you can go round buying up as much art as you like because it's your head on the banknotes. And secondly lots of other rich rulers give you very expensive gifts to show off quite how rich they are. So there's some really opulent stuff here. The first gallery contains fabulous furniture, sumptuous sculpture and perfect paintings, for starters. Nextdoor there's a temporary exhibition of the very finest Sèvres porcelain, because it turns out that George IV was a crockery-hoarder extraordinaire. A tiny dim-lit alcove nearby holds some exquisite jewellery, including a Fabergé egg and some droopy diamond earrings. You'll need your reading glasses to be able to see the information about each item, else just gawp and admire.
A second large gallery repeats the formula, but on a larger scale. The Russians once sent our royals a huge malachite vase, so there it stands in the centre. George III bought that pair of Thames panorama Canalettos, so they've been stashed either side of the gold Flemish cabinet. Press audio button 23 for further information. And what's on show here is only a tiny part of the entire collection, so one can only guess at what the Queen might have hung in her own private quarters.
R A short distance down the road is the Queen's garage - the Royal Mews. It's no ordinary garage, obviously, because the HRH's modes of transport are always something special. Around the Mews' spacious quadrangle are parked some top of the range vehicles, as well some four legged hay-munchers. The horses arrived first, shifted into Buckingham House's back garden by George III, and thirty-ish are still stabled on site today. They're all lovingly cared for, and our present equine fanatic Queen knows every one by name. Visitors are able to walk through Nash's elegant long stable block where the horses are groomed and dressed for major ceremonies, although the penned-up Cleveland Bays and Windsor Greys are more likely to be glimpsed in the working stables on the way out.
In pride of place within the Mews is the Gold State Coach, which has been used by the sovereign at every Coronation for the last two centuries. It's magnificent, in a totally impractical showing-off sort of a way, bedecked with shiny sculpted gold at every opportunity [photo]. It's also very hard to manoeuvre and desperately uncomfortable to ride in. Our present Queen has only risked a trip three times - once at her Coronation and subsequently at her Silver and Golden Jubilees. If all goes to plan she'll be back inside for her Diamond in 2012, which will also be the 250th anniversary of the Gold Coach's first royal journey. For slightly lesser ceremonial trips other carriages are available, including the Glass Coach and the Australian State Coach. These have silkier seats and better suspension, and are better suited to lengthy parades with a lot of regal arm-waving.
When something quicker than horse-drawn is required, the Queen has a small collection of top-notch limousines. These include Bentley 1 and Bentley 2, as well as Rolls Royces 1, 2 and 3. One of these is usually on show, most probably the 1950s vintage Roller, whereas the Bentleys are considerably younger and carry out the donkey work on many a royal engagement. Each limo has a small heraldic flag that's raised manually through a hole in the roof, although apparently this has to be lowered whenever the vehicle exceeds 40mph so as not to cause damage. The Mews is a working community, so you might be fortunate enough to see one of the cars (or several of the horses) heading out on royal business. But don't expect to see HRH driving, merely smiling serenely from the back seat. by tube/train: Victoria
LONDON A-Z An alphabetical journey through the capital's museums Sikorski Museum
Location: 20 Princes Gate, SW7 1PT [map] Open: weekdays 2pm-4pm (1st Saturday of the month 10am-4pm) Admission: free Brief summary: exiled Polish wartime archive Website:www.sikorskimuseum.co.uk Time to set aside: about an hour
The people of Poland haven't had it easy over the last millennium, regularly overrun and overtaken by their more belligerent neighbours. When the country was finally 'liberated' from the clutches of Adolf Hitler, and communist Russia took over instead, exiled Poles sought somewhere abroad to preserve their country's wartime records and treasures. Thus was the Sikorski Institute founded, safely within Allied territory, on the southern fringe of Hyde Park just along from the Royal Albert Hall. Today it's both an archive and a museum, hidden away in a row of villas mainly reserved for foreign embassies, and usually with a policeman pacing up and down nearby. Ring the bell at number 20 and a very grateful country will welcome you inside.
Within is a spacious terraced house with a central spiral stairwell and large airy rooms to front and back. The walls are decorated with Polish art, mostly military in theme, and each of the visitable rooms houses a different selection of Eastern European keepsakes. Room 1 is devoted to the military leader after whom the museum is named - Władysław Sikorski. His desk, his bust, that sort of thing - while all his very many medals are displayed in another room upstairs. Room 2 has a few historic pieces and some rather lovely Polish porcelain, but other than that it's pretty much militaria all the way. Don't panic - that's slightly more interesting than it sounds.
At the foot of the stairs is a bronze sculpture of Wojtek the bear, adopted as a cub by serving WW2 soldiers, then enlisted into the army when he grew into a lumbering (yet helpful) beast. Wojtek saw action at the battle ofMonteCassino, an Italian bloodbath in which Polish troops were eventually victorious seizing a heavily defended hilltop town. Monte Cassino gets a lot of mentions around the museum, being a victory of which the Polish Government in Exile were extremely proud, although it wasn't a battle I'd previously been familiar with. Indeed, I think it surprised my tour guide that I was neither Polish myself nor one of the UK's 1 million or so Polish descendant citizens. Everybody else on the tour was, all four of them.
Upstairs, a rare treat. Secured beneath a plastic cover is one of only two Enigma coding machines still on display in this country (the other, not surprisingly, is at Bletchley Park). This was acquired, and its code first cracked, by a bunch of Polish mathematicians before WW2 even started. They worked out how to decipher the millions of combinations of rotors and leads in this evil typewriter, allowing the Allies to know what over-confident German generals were up to. Machine complexity was later greatly increased, but Alan Turing and his pioneering 'Bombe' computer eventually unravelled that too, thereby helping to end the war two years earlier than might otherwise have been the case. It's hard to believe that such a lowly black contraption, all keys and cables in a small wooden box, had so great an effect on our global future.
And yes, more Polish military stuff to follow. The cap Władysław Sikorski was wearing during his suspicious fatal plane crash. Some swords. Lots of banners and military colours (including a liberator's red and white flag hastily made out of a bedsheet). Various leaflets, posters and booklets (in Polish, obviously). And all brought to life by a guide who himself saw action as a Polish post-war soldier, and without whom it all might have been rather dry.
And ssh, don't mention this bit to the staff, but one of the best bits about the tour was the opportunity to see inside a proper Kensington embassy-type building. The Iranian Embassy, location of an infamoussnooker-interruptingsiege in 1980, is only four doors up the road and must look pretty much identical inside. I imagined hostages holed up in the echoing rooms, and abseiling SAS men breaking in through the front windows, and gas from stun grenades swirling down the precipitous central staircase. And then I pulled myself together and thanked my guide and saw myself back out onto Princes Gate. A unique, and entirely eye-opening experience. by tube: South Kensington, Knightsbridge
LONDON A-Z An alphabetical journey through the capital's museums Twickenham Museum
Location: 25 The Embankment, Twickenham TW1 3DU [map] Open: Tue, Sat 11am-3pm (& Sun, 2pm-4pm) Admission: free Brief summary: historical riverside Richmond Website:www.twickenham-museum.org.uk Time to set aside: less than half an hour
There are several small local museums sprinkled around the London suburbs, each telling the story of their neighbourhood to anyone who cares to pop in. Southwest London has a fair few, including historical hideaways in Richmond and Kingston-upon-Thames. But I went to Twickenham, purely because it started with the letter T. It was either there or to the tiny Twinings Museum in the Strand. I might have misjudged.
Twickenham Embankment is a very pleasant spot. It's located away from the High Street, down by the river, facing the midstream boathouses of white-gabled EelPieIsland. This is a great place to feed the swans, or to watch the pleasure cruisers chug by, or to sit outside the BarmyArms for an alfresco post-rugby ale. There's even a cascade dripping with sculptednaked ladies in the gardens of York House, which isn't something you see every day. As for Twickenham Museum, that's to be found in a Grade 2 listed townhouse up winding Church Lane, with proper Georgian windows and a pale green door. Occasionally a blue sign appears on the door, and another on the wall alongside, bearing a boldly welcoming "OPEN". Ten hours a week, the museum's volunteer curators await someone to chat to.
I earned a cheery hello from the jolly retired lady behind the desk, then walked into the alcove behind her desk to take a look at some photos of old Twickenham. There were a lot of photos of old Twickenham in the museum, and of Whitton, Teddington and the Hamptons. Each panel showed some buildings how they used to look, then how they look now, with some meaningful words inbetween. They're no doubt fascinating if you live hereabouts, but I don't, so I nipped round the alcove a little briefly. A grey-haired bloke walked in through the front door who I thought looked suspiciously like very-local inventor Trevor Baylis. Alas not, I was assured, just another volunteer popping in to say hello. Official visitor numbers for the day remained in single figures.
There was only the one room downstairs, bedecked with more old/new photos and a cabinet of TW1 curiosities. Programmes for Twickenham's Charter Day, old bits of printed paper, that sort of thing. Beneath the stairs a diving costume tableau provided a reminder of underwater stuntman 'Professor Cockles', who entertained riverside crowds here from the 30s to the 70s. Museumfolk reconstructed one of his dives a few years back, managing to retrieve a bunch of keys and an eel from the murky depths of the neighbouring Thames, because they're inventive like that.
And there was only the one room upstairs. More history and more bygone photos - again rather more on the walls than in the cabinets. The whole northern-Thames-side stretch of Richmond borough was covered, including various elegant village-ettes I've never personally visited. Depressingly little on EelPieIsland, I thought, given that it was a fascinating location and only 100 metres away. While I was investigating upstairs another couple of visitors nipped into the museum, and nipped round, and nipped back outside again. But I still had time to make one further discovery about the house itself, which is that 25 The Embankment had once been owned by Thomas Twining, the legendary 18th century leaf importer. My museum trip had come up trumps, as I bagged an unexpected two for T. by train: Twickenham
OK, I confess, I was wholly underwhelmed by the Twickenham Museum. I couldn't fault the enthusiasm of the volunteers, and the old house had a bit of character, but the former hadn't really filled the latter with much interesting "stuff". Words and pictures yes, but you don't need to walk through the door to see those, they're just as easily absorbed on the museum's website. And the website's detailed, and fact-packed, and excellent. So go there instead.
LONDON A-Z An alphabetical journey through the capital's museums UCL Collections - Petrie Museum
Location: Malet Place, University College London WC1E 6BT [map] Open: Tue - Fri, 1pm-5pm (& Sat, 11am-2pm) Admission: free Brief summary: academic Egyptological hoard Website:www.ucl.ac.uk/museums/petrie Time to set aside: an hour
The University of London is reputedly the third oldest in England, after Oxford and Cambridge, established in Gower Street during the reign of George IV. It's old enough to boast (count 'em) eight different museums, most of them small, and several open by appointment only. Only one of these is open at the weekend, and then for only three hours, so I took my chance and that's where I headed. Back in time to the age of the Pharaohs, to an upper room where eighty thousand catalogued Egyptian artefacts are stored.
They don't make museums like the Petrie any more. No buttons to press, no £3 audio guides, just a heck of a lot of very old things in gloomy glass cases. The collection's primary function is to serve the needs of classical and archaeological students, and don't you forget it. Admittance is via a dead-end backstreet, through a not-entirely obvious door, then upstairs to an admissions desk in what looks like one of the campus's forgotten offices. Prepare for items-on-shelf overload, and step inside.
The first short gallery, which is not entirely typical, houses fragments of carved stone. Few are wholly intact, but several slabs are carved with strip upon strip of exquisite hieroglyphics. As languages go, the Egyptian's intricate pictorial script may have been woefully inefficient (and entirely inappropriate for web-based communication), but it doesn't half look good. Another narrow gallery is located alongside, opening out into a larger space beyond, and all bursting with rammed-full glass cases. Don't expect glittering mummies and whopping sarcophagi, these tend to be much smaller more commonplace tomb-raided treasures. Votive tablets, serpentine caskets, and signet rings once worn by Nectaneto II - that sort of thing. Every item in the museum is labelled with a painted serial number plus a short written description, and here you'll find regular reference to dynasties, cartouches and "faience pendants". Ssh, try not to mention that all these objects were thieved from their country of origin by Empire-building 'collectors'.
For a relatively obscure museum, the building was busier than I expected. Some visitors were young couples, quite possibly UCL freshers taking time out to see what their new university had to offer. The rest tended to be older and more scholarly, or were at least pretending to be. A couple of earnest Egyptologists were wandering around, busy telling an ever-decreasing crowd of hangers-on about their favourite Petrie exhibits. It was entertaining to watch their beleaguered audience attempting politely to slip away before their nemesis dived into yet another lengthy anecdote about a big dig or the object of their PhD thesis. "You have to go do you? Pity, but thank you for your attention."
A second, lower, gallery contains an unfeasibly high number of different kinds ofpot, plus a few hundred tiles for good measure. If Egyptian earthenware is your thing then there's even a table for personal study, or alternatively where visitors under the age of 10 can colour in some pictures in crayon. One one particular wall there's a rack of torches - do take one, because the lighting's kept low throughout the museum to preserve the exhibits from permanent decay. And don't forget to check out the rear staircase, where yet more objects (including a fair number of ornamental cats and a sandstone jackal's paw) have been stashed. No space in this historical repository is underused.
If you want dazzling Egyptian treasures, then head instead for the British Museum. But for a clearer sense of the ancient everyday, or simply for the opportunity to potter round a musty academic backwater, try the Petrie. by tube: Euston Square
LONDON A-Z An alphabetical journey through the capital's museums Crofton Roman Villa
Location: Crofton Road, Orpington, BR6 8AF [map] Open: Wed & Fri 10-1 & 2-5, Sun 2-5 (Apr-Oct only) Admission: £1 Brief summary: mid-suburban Roman remains Website:http://cka.moon-demon.co.uk/villa.htm Time to set aside: half an hour
[In a brilliant piece of planning, I visited today's museum in October before it closed down for the winter. In a none-too-brilliant bit of timing, you won't be able to visit today's museum until Easter. So don't get too excited by what follows]
London was once a Roman stronghold, but the centre of the City has been so wholly and utterly developed over the centuries that barely any trace remains. Modern London boasts just one Roman villa open to the public, and that only because the boundaries of the capital have been stretched out to encompass chunks of Kent. Originally a remote rural farmstead, it's now conveniently located immediately adjacent to Orpington station. Ideal for commuting, if only the former residents had hung around for long enough.
The first modern Britons to uncover Crofton Roman Villa were Victorian navvies working on a railway cutting. There were no preservation orders in those days, nor was there any knowledge of what was being churned up, so a large part of the foundations were irrevocably lost. Wiser workmen laying driveways for new council offices in 1926 quickly realised that they were carving through Roman remains, but archaeological interest was lacklustre and yet more damage was done. Only in 1988, when the council planned to raze the area for a car park, did the Kent Archaeological Rescue Unit step in. They excavated what was left, then built a protective shed around the site, and the public are now invited inside to view what they managed to save.
From Crofton Road, the bland municipal exterior looks like it might hold a youth club, swimming pool or church hall. Indeed no expense has been wasted outside - this is simply a big shed containing Roman leftovers. No permanent staff are employed, just a group of kindly volunteers who give up their time in case any members of the public might open the door and step inside. I would have had the entire place to myself, but a well-intentioned local parent had hired the villa for their child's birthday party and so a crowd of well-behaved under-10s were quietly assembling mosaics on a trestle table.
My volunteer guide, having swapped one pound coin for a quaint old admission ticket, gave me a quick rundown of the history of the place. The villa was owned by well-to-do farmers in around the 2nd-4th centuries AD, and stood on a ridge above the fertile banks of the River Cray (now culverted beneath Orpington's main shopping street). Of the 20 rooms thought once to exist, remnants of at least 10 survive - all at foundation level. Don't come expecting grand walls and tessellating pavements, although there is plenty of ancient brick infrastructure and also some illustrative reconstructed tiling. Here context is key, with labels and plans aplenty to explain what everything in front of you used to be. But best to hear it all from the guide ("that bit used to be the hypocaust - you know what a hypocaust was don't you?"). Mine confessed to being a retired teacher, in common with many of the other volunteers here, and her enthusiasm and expertise were put to good use.
I managed to explore the fenced-off perimeter of the Roman remains whilst carefully avoiding getting too close to the assembled birthday crowd. They were still busy mosaicing while I perused the "touch table" of genuine ancient stuff and the sandtray in which children pretend to be archaeologists. Then we swapped places, and I went to stand on the raised platform at the rear while they went to sit in the dressing-up corner. I earned a different perspective on the old villa, including a close up of where the underfloor central heating used to be, while the kids were held distantly spellbound by a selection of animal bones.
This is a defiantly low-key attraction, with the emphasis very much on archaeology rather than entertainment. The admission charge is merely tokenistic and couldn't possibly support the building's upkeep. The bookshop contains dense volumes solely of local interest rather than popular sciency tomes. And the Roman remains themselves require not inconsiderable amounts of visualisation, far exceeding the passive spoonfeeding most tourists seem to desire. Oh that there were more London museums like this, ploughing their own specialist furrow with love, care and conviction. by train: Orpington
LONDON A-Z An alphabetical journey through the capital's museums Whitewebbs Museum of Transport
Location: Whitewebbs Lane, Crews Hill EN2 9HW [map] Open: Tuesdays 10am-4pm (& Open Days last Sunday of the month) Admission: £4 Brief summary: low-key many-wheeled ephemera Website:www.whitewebbsmuseum.co.uk Time to set aside: an hour or two
And for W, the northernmost museum in London. You can't go further north in London than Crews Hill - a semi-rural outpost of greenhouses and garden centres. Most people arrive by car, probably from the M25, queueing patiently along the only road in the village as they attempt to drive from one horticultural car park to another. Reaching the museum by public transport is a little trickier, especially for their Sunday Open Days, because the weekend's last bus departs mid-Saturday afternoon. The only option is to travel via one of London's least used stations, a bleakhalt on the Hertford North line, and then trudge past the potted shrubs and fibreglass birdbaths to the museum.
Whitewebbs' main building used to be a pumphouse for the New River, the artificial contour-hugging canal which channeled drinking water into London in the 1600s. The pumphouse dates from 1898, which is of a similar vintage to the earliest vehicles housed therein and roundabout. Old vans and early automobiles are parked in an outdoor shed, mixed in with classic cars from later in the 20th century. When I was young an Austin Princess or Vauxhall Victor would have been fairly commonplace, but this is one of the few places you'll see either today. Or a Ford Capri, a chocolate-brown Ford Capri no less, another reminder of a less flash pre-TopGear age.
Nextdoor are a couple of fire engines, because they're exactly the sort of thing this sort of museum collects. When the nation's Green Goddesses were phased out a few years ago, one of them ended up here. Out here you'll also find a tractor, and some motorbikes, and quite a few piled-up motoring accessories. One rather interesting room contains a Mini Clubman van, a display of old car radios, plus shelf after shelf of old packets and tins that your uncle might have stored in his garage. A Castrol oilcan, a bottle of 1001 carpet cleaner, an austere chunky Thermos flask, that sort of thing.
There is, of course, a model railway layout. It's housed inside a disused railway carriage, and there's not very much space for the public to squeeze inside to take a look. Little locos whizz round on a split-storey circuit, nothing special, but enough to enchant small boys ("Thomas!!" "James!!!") and their moist-eyed grandfathers. Inside another room, past the level crossing gate and a "Rhyl" platform nameplate, is a fully functioning rotary steam engine. You always seem to find one of these in a museum like this, because it's something for the volunteers to enjoy greasing and tweaking while they wait for any visitors to pop in.
On the day of my visit, two floors of the old pumphouse housed a Toy Collector's Fair. These are fascinating occasions, even for the non-collector, because the enthusiasts are usually as intriguing as the objects they're being enthusiastic about. Those with stuff to sell sat behind tables crammed with model cars, or vans in pristine boxes, or Hornby engines, or whatever, and waited patiently for a customer to take an interest. Most such folk were older middle-aged, often here with friends or partners, and happy to have hundreds of subtly different miniatures to pick over. I will confess to being drawn to the stalls piled with Matchbox cars, but only because my brother and I played with Hot Wheels rather a lot as kids, and I wanted to see how much they might have been worth. They might have been worth something if we hadn't taken them out of the box, it seems, but smashing them down a plastic track and chipping half the paint off meant their value was rather closer to what we'd paid for them in the first place.
I resisted a bite to eat in the cafe, not because toasties and beans on toast aren't my thing, but because it was full. Whitewebbs is almost more of a social club than a museum on these Open Days, and many people need little excuse to meet up and reminisce about a golden age of transport. All credit to the Enfield and District Veteran Vehicle Trust, who've nurtured an attraction out of nothing and continue to preserve the everyday past for future enjoyment. by train: Crews Hill
LONDON A-Z An alphabetical journey through the capital's museums nothing to see here
Z
LONDON A-Z An alphabetical journey through the capital's museums Grant Museum of Zoology
Location: Malet Place, UCL WC1E 6BT [map] Open: Monday - Friday 1pm-5pm Admission: free Brief summary: pickled beasts & bones Website:www.ucl.ac.uk/museums/zoology Time to set aside: up to an hour
(Yes, I know I've skipped X and Y. That's because museums starting with X or Y aren't terribly common, even in London. But mostly because I've been visiting two museums a month since January, so I need to skip two letters if I'm going to reach the end of my alphabet by the end of the year. So I've skipped X and Y. Cue Z)
When you're studying zoology, you need somewhere to go look at animals. The real thing isn't always accessible, not without a round-the-world journey and/or a diving helmet, so it makes sense to collect together the remains of various species and display them for the benefit of future students. So believed Robert Grant, the UK's first Professor of Zoology, who in 1827 started a museum of preserved organisms at the University of London. Such was Mr Grant's talent that he had a sponge named after him - an honour he shares with Queen Victoria (although in this case a hermaphrodite aquatic invertebrate, not a gooey icing-filled cake). A Grantia sponge is one of the many hundreds of animals still on display at the Grant Museum of Zoology, now to be found crammed into a hospital-like basement at UCL in Bloomsbury. Find your way to the University and you can peruse the specimens like a student, no grant required.
Themuseum isn't huge, more like the corner of a library, but the space is packed full of cases, jars and bones. The most impressive exhibits are the skeletons, one especially large rhino dominating the centre of the room. Another cabinet contains the skeleton of a quagga, one of only seven such specimens remaining in the world today, although more fortunate than the dodo alongside of whom only bits remain. I was able to confirm that the nine-banded armadillo really does have precisely nine bands, and that the three-toed sloth is similarly well-named. As for the aye-aye, that looks particularly cute with all its organs stripped off, and blimey doesn't an orang-utang have very long arms? Although scholarly throughout, there's also an element of humour. The skull of a male deer has been labelled "Bambi's Dad", for example, and a human skeleton has been dressed up with tinsel, fleecy hat and baubles as a seasonal affectation [photo]. No giggling at the long white bone just inside the door, though. It's a baculum, or walrus penis bone, and the size of it is enough to make any female walrus's eyes water. Or light up, whatever.
Peer into the many pickle jars and you'll see animals that died up to 150 years ago, preserved beyond their time for future scrutiny. A "jar of assorted reptiles", for example, or a bloated axolotl, or some tiny crusty sea creatures. Several specimens are labelled with spidery Victorian handwriting, although this is a living museum and there's 21st century printing on more recent acquisitions. Every animal is also marked by a coloured pictogram sticker - a simple but informative way to depict its classification, be that amphibian, crustacean or whatever. Wander round the museum clockwise and the specimens generally get more complex, starting with some of the smaller sea creatures and moving on to fish, birds and mammals. There's not much explanatory text alongside, but there doesn't need to be because the dead animals do the talking. It's a lot more interesting than staring at a textbook, that's for sure.
In the week before Christmas I was expecting to have the place to myself, but not so. Several parents had brought along their inquisitive children, here to stare at animals inside-out, and also to take part in some holiday activities. Nothing too outlandish, just some cards to shuffle and drawings to colour, but engrossing enough for those I had to squeeze past. There was also a lady from the Camden Health Trust sitting patiently in the corner, waiting to dispense rubella-related goodie bags (I trust there wasn't a free virus inside to play with). But i slipped in just before the university, and therefore the museum, shut down for the festive period. Grant's ex-animals aren't always on show, but you can always study some of the collection's highlights here while you wait. by tube: Euston Square
And why is Woolwich station called Woolwich Arsenal? Because the nearby Royal Arsenal at Woolwich used to be UK's most important munitions factory, that's why. If you were once a subjugated citizen of the British Empire, it's quite likely you were subjugated using ammmunition from here.
King Henry VIII kicked things off in Woolwich nearly 500 years ago by establishing a royal dockyard. The isolated conditions alongside the Thames estuary were later thought perfect for the storage of gunpowder, so the Board of Ordnance moved in and snapped up 31 acres of Woolwich Warren. Facilities grew, the site expanded, and more and more factories were built (that Napoleon bloke, he took a lot of beating). The Royal Arsenal reached its peak during World War I, employing more than a hundred thousand workers and stretching more then four miles downriver to Crossness. Munitions aplenty were churned out during World War II, but then a steady decline set in. In the 1950s Woolwich was home to a top secret outpost of the Government's Atomic Weapons Establishment (but don't worry, people of SE18, because they only made the detonators here not the nuclear bits). Finally in 1967 virtually the whole site was shut down and sold to the GLC, who promptly nipped in and built Thamesmead instead.
A couple of Royal Arsenal sites lingered on in MoD use until the 1990s, one of which is at the heart of the latest redevelopment activity close to Woolwich Town Centre. It's so close to the town centre that the original Royal Arsenal Gatehouse now stands cut off in the middle of Beresford Square market, severed from its historic hinterland by an arterial road. Cross the A206 and you'll find what's left of Royal Arsenal West - several preserved military buildings and a lot of very new flats. At the moment the old outnumbers the new, and the old is mostly rather lovely. The Royal Brass Foundry and the Military Academy boast bold Georgian frontage bedecked with with painted coats of arms and gleaming clockfaces. The Paper Cartridge Factory and the Carpenters' Shop have been occupied by the Firepower Museum and the Greenwich Heritage Centre respectively. Walk down No 1 Street to the pierhead and you can still (almost) imagine this as unspoilt history.
Several of the old riverside munitions buildings have been converted to apartments, and highly desirable they look too. But also very exclusive, as you can tell by the series of metal entrance gates around the perimeter that swing automatically open and closed as residents come and go. This is fenced-off heritage, a residential fortress, with all the personalised numberplates on the inside and all the riffraff kept firmly out. Priorities for residents include their own first-floor parkland, their own deli (no mere corner shops here) and a gymnasium housed inside a marvellously ornate 18th century Shell Foundry (I've never seen anywhere quite so appropriate for pumping iron). If you've bought a flat in this part of the Royal Arsenal development, you'll rightly be rather smug about it.
But not all the flats are so appealing. Some rather more contemporary blocks have been erected as infill, of the kind that would look pleasant enough anywhere else, but whose architectural ordinariness here appears particularly out of place. Alas they're only the start. A whole new swathe of construction is underway between the river and the town, and this is going to be anything but historic. 1700 properties are promised, most of them apartments, courtesy of developers Berkeley Homes. They coughed up a small fortune to get Crossrail to stop in their half of Woolwich, and for that they get to create their own small town worth a rather larger fortune. The Armouries development will have eco-heating, brown-roof technology and a central lagoon - all fine and dandy I'm sure, but the sole link to the past will be its name. Even DialSquare, home to the founding fathers of Arsenal Football Club, is destined to be reborn as apartments. Precisely the same fate as the old Highbury Stadium, in fact.
If you can get yourself a mortgage and you fancy living somewhere relatively cheap yet swanky, maybe the new Royal Arsenal will suit you fine. There's a convenient DLR station, as well as a Thames Clippers pier on your very doorstep. But if it's history you want, I'm afraid your new flat may be partly responsible for wiping that out.
I was still eight stops from the newly-opened Woolwich Arsenal station when I realised something unfortunate had occurred. Something that's going to annoy me every time I travel eastbound on the DLR. Because the new line terminus has a name that's slightly too long for the infrastructure's existing systems. Sixteen characters - it's one too many to fit on the next train indicators on the platforms. Which has created a bit of a problem. And the chosen solution, a premature apostrophe, is very ugly indeed. W'wich Arsenal
Ooh that's nasty, and desperately unhelpful. Where the hell is W'wich? It sounds like it ought to be in Wales, probably deep in a valley somewhere. Or it could be a reference to that evil character from the Wizard of Oz. It certainly doesn't sound like the name of a well-known Thames-side settlement. And the destination's just as unreadable on the rolling display on the front of a train.
W'wich Arsenal[blip]v City Airport[blip]
The word Arsenal is clear as day, which conjures up images of football, Highbury and Islington. But no, all that's ten miles away. And so we get lumbered with W'wich instead. Sigh. The whole point of this new railway line is that it goes to Woolwich, not Arsenal, but Woolwich is the word the powers that be have chosen to abbreviate. Couldn't they have tried shortening the name another way?
Brilliant, just ignore the sixteenth character as if it doesn't exist. That's no good either, is it? But there is an obvious solution, one that would make sense to the vast majority of passengers, and it's this.
Woolwich
I know that the station isn't called Woolwich, it's called Woolwich Arsenal. And I know that there's another Woolwich station called Woolwich Dockyard, even if the DLR doesn't go there. But plain old 'Woolwich' would be so much better. Please, someone, bend the rules a bit and stick this simple eight letter word on the DLR's destination boards instead. Make it easy for everyone to tell where they're going. Because by slavishly following convention you've done something ugly, impractical and unhelpful to poor old Woolwich. Arse.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Visit Woolwich
So, if you take advantage of the DLR's new link to Woolwich (available from 0521 this morning), what might you find there? Well worry not, because the DLR website features an extra-special tourist guide for the benefit of inbound visitors. Apparently "the station gives you the perfect opportunity to take advantage of what Woolwich and its surrounding area has to offer". Here's the website's list of suggested attractions. I wonder if you'll be as thrilled as I am?
• All major UK bank branches. No really, that's the first thing on the list. Apparently the most interesting thing about Woolwich is that it boasts all major UK bank branches. If there are no banks where you live, why not take the DLR to Woolwich? But there's no mention of the financial institution which put the town on the map. The Woolwich Permanent was one of the UK's first building societies, launched in 1847, and also one of the country's biggest. But when it demutualised in 1997 it aimed too high. The Woolwich was bought out lock stock and barrel by Barclays in 2000, and now exists only as a mortgaging brand name. Probably not worth the effort to come here especially for that.
• Reference, heritage and lending libraries. No really, that's the second thing on the list. Apparently the second most interesting thing about Woolwich is that it has libraries. If there are no libraries where you live, why not take the DLR to Woolwich, because it has three. Two of these are in the same building, with the poky single-room reference library on the floor above the cheerless lending library. Closed Wednesdays. This is no Woolwich highlight, this is 100% municipal ordinariness.
• A great variety of shops to suit everyone's taste including Marks and Spencer outlet, Sainsbury's and Primark. Woolwich is particularly noteworthy for its factory outlet and discount stores selling products at very low prices providing an outstanding opportunity for bargain hunters. Now if I've got this right, one of the best reasons to visit Woolwich is supposedly because the shops are cheap? Iceland, Peacocks, Chicken Cottage, McDonalds, that sort of thing. Charity shops galore. So if there are no pound shops where you live (maybe you live in Chelsea or something), why not take the DLR to Woolwich? It's the perfect credit-crunch retail destination.
• Beresford Square and Plumstead Road market is located in the heart of Woolwich town centre. The market is open Monday - Saturday selling food and goods at competitive prices. And there are two markets, one in the street and one undercover. That's hardly unique for London, isn't it? The market in Beresford Square sells specialist stuff like 29p dishcloths, bananas in plastic bowls and dodgy-looking puffa jackets, while the indoor hall echoes with badly-punctuated emptiness. Both markets are in "a fully accessible, vehicle-free environment", according to the Greenwich council website, which pulls no punches attempting to make the place sound appealing. There's also a big painted sign on stilts between the two to remind shoppers how historic the place is, royal charter and all. So hey, if there are no markets where you live, why not take the DLR to Woolwich?
• Firepower – the Royal Artillery Museum. The Museum, based in the Royal Arsenal in Woolwich, tells the story of the men and women who have served as Gunners in the Royal Regiment of Artillery since it was founded. Ooh, hang on, genuine tourist destination! Not just because North London's finest footballteam kicked off right here in 1886, but because Woolwich has a rich military history. The Royal Arsenal started off as Tudor dockside ordnance stores, and grew eventually into the UK's largest gun repository. Proper huge and important it was, until it closed in 1967 and evolved into an elite-ish housing development. And a museum, which is yours to enter for a fiver. They're doing some major shuffling around at the moment, so 2009 may not be the year to visit, but it's got to be worth doing one day.
• For another piece of local History, visit the Greenwich Heritage Centre. Bringing together the former Borough Museum and Local History Library it offers a wealth of information and fascinating displays about the history of the borough. And back to libraries again. That's the second time that the Heritage Library has been mentioned, which suggests it must be pretty damned exciting. Trust me, it isn't. A few local archives to look through, a humbly-stocked heritage shop and a transient art display. Plus a half-decent exhibition about Woolwich Arsenal, which rescues the place somewhat. But not quite enough.
• Thames barrier visitor centre. Completed in 1984 the Thames Barrier is over 1,700 feet in width with four 200 foot openings. The best view of the barrier is by boat- several of the Thames tours stop here. That's the most underwhelming description of the Thames Barrier I think I've ever read. The barrier's more than a mile from the new DLR station, and it's not a lovely walk either. But still the mostamazingthing in the area.
• Waterfront Leisure Center. A water park with 65 metre anaconda slide, a hot tub, a wave machine, a waterfall, water jets and five-lane multi-slide, there's something for here for everyone! There's nothing here for me, sorry. It's just a souped-up swimming pool, and they're ten a penny these days. But if you're bringing hyperactive children to Woolwich, don't take them anywhere else, take them here.
Not mentioned: » The Woolwich Ferry(presumably because it's competition for the new DLR service) » The Woolwich Foot Tunnel(presumably because it's competition for the new DLR service) » The DLR Information Centre(a few chairs in a disused retail unit with free leaflets) » Woolwich Arsenal DLR station(I bet this'll be the most popular tourist attraction in town today) » Woolwich Barracks(it may, or may not, be home to the shooting at the 2012 Olympics. And it has the longestcontinuous facade of any building in the UK. You can't visit, not unless you enlist in the army or something. But it's possibly the most fascinating place in Woolwich, and it isn't even on the list. Beats the bank and the bloody library, that's for sure)
If everything goes to plan, tomorrow's the day that the DLR reaches Woolwich. Lucky Woolwich. Trains on the three-year-old City Airport branch will no longer have to terminate at the unlikely-named King George V, they'll continue down a brand new tunnel under the Thames and emerge beneath the heart of Woolwich Town Centre. Change here for services to Erith and Dartford (or, if you're a bit nervous, just stay on the train and head straight back to Newham).
It's an impressive little infrastructure project, this. Completed in 3½ years flat, it's a great example of the effective impact of a bit of well targeted funding. There may be only one additional station, but reaching it has involved some technically awkward underwater boring using a 540-tonne drilling machine. The new tunnel links the north and south banks of the Thames via public transport, the only such crossing for three miles upstream and ten miles down. And it yanks not-so-affluent Woolwich into the wealth-creating reach of Docklands and the City, literally overnight.
Attempt to cross the river here today and you have to use theferry. That's an experience in itself, and the passenger quarters below deck drip with an atmosphere of mid-fifties austerity. Or there's the foottunnel, the poorer cousin of its Greenwich neighbour, whose subterranean character was recently wrecked by the installation of architecturally insensitive cycle barriers. Neither journey is quick or easy. But from tomorrow you can sit in a nice comfortable train and be whisked beneath the waves in style, in only a couple of minutes. It's the 21st century way.
This is the Docklands Light Railway's first venture into Zone 4, which may also be why this is the first DLR station to be kitted out with ticket barriers. No coasting into town for free from here, nor sneaking onto a Southeastern train for nothing. And it's only the first of a slew of new DLR stations that Boris will have the privilege of opening (even though he had nothing to do with their creation). The line from Canning Town to Stratford International should open next year, and that'll make a damned fine Mayoral photo opportunity too. But sorry Dagenham, you can only watch the Woolwich opening with a jealous sense of what might have been, because Boris no longer has plans for the DLR to make tracks to you.
Oh lucky people of Woolwich, your life's just about to get a little better. And then, when Crossrail arrives in 2017, a lot lot better. Yet another tunnel under the river, plus trains to the West End and Heathrow, which might almost make the much-vaunted Thames Gateway an enticing place to live. But a word of advice to SE18's current residents. Don't get too carried away in a flush of opening excitement, because your existing rail service may still be the way to go. To the heart of the City via DLR will take you 27 minutes tomorrow. But it's only 20 minutes from Woolwich Arsenal to LondonBridge today. Way to go.
You don't have to cram onto the Embankment to see London's New Year fireworks. Anywhere with a decent view of the London Eye will do, be it a nearby bridge, a Lambeth rooftop or a BBC1 TV camera platform. So for the dawn of 2009 I decided to step three miles further back, to one of the best unobstructed views across the capital. To the dark northern slopes above Regent's Park. To Primrose Hill.
A swarm of onlookers covered the entire top of the hill, like an apocalyptic crowd watching the heavens waiting for the end of the world. I couldn't quite get through to the summit, so thick was the mass of people, but the natural amphitheatre afforded everyone a decent line of sight. The crowd was quite young, mostly twenty somethings in unintentionally comic woolly hats, plus a couple of police officers enjoying the easiest New Year shift in the capital. At the foot of the hill someone was setting off intermittent rockets, just to keep everyone entertained, while up top a series of hot-air-filled plastic bags rose slowly upwards into the overcast sky.
The midnight hour approached. We stood facing southwards, waiting for the distant ring of pulsing lights to explode into life. The bunch of friends to my right misjudged their timing somewhat and lit their sparklers 90 seconds early. Several false countdowns were started - not a chance of hearing Big Ben out here in the middle of nowhere. And then... And then... And then, finally, 2009 was heralded by a series of bright flashes on the banks of the Thames. The hilltop erupted with a yelping cheer, just in time for my neighbours' sparklers to splutter out. There was much indiscriminate hugging, and some slightly over-excited cuddling, plus the popping of several bottles of champagne. Happy New Year everybody!
In the distance the Eye erupted, puncturing London's sodium glare with flashes of red and white. From up here in NW3 they only filled a tiny portion of the horizon, but (unlike last year) every pyrotechnic flourish was clearly visible. A number of other unofficial firework displays could also be seen, randomly spluttering from Camden round to Hampstead, while the Primrose Hill rocket man provided further lofty explosions much closer at hand. There was much whooping, and plenty of drinking, and even a hug or two for the Metropolitan Police from some of the merrier youths on the hillside.
For ten minutes we watched, not always intently, as a million quid's worth of gunpowder burnt itself out. And then the main display was over, leaving just the lights of the BT Tower and a cluster of cranes twinkling away in the distance. Most of the crowd stayed put, enjoying the atmosphere and the opportunity to see in 2009 with friends and family. I had nobody to share a plastic beaker with, so I weaved my way slowly down the grassy slope and joined the steady exodus to the gates. My tube train home beckoned, which I reached far quicker than if I'd been stuck in the seething throng on the Embankment. The fireworks may not have looked so spectacular from atop Primrose Hill, but the elevated New Year experience was a whole lot more enjoyable.
NDIf you've got kids and want to take them round a museum full of toys, go to the Museum of Childhood in Bethnal Green. But if you're child-free and would like to remember your own far distant childhood, try Pollocks. The museum's tucked away in the backstreets of Fitzrovia, in the shadow of the BT Tower. Two characterful houses, one Georgian, the other Victorian, have been interlinked and packed with long-past playthings. Every nook and cranny has some childlike treasure crammed inside. It's a bit like Emily's shop from Bagpuss, except that nothing springs to life while you're not watching.
First room, boys' toys. A case of things to build with (anyone else remember Bayko?), another of shiny metal spacecraft-y robot things, and a third of miniature locomotives. The Ever Ready Electric Train set, for example, included a Morden-bound tube train for 66 shillings and ninepence (battery not included). In another case was a selection of penny toys bashed out in tin for a few marketplace coppers, while rather more traditional was the care-worn rocking horse resting above the fireplace. Young scientists would no doubt have preferred playing with a twirly gyrospcope, or else some of the fine collection of magic lanterns and zoetropes - for the more visually inclined.
Wax dolls, rag dolls and china dolls - each no doubt delightful in their own way, but two roomsful all staring forward through glassy beady eyes were quite sufficient to give me the shivers. Rather more endearing were the Edwardian teddy bears, their owners long since passed away, as well as an unthreatening uncensored shelf of jet black golliwogs. The intricacy of dolls house design drew some admiring glances, although more from passing adults than passing children. Modern youngsters seemed keen to drag their parents around the museum as quickly as possible (or maybe they assumed there'd have to be a room containing a Wii and PSP eventually, although there wasn't).
Q The Queen's Gallery is where HRH ERII displays her art collection to her humble citizens. Being the monarch of a once world-dominant nation she has a heck of a lot of art in her possession, and only a very small building in which to show it off. It's located along the southern edge of Buck House, in what used to be the Palace's private chapel until German bombs hit home, and was later refurbished as an exhibition space. It's all very grand, both on the way in and inside, with a sort of classical vibe to complement the centuries-old artefacts within. Therefore it seems slightly incongruous to see all the visitors wandering around wearing ugly modern headphones. But the audio guide (and its evocative minute-long descriptions) is crucial to enjoyment of the works on show, because without it you'd be in and out of the Gallery far too quickly.
R A short distance down the road is the Queen's garage - the Royal Mews. It's no ordinary garage, obviously, because the HRH's modes of transport are always something special. Around the Mews' spacious quadrangle are parked some top of the range vehicles, as well some four legged hay-munchers. The horses arrived first, shifted into Buckingham House's back garden by George III, and thirty-ish are still stabled on site today. They're all lovingly cared for, and our present equine fanatic Queen knows every one by name. Visitors are able to walk through Nash's elegant long stable block where the horses are groomed and dressed for major ceremonies, although the penned-up Cleveland Bays and Windsor Greys are more likely to be glimpsed in the working stables on the way out.
In pride of place within the Mews is the Gold State Coach, which has been used by the sovereign at every Coronation for the last two centuries. It's magnificent, in a totally impractical showing-off sort of a way, bedecked with shiny sculpted gold at every opportunity [photo]. It's also very hard to manoeuvre and desperately uncomfortable to ride in. Our present Queen has only risked a trip three times - once at her Coronation and subsequently at her Silver and Golden Jubilees. If all goes to plan she'll be back inside for her Diamond in 2012, which will also be the 250th anniversary of the Gold Coach's first royal journey. For slightly lesser ceremonial trips other carriages are available, including the Glass Coach and the Australian State Coach. These have silkier seats and better suspension, and are better suited to lengthy parades with a lot of regal arm-waving.
The people of Poland haven't had it easy over the last millennium, regularly overrun and overtaken by their more belligerent neighbours. When the country was finally 'liberated' from the clutches of Adolf Hitler, and communist Russia took over instead, exiled Poles sought somewhere abroad to preserve their country's wartime records and treasures. Thus was the Sikorski Institute founded, safely within Allied territory, on the southern fringe of Hyde Park just along from the Royal Albert Hall. Today it's both an archive and a museum, hidden away in a row of villas mainly reserved for foreign embassies, and usually with a policeman pacing up and down nearby. Ring the bell at number 20 and a very grateful country will welcome you inside.
Upstairs, a rare treat. Secured beneath a plastic cover is one of only two Enigma coding machines still on display in this country (the other, not surprisingly, is at Bletchley Park). This was acquired, and its code first cracked, by a bunch of Polish mathematicians before WW2 even started. They worked out how to decipher the millions of combinations of rotors and leads in this evil typewriter, allowing the Allies to know what over-confident German generals were up to. Machine complexity was later greatly increased, but Alan Turing and his pioneering 'Bombe' computer eventually unravelled that too, thereby helping to end the war two years earlier than might otherwise have been the case. It's hard to believe that such a lowly black contraption, all keys and cables in a small wooden box, had so great an effect on our global future.
And ssh, don't mention this bit to the staff, but one of the best bits about the tour was the opportunity to see inside a proper Kensington embassy-type building. The Iranian Embassy, location of an infamous snooker-interrupting siege in 1980, is only four doors up the road and must look pretty much identical inside. I imagined hostages holed up in the echoing rooms, and abseiling SAS men breaking in through the front windows, and gas from stun grenades swirling down the precipitous central staircase. And then I pulled myself together and thanked my guide and saw myself back out onto Princes Gate. A unique, and entirely eye-opening experience.
Twickenham Embankment is a very pleasant spot. It's located away from the High Street, down by the river, facing the midstream boathouses of white-gabled Eel Pie Island. This is a great place to feed the swans, or to watch the pleasure cruisers chug by, or to sit outside the Barmy Arms for an alfresco post-rugby ale. There's even a cascade dripping with sculpted naked ladies in the gardens of York House, which isn't something you see every day. As for Twickenham Museum, that's to be found in a Grade 2 listed townhouse up winding Church Lane, with proper Georgian windows and a pale green door. Occasionally a blue sign appears on the door, and another on the wall alongside, bearing a boldly welcoming "OPEN". Ten hours a week, the museum's volunteer curators await someone to chat to.
And there was only the one room upstairs. More history and more bygone photos - again rather more on the walls than in the cabinets. The whole northern-Thames-side stretch of Richmond borough was covered, including various elegant village-ettes I've never personally visited. Depressingly little on Eel Pie Island, I thought, given that it was a fascinating location and only 100 metres away. While I was investigating upstairs another couple of visitors nipped into the museum, and nipped round, and nipped back outside again. But I still had time to make one further discovery about the house itself, which is that 25 The Embankment had once been owned by Thomas Twining, the legendary 18th century leaf importer. My museum trip had come up trumps, as I bagged an unexpected two for T.
Location: Malet Place, University College London WC1E 6BT [map]
The first short gallery, which is not entirely typical, houses fragments of carved stone. Few are wholly intact, but several slabs are carved with strip upon strip of exquisite hieroglyphics. As languages go, the Egyptian's intricate pictorial script may have been woefully inefficient (and entirely inappropriate for web-based communication), but it doesn't half look good. Another narrow gallery is located alongside, opening out into a larger space beyond, and all bursting with rammed-full glass cases. Don't expect glittering mummies and whopping sarcophagi, these tend to be much smaller more commonplace tomb-raided treasures. Votive tablets, serpentine caskets, and signet rings once worn by Nectaneto II - that sort of thing. Every item in the museum is labelled with a painted serial number plus a short written description, and here you'll find regular reference to dynasties, cartouches and "faience pendants". Ssh, try not to mention that all these objects were thieved from their country of origin by Empire-building 'collectors'.
A second, lower, gallery contains an unfeasibly high number of different kinds of pot, plus a few hundred tiles for good measure. If Egyptian earthenware is your thing then there's even a table for personal study, or alternatively where visitors under the age of 10 can colour in some pictures in crayon. One one particular wall there's a rack of torches - do take one, because the lighting's kept low throughout the museum to preserve the exhibits from permanent decay. And don't forget to check out the rear staircase, where yet more objects (including a fair number of ornamental cats and a sandstone jackal's paw) have been stashed. No space in this historical repository is underused.
London was once a Roman stronghold, but the centre of the City has been so wholly and utterly developed over the centuries that barely any trace remains. Modern London boasts just one Roman villa open to the public, and that only because the boundaries of the capital have been stretched out to encompass chunks of Kent. Originally a remote rural farmstead, it's now conveniently located immediately adjacent to Orpington station. Ideal for commuting, if only the former residents had hung around for long enough.
From Crofton Road, the bland municipal exterior looks like it might hold a youth club, swimming pool or church hall. Indeed no expense has been wasted outside - this is simply a big shed containing Roman leftovers. No permanent staff are employed, just a group of kindly volunteers who give up their time in case any members of the public might open the door and step inside. I would have had the entire place to myself, but a well-intentioned local parent had hired the villa for their child's birthday party and so a crowd of well-behaved under-10s were quietly assembling mosaics on a trestle table.
I managed to explore the fenced-off perimeter of the Roman remains whilst carefully avoiding getting too close to the assembled birthday crowd. They were still busy mosaicing while I perused the "touch table" of genuine ancient stuff and the sandtray in which children pretend to be archaeologists. Then we swapped places, and I went to stand on the raised platform at the rear while they went to sit in the dressing-up corner. I earned a different perspective on the old villa, including a close up of where the underfloor central heating used to be, while the kids were held distantly spellbound by a selection of animal bones.
Whitewebbs' main building used to be a pumphouse for the New River, the artificial contour-hugging canal which channeled drinking water into London in the 1600s. The pumphouse dates from 1898, which is of a similar vintage to the earliest vehicles housed therein and roundabout. Old vans and early automobiles are parked in an outdoor shed, mixed in with classic cars from later in the 20th century. When I was young an Austin Princess or Vauxhall Victor would have been fairly commonplace, but this is one of the few places you'll see either today. Or a Ford Capri, a chocolate-brown Ford Capri no less, another reminder of a less flash pre-TopGear age.
On the day of my visit, two floors of the old pumphouse housed a Toy Collector's Fair. These are fascinating occasions, even for the non-collector, because the enthusiasts are usually as intriguing as the objects they're being enthusiastic about. Those with stuff to sell sat behind tables crammed with model cars, or vans in pristine boxes, or Hornby engines, or whatever, and waited patiently for a customer to take an interest. Most such folk were older middle-aged, often here with friends or partners, and happy to have hundreds of subtly different miniatures to pick over. I will confess to being drawn to the stalls piled with Matchbox cars, but only because my brother and I played with Hot Wheels rather a lot as kids, and I wanted to see how much they might have been worth. They might have been worth something if we hadn't taken them out of the box, it seems, but smashing them down a plastic track and chipping half the paint off meant their value was rather closer to what we'd paid for them in the first place.
When you're studying zoology, you need somewhere to go look at animals. The real thing isn't always accessible, not without a round-the-world journey and/or a diving helmet, so it makes sense to collect together the remains of various species and display them for the benefit of future students. So believed Robert Grant, the UK's first Professor of Zoology, who in 1827 started a museum of preserved organisms at the University of London. Such was Mr Grant's talent that he had a sponge named after him - an honour he shares with Queen Victoria (although in this case a hermaphrodite aquatic invertebrate, not a gooey icing-filled cake). A Grantia sponge is one of the many hundreds of animals still on display at the Grant Museum of Zoology, now to be found crammed into a hospital-like basement at UCL in Bloomsbury. Find your way to the University and you can peruse the specimens like a student, no grant required.
Peer into the many pickle jars and you'll see animals that died up to 150 years ago, preserved beyond their time for future scrutiny. A "jar of assorted reptiles", for example, or a bloated axolotl, or some tiny crusty sea creatures. Several specimens are labelled with spidery Victorian handwriting, although this is a living museum and there's 21st century printing on more recent acquisitions. Every animal is also marked by a coloured pictogram sticker - a simple but informative way to depict its classification, be that amphibian, crustacean or whatever. Wander round the museum clockwise and the specimens generally get more complex, starting with some of the smaller sea creatures and moving on to fish, birds and mammals. There's not much explanatory text alongside, but there doesn't need to be because the dead animals do the talking. It's a lot more interesting than staring at a textbook, that's for sure.
King Henry VIII kicked things off in Woolwich nearly 500 years ago by establishing a royal dockyard. The isolated conditions alongside the Thames estuary were later thought perfect for the storage of gunpowder, so the Board of Ordnance moved in and snapped up 31 acres of Woolwich Warren. Facilities grew, the site expanded, and more and more factories were built (that Napoleon bloke, he took a lot of beating). The Royal Arsenal reached its peak during World War I, employing more than a hundred thousand workers and stretching more then four miles downriver to Crossness. Munitions aplenty were churned out during World War II, but then a steady decline set in. In the 1950s Woolwich was home to a top secret outpost of the Government's Atomic Weapons Establishment (but don't worry, people of SE18, because they only made the detonators here not the nuclear bits). Finally in 1967 virtually the whole site was shut down and sold to the GLC, who promptly nipped in and built Thamesmead instead.
Several of the old riverside munitions buildings have been converted to apartments, and highly desirable they look too. But also very exclusive, as you can tell by the series of metal entrance gates around the perimeter that swing automatically open and closed as residents come and go. This is fenced-off heritage, a residential fortress, with all the personalised numberplates on the inside and all the riffraff kept firmly out. Priorities for residents include their own first-floor parkland, their own deli (no mere corner shops here) and a gymnasium housed inside a marvellously ornate 18th century Shell Foundry (I've never seen anywhere quite so appropriate for pumping iron). If you've bought a flat in this part of the Royal Arsenal development, you'll rightly be rather smug about it.
7pm photo update: a few of mine (and rather more from Ian)
If everything goes to plan, tomorrow's the day that the DLR reaches Woolwich. Lucky Woolwich. Trains on the three-year-old City Airport branch will no longer have to terminate at the unlikely-named King George V, they'll continue down a brand new tunnel under the Thames and emerge beneath the heart of Woolwich Town Centre. Change here for services to Erith and Dartford (or, if you're a bit nervous, just stay on the train and head straight back to Newham).
You don't have to cram onto the Embankment to see London's New Year fireworks. Anywhere with a decent view of the London Eye will do, be it a nearby bridge, a Lambeth rooftop or a BBC1 TV camera platform. So for the dawn of 2009 I decided to step three miles further back, to one of the best unobstructed views across the capital. To the dark northern slopes above Regent's Park. To Primrose Hill.
The midnight hour approached. We stood facing southwards, waiting for the distant ring of pulsing lights to explode into life. The bunch of friends to my right misjudged their timing somewhat and lit their sparklers 90 seconds early. Several false countdowns were started - not a chance of hearing Big Ben out here in the middle of nowhere. And then... And then... And then, finally, 2009 was heralded by a series of bright flashes on the banks of the Thames. The hilltop erupted with a yelping cheer, just in time for my neighbours' sparklers to splutter out. There was much indiscriminate hugging, and some slightly over-excited cuddling, plus the popping of several bottles of champagne. Happy New Year everybody!
