Suffering for your beliefs

I have been a bit quite recently, due to not being particularly well. I have had a chest infection, which got quite bad just before Christmas and I was told my doctors to stay in doors for a bit, in addition to the medication. So I was pretty much housebound for a month. I haven't yet picked up my camera this year, but I may resume the project next week. In the meantime I still have one days shots to post, which will likely take up this and the next post.

The shots here, were taken before Christmas, on my birthday. I took a half days holiday in order to try and complete the area between Holborn and Fleet Street. I started off on the east end of Holborn, where St. Andrew Avenue and New Fetter Lane join onto Holborn Circus. Here I met an Iranian man who was on day 18 of a 30 day hunger strike and protesting for the freedom of political prisoners, democracy, equal rights and freedom of speech. I spent a a while talking to him and was humbled by the experience. It was a very brave and courageous thing that he was doing, something that know I couldn't do.

After we finished our conversation, I continued up Holborn which turns into High Holburn just past the tube station, a fact I had not realised when in this area previously.

From here I then headed back down Holborn to photograph some of the streets off it, gradually heading south towards Fleet Street. The next stop was Furnival Street. Behind the doors in the shot below is a goods lift, that dates back to the late 1940’s and which leads down to an endless warren of tunnels known initially as The Chancery Lane Deep Shelter, and latterly as the Kingsway Trunk Exchange. After the war, the tunnels were briefly occupied by nearly 400 tons of Public Records Office documents, until in the late 1940’s, with the Government’s increasing realisation of how vulnerable the Capital’s communications networks would be in a time of conflict, it was decided to transform the tunnels into a protected trunk telephone exchange.This huge undertaking was completed in 1954, and a couple of hundred people worked down there until the 1980's.

Just off of here is Took Court.

At the end of both Furnival Street and TookCourt is Cursitor Street. There was quite a lot of building work going on here as you can see in the image, which limited options somewhat. The man coming towards me in the shot, stopped to chat to me for a few minutes. He was interested in my cameras, which he thought was a Leica; he owned one and was quite disappointed to find out that it was not.

Also off of Furnival Street is Norwich Street.

This leads to Fetter Lane, and from here I went through  Plough Lane.

Plough Lane then leads to New Fetter Lane, where I took a couple of images. The first is a reflection which doesn't really work, and the second is the empty interior of an office - here I quite liked the stark white emptiness , broken up the ladder. Its not a great shot, but I don't think it would have worked had the ladder not been there, or the ladder had been a plain metal variety.

I then continued east for a few streets onto Little New Street.

Just off here leading to Faringdon Street is Stonecutter Street, which is the last image of the post. The rest of the streets I photographed this day, will follow in another post.

The north side of cheapside

The title gives the location away - between Cheapside and Gresham Street. The few images here were  all taken before xmas, and this little outing completed this section of the map.

First up is King Street. Walking along here, the sun was low and creating some really nice long shadows, though the strong sunlight was also a little problematic.

Parallel to King Street is of Lawrence Lane. I wasn't overly inspired here but decided to focus on the man getting into his car, getting down low to use the yellow line as a lead-in.

Off of King Street, and which leads to Lawrence Lane, is Trump Street.

Trump Street very quickly turns into Russia Row. In the image below I was inspired to take a sneaky looking sort of shot, but with a juxtaposition provided by the security camera. Photographers get a raw deal from the public sometimes and whilst I have never had a problem I do know of people who have had abuse hurled at them because they happened to be photographing in the vicinity of (fully clothed) children, but not photographing them. In 2013 it was reported that the UK had just under 6 million CCTV cameras, or one per eleven of the population, with 5.5 million of those are in private hands. Mobile apps are now available that offer live streaming of cctv footage, yet few people seem concerned about whom is videoing our streets and what the footage is being used for.

I have been stopped a few times by people since I started this project, but most were just curious as to what I was photographing, and all took a genuine interest in the project and wished me luck, when I told them about it. It did however take me quite a while to have some level of confidence to photograph on the street, and to begin with I was very nervous about doing so. I think it helps that Londoners are so used to tourists taking pictures. The paranoia about photographers being pedophiles or terrorists means that whilst we are in an age where more people have cameras than ever before, we are not documenting our streets or way or life as much as we used to. A related matter, is the increasing amount of huge areas of private land, where you are restricted from taking photographs by over zealous security guards if they deem you to be in possession of a "professional" looking camera of heaven forbid a tripod. The whole of the Canary Wharf estate is privately owned, as are large sections of the South Bank, and photography there can be problematic.

Right, off my high horse. A bit further west, and between Wood Street and Gutter Lane is Goldsmith Street. I was quite pleased with the image below, the timing was spot on.

Half way down Gutter Lane and leading to Foster Lane is Priest's Court.

At on point this splits into two alleys, the other being Rose and Crown Court.

The final image of the day was taken on Carey Lane, which also connects Gutter Lane and Foster Lane.

Short but Sweet

A short post, with just a few pics from a few weeks ago, all taken in the area between Cheapside and Gresham Street.

First up is Honey Lane, my favourite image from this post. The street visible at the end of the passage is Cheapside.

The following image is of Prudent Passage,which connects Ironmonger Lane, with King Street.

Also connecting Old Jewry with Ironmonger Lane is St. Olaves Court, once the location of the St. Olave, Old Jewry church. the church was destroyed by the great fire of London and rebuilt by who else but Sir Christopher Wren. The church was mostly demolished in 1887, and all that remains are the tower and west wall.

On Ironmonger lane itself there was a very popular cafe/takeaway place with a long queue outside, where I took the following shot.

Heading further along towards St. Pauls, I then took two pictures of the same building but on/of different streets - Milk Street and Compter Passage which leads to Wood Street.

My last image of the day was from Frederick's Place (just off Old Jewry) and is evidence of a xmas drinks party the night before - I'm a little surprised by the coffee cup.

Do they know its Christmas time at all

Christmas has passed at the time of writing this, but as ever I am a catching up. I dont know whether its because I try do so as much of my Christmas shopping online, but I didnt seem to be exposed to so much Christmas stuff and it seemed relatively subdued. I even managed to completely avoid the latest band aid record; like some of the artists that declined an offer to perform, I chose to donate in other ways.

Anyway having justified the title of the post, its time to get on with it; two sets of images from different days and different parts of the city, both from half an hour or so breaks from the office. First up is Mansion House Street, a small stretch of road directly in front of the Mansion House; the home and office of the Lord Mayor of London.

A short distance from here down Queen Victoria Street is Bucklersbury. The image below is taken at the building site for Bloomberg's new headquarters. When the previous building was being built, the remains of the the roman Temple of Mithras were found. Progress was not impeded though and the temple was relocated to a street level roof of a car park (of all things), Now they are on the move again and will be relocated back to the original location. Hooray. There are some more details at the guardian.

From here I moved down onto Cannon Street and some of the roads off it. When I first entered Salters Hall Court I was completely uninspired and decided to come back another day, However on walking up the next parallel street to it, St. Swithins Lane, I came across a garage entrance to the court and noticed this silhouetted woman.

I continued up St. Swithins Lane, before heading back to the office.

A couple of days later I had another short break from the office, this time filling in some of the streets around St. Bartholomew's hospital. Newbury Street was not very inspiring, and the best I could do was to frame someone in some scaffolding.

Next stop was Bartholomew Place, a small courtyard of sorts, but with a charming looking picture framers.

Across from here is Bartholomew Close which then leads to Middlesex Passage, a twisty turny alley. I spotted a couple of hospital workers here on an unofficial smoking break who would have made a great photo, but they refused to have there photo taken as they shouldn't have been there,

Also off of the close is Bartholomew Passage, which is very short and does not present many photographic opportunities.

I then backtracked a little and onto Kinghorn Street, where the rain had produced nice shiny reflections on the pavement.

My last shot of this area was of Cloth Street, which I had been down several times previously without managing to take a shot. I got one this time, but its nothing to write home about; if the scaffolding looks familiar its because the shot was taken from the end of Newbury Street, the first image in this post.

I then headed back to the office, but via a long route, down to St. Pauls tube station and onto Cheapside, before going down Foster Lane, were I shot by my favourite image of the two days.

From here I walked along Gresham Street, which I had photographed previously, but my eye spotted the steps outside the building below, which made great lead-in-lines.

My final image of the day and this post, was taken later that afternoon, from my office as the sun was setting. It was a lovely sunset and made a nice image.

Another month passes

This post marks the end of November (still a bit behind) and I'm beginning to feel like the end is in sight, but only a little closer than the horizon. The shots here were taken on two days in the last week of the month and are a mixture of around Cannon Street or down on the Thames footpath.

First up is Abchurch Yard. Not my best picture but any means but I like the lead in lines here. The  building in the background is St. Mary Abchurch (another post fire of london Wren Church).

The following shot is taken on the steps at the entrance to Cannon Street station.

Next is Swan Lane which leads from Upper Thames Street down to the Thames. I have seen some great pictures of the building in the picture below in the past, with the bright yellow of the building contrasting against a clear blue sky and I have wanted to take such a shot, but didn't recognise the building at the time. Instead I opted for a reflection shot and perhaps it is a good thing that I found my own image rather than copied someone else's, even if mine is not as good.

I then walked along the Thames footpath, where the name changes frequently. The fist image below is of Oystergate Walk, and the second is Hanseatic Walk.

The following day I headed down to the river again, filling in a few streets along the way. Birchin Lane was one of the last, if not the last street between Cornhill and Lombard Street, that I still needed to photograph.

A bit further on and on the south side of Cannon Street is Martin Lane.

The bottom of Martin Lane leads onto Arthur Street where I encountered some construction workers engaging in traffic duties.

From here I crossed Upper Thames Street and onto Angel Lane whose most prominent feature is a large shiny building occupied by the Japanese bank Nomura.

At the end of Angel Lane is the Thames footpath and I walked westerly along here for a bit, My next image is of Steelyard Passage which passes underneath Cannon Street station. Its quite a dark passage but does have some ground level lights. It also features a sound installation that allegedly plays industrial sounds from days gone by, but personally I thought it sounded quite spooky.

My last shot of the day and of the month also was of Peters Hill, which leads from the river up to St. Paul's Cathedral. On the left of the image below is the millennium (or wobbly) bridge.

The updated map now looks as follows -