Leytonstone Lockdown Walk

I’m really enjoying the challenge of digging deeper into my local area for my lockdown walks. For this video I only cover a short section of Leytonstone High Road and yet it was so rich in resonances and associations. It starts with the ghosts of the M11 Link Road protests in Dyers Hall Road in the early 1990’s. Then passes the rubble of the much-loved 491 Gallery, now being very slowly transformed into a block of flats with a beautiful view of the A12/M11 Link Road. Passing on to Leytonstone High we face another development of flats built on the site of Lincolns Pub, but which YouTube comments have informed me was better known to locals in its previous incarnation as The Elms.

We acknowledge Marnie Court, named in honour of Leytonstone’s famous son Alfred Hitchcock, born further down the High Road. The turning point in the walk is the former State Cinema on Leytonstone High Road, now a banqueting venue. From here we turn back along the High Road then into Trinity Close which once would have led us to the ground of Leytonstone FC at Granleigh Road. Leytonstone were a very successful non-league football club, multiple winners of the Isthmian League and the FA Trophy. The ground is now a housing estate.

Leytonstone lockdown walk

The traffic on Leytonstone High Road was still a relatively busy. Scooters buzz away from Yard Sale Pizza. There were more pedestrians at points on this particular day, Friday 17th April around 5pm, than I anticipated, despite very few shops being open (only food shops and chemists).

It was sad to the see the Red Lion closed, chairs on tables, and the shutters down on the Luna Lounge. When will we be back supping a pint of ale and listening to live music at Luna?

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The Lighting of the Leytonstone Menorah

Leytonstone Menorah

Leytonstone Menorah

Leytonstone Menorah

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This evening saw the lighting of the first Leytonstone Menorah to mark the last night of Hannukah.

The celebration was organised by Leytonstone and Wanstead Synagogue in Fillebrook Road. It was a beautiful community event, attended by a large crowd in the hundreds, gathered around the Menorah in a raised bed on the corner of Fillebrook and Grove Green Road opposite the tube station. A band played, doughnuts and laktes were handed out, and the Rabbi spoke about the illuminating of the darkness that Hannukah represents.

Sunday sunset walk through Bush Wood

Bush Wood

The Shard seems to be aligned perfectly with the avenue of trees that cuts across Wanstead Flats from Leytonstone to what was once the grounds of the grand Wanstead House. I believe I’ve erronously claimed in the past that this avenue was laid out by Humphrey Repton (confusing it with the avenue of trees he planned in Wanstead Park near one of the lakes). The sunset reveals this alignment in the startling burnt sky. One of the reasons the last light is a perfect time to walk on Wanstead Flats.

Bush Wood

It was dark by the time we looped back from Blake Hall Road, following the path to Bushwood Lodge, and then turning into Bush Wood. Our passage through the woods was illuminated by a full moon casting a crystal trail through the muddy woodland. This pond in Bush Wood has always had a slightly mysterious tinge, often dried out in summer, in winter it lurks like a magic bog among the trees. The moon sat above the bare trees solely to cast moonbeams into this very pool.

Iain Sinclair & Edith Walks at Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema

Iain Sinclair Leytonstone

I had to photograph Iain Sinclair in front of Leytonstone’s Olympic Fish Bar in Church Lane. The great London writer had come to introduce his film collaboration with Andrew Kötting, Edith Walks at Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema in Leytonstone Library. Iain had been a prominent critic of the London 2012 Olympics, resulting in Hackney Council temporarily banning him in 2008 from speaking in its libraries.

Iain Sinclair Leytonstone

Iain Sinclair introducing Edith Walks

Iain Sinclair Leytonstone

Iain Sinclair introducing Edith Walks at Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema

When introducing Iain Sinclair, I mentioned how in the boom years of the psychogeography revival at the turn of the millenium, the idea of a Sinclair – Kötting collaboration was considered the psychogeographer’s ‘dream ticket’. Then while I was working at the National Film Theatre that dream ticket quite incredibly manifested itself with the film Offshore Gallivant, which screened at the NFT in 2006. Iain gave a humorous account of the making of the film as the crew spent the entire trip throwing up over the side of the boat meaning little footage was actually shot, however somehow Kötting still managed to make a film.

Iain related this to the making of Edith Walks, one of a number of subsequent collaborations between the pair, documenting a pilgrimage in the wake of King Harold’s wife Edith Swanneck from Waltham Abbey to the battlefield at Hastings. The nature of a 100-mile walk meant footage was not easy to capture throughout. Some of the scenes I shot at Waltham Abbey and on the towpath to Enfield Lock made their way into the final cut. A fair percentage of the film was shot on iphones using a Super8 app. The result was something magical and entrancing that the audience received warmly and sparked a fascinating discussion after the screening.

Edith Walks by Andrew Kötting

Iain Sinclair in Edith Walks directed by Andrew Kötting

Edith Walks Kötting

Claudia Barton as Edith Swan Neck

Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema is the first Wednesday of the month at Leytonstone Library

A walk along Leytonstone’s Lost River – the Philley Brook (Fillebrook)

A walk along Leytonstone’s Lost River – the Philley Brook (or Fillebrook) – part of a series of walks for Waltham Forest London Borough of Culture 2019.

The route of the walk in the video is as follows:

Fillebrook Route

Start at St. Andrew’s Church – go behind to patch of land beside St. James Lane – Bury Field Farm – note church on boggy high ground – gas lamp beside church – note course across Forest Road

Follow the footpath beside St.Andrew’s Church and turn left  into Coleworth Road

Turn right into Hainault Road to block of modern flats – brook runs through car park

Turn left into Lytton Road

Turn left into Wadley Road

Brook cuts across Ripley Mews and Temple Close (linking to carpark behind flats) – can hear under street iron

Continue back along Lytton Road

Turn left into Esther Road – see where brook comes through metal gate continues under houses – flooding

Back to Lytton – look down across back gardens

Turn left into Wallwood Road – Wallwood Farm Estate – Stratford Langthorne

See where brook comes through opposite Kings Passage

Listen to river in Kings Road (be careful of cars) – then it goes through St. John’s Ambulance

Along Kingswood Road to Queen’s Road – see brook running across – listen (watch out for traffic)

Kingswood Road – ex-Fillebrook Road

Turn right into Fairlop Road – then left into Bulwer Road – left into Chelmsford (alt. route goes from Grove Green Road straight into Fillebrook Road)

Turn right Into Fillebrook Road from Chelmsford Road opp Damon Albarn house and Leytonstone & Wanstead Synagogue

At end of Fillebrook Road turn right into Drayton Road – Drayton Road sound of river opposite flats – then left into Southwest Road

Turn right into Avebury Road – right into Cavendish Road – left into Scarborough Road

Philley Brook Fillebrook

The Philley Brook in Drayton Road

Turn right into Grove Green Road – look at Stuart Freeborn Murals on other side of the railway – Heathcote and Star Pub

Turn right at Heathcote into Pretoria Road – then left into Newport Road

[Ian Bourn diversion not in the video but on guided walk: Grove Green (Farm) – Stuart Freeborn – Claremont Rd – Northcote Arms -Francis Road]

Across Francis Road – alleyway into Dawlish Road

Through Sidmouth Park

Cross Leyton High Road – note –  Brooke House – go through Coronation Gardens  – maze + water feature

Exit onto Oliver Road – note Leyton Beach – turn left

Turn right into Dunedin Road – (note Ruckholt Road) go through new development to Orient Way – end at Allotments

Graham Millar M11 Linked

Listening to Graham Millar’s M11 Linked on Grove Green Road

 

Walking in Waltham Forest talk

I’ll be giving an illustrated talk about my walks for Waltham Forest Borough of Culture at Leyton and Leytonstone Historical Society on Wednesday 16th October – more details here

 

Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema at Leytonstone Loves Film

Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema’s programme of Films of East London was a great success at Leytonstone Loves Film on Saturday. There were big audiences and fascinating director Q&As. Let’s hope that Leytonstone Loves Film – produced by the Barbican – becomes an annual event.

 

Adam Kossoff

Adam Kossoff director of The Anarchist Rabbi

Q&A with Adam Kossoff covered the importance of cultural memory, Jewish radicalism, and the life of Rudolph Rocker.

Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema - Leytonstone Loves Film

The Anarchist Rabbi

Paul Kelly film-maker

Paul Kelly director of What Have You Done Today Mervyn Day

Paul Kelly explains how he spent several weeks exploring the area around the proposed Olympic Park in the summer of 2005 for his film What Have You Done Today Mervyn Day, that was made for a live performance by pop band St. Etienne at the Barbican later that year.

Ian Bourn introduces Lenny's Documentary

Ian Bourn introduces Lenny’s Documentary

Ian Bourn explained how the idea for Lenny’s Documentary arose in 1978 from wondering what would happen if anyone could make and broadcast a TV programme. Shot on U-Matic, it was a pioneering piece of video art, made when Ian was a student at the Royal College of Art.

Barbican Family Film Hub St. John's Churchyard

Barbican Family Film Hub St. John’s Churchyard

Tehran Taboo

Our next film screening

The next screening at Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema – Tehran Taboo is on Wednesday 6th October, 7.45pm at Leytonstone Library

Video Strolls at Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema

Video Strolls Leytonstone

Andy Howlett of Video Strolls – photo by Liberty Rowley

On the 3rd July we hosted the fantastic Video Strolls at Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema with a programme of artists films related to ‘Quiet Spaces’. Andy Howlett and Liberty Rowley of Video Strolls suggested we start the event with a short wander around some of the quiet spaces of Leytonstone to set the tone.

Leytonstone bus station

‘Time Terminus’ – photo by Liberty Rowley

They were fascinated by the peculiar bus sculpture outside the Tube station (Time Terminus by Lodewyk Pretor), which prompted an interesting discussion about the legacy of the building of the M11 Link Road that was running beneath our feet. Luckily film-maker Ian Bourn was in attendance and was able to recount first-hand stories of the building of the road and the artist community that was destroyed in the process. Apparently the sculpture was made from left over bricks from the construction of the road. Paul Greenleaf was also on hand to add to talk about his beguiling film about the Link Road, I Will Become More Powerful Than You Can Possibly Imagine, that screened on the Leytonstone Arts Trail the following weekend.

Leytonstone Churchyard

Leytonstone churchyard

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We then moved on to St. John’s churchyard where we looked at the Buxton family grave and talked about the ‘flying bombs’ that fell on Leytonstone during World War 2.

Matalan Leytonstone

From the churchyard we explored a different type of ‘quiet space’ in the carpark behind and beneath Matalan – once a rolling skating rink of some renown and a rather grand cinema, the Rink Picture Palace, which opened in 1911 on the same site.

Video Strolls Leytonstone

Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema

The film programme at Leytonstone Library was very well received and we had a fascinating post-screening discussion with Liberty and Andy prompting some great contributions from the audience on the subject of place based film-making.

Thanks to Video Strolls for ambling to Leytonstone.

 

 

Leytonstone Pop-Up Cinema is the first Wednesday of the month at Leytonstone Library (except August and January) – sign up to our mailing list for news of future screenings.