Postcode Pinboard: SE1
Today I wandered around the Blackfriars area of SE1. It’s a truly varied part of the capital. One moment you’re passing a brutalist council estate, the next you’re stumbling across a quaint, leafy square complete with a red telephone box. I’ll be creating similar postcode pinboards like this one for other areas of London soon.
I like your top Shard one. I thought it was a reflection, but I’m thinking not now. And is the bottom one anti-Olympic graffiti? I thought they destroyed all that in the build up to the event, or was that just in certain parts of London?
The Shard image is taken through some railings, but reflection was a good guess as some glass buildings do have those thick black struts on them. There is definitely some anti-2012 graffiti about – even in Stratford – so if they tried to remove it, it looks like the artists went back and re-stated their point. I’ve photographed as much Olympic-related graffitti as possible as there’s an interesting undercurrent of distaste about what the Olympic park has done to the Hackney area.
It was in the news up here, in the lead up of the games where there was still a lot of apprehension (militant corporate sponsors, missiles on roofs), before Danny Boyle and all that, that they were removing anti-Olympic graffiti in some areas where the tourists would see it. It all sounded a bit Communist China trying to paint a false picture. So well done for capturing it as it’s a valuable social document of the time and tells a story.
The one example I used on my blog is here, although I didn’t take it: http://frivolousmonsters.wordpress.com/2012/08/03/a-foreigners-guide-to-the-olympic-opening-ceremony/
That’s a wicked post! I will have to see if I can dig out my other examples of anti-Olympic graffiti. Not sure what I’m actually going to ‘do’ with them yet. But I remember thinking it was important to document them.
You are welcome to pop round if you chose to do SW19 or SM4
Ooh. I’m sure I’ll get to those!