London

Derelict London Part 2

Since my post last year on Pall Talling’s Derelict London site he has had his work published in a book.  It makes for fascinating reading and is truly inclusive of the whole city. The book is divided into sections along the lines of those featured on his site such as ‘Houses & Flats’, ‘Pubs & […]

31 May 2008

Herbrand Street ‘Mural’

Biking home along the now congested cycle lanes in Bloomsbury I couldn’t help noticing this huge mural on the side of the terrace at the corner of Herbrand Street and Tavistock Place. I went back to it the next day with my camera and took these pictures. At the same time I went up to […]

25 May 2008

John Henstock

I got in touch with John Henstock recently as he’d started uploading some of his pictures on Flickr. Here’s one example from Brixton for Our Sons Menswear (funny, I’d always read it as Dursons Menswear!). They interested me because of their very distinctive look and so I asked how he had achieved the effect. He […]

27 Mar 2008

London Street Scenes

Bob just told me about his site London Street Scenes [update: website no longer available] where a good collection of mainly London ghost signs can be seen. There’s a good spread from North and South London and it looks like there are more being added all the time. In addition to this section there are other galleries […]

16 Mar 2008

Ghost Signs Received (London)

Having been fairly busy over the last few months at work and on my course I’ve only been making the occasional posts of things that people have sent to me. What has resulted is a slight backlog of pictures and so these posts will pull these together along geographic lines (London, UK, Europe and USA). […]

11 Mar 2008

Faded London

If you like the sort of stuff found on this blog you will certainly also be interested in the work of Yelfy over at Faded London.  This features some excellent examples of Ghost Signs, many from South London which is clearly my weak spot along with West London (funny that, living in North East!). The […]

4 Feb 2008

Pulse of the Planet

A while ago I submitted some photos and general information to a competition run by USA science website Pulse of the Planet. And I won (!) with this picture of one of my personal favourites from Stoke Newington Church Street, N16. Interestingly one of the two runners up prizes went to another Stoke Newington sign […]

2 Dec 2007

Boyd Pianos

Charlie, sarflondondunc and Ross all told me about this great sign for Boyd Pianos that has recently been revealed on Shacklewell Lane in Hackney, presumably by the removal of a billboard. It is interesting on a number of levels, not least the quality of preservation 1. It is advertising pianos which is something you would […]

23 Nov 2007

Literary London Article (Part One)

Sebastian Groes and I have been working on a Ghost Signs article in response to the presentation we gave at the annual Literary London Festival.  This looks broadly at the signs in the context of London and discusses what they symbolise and represent for the city. There are also some practical discussions about the techniques […]

14 Nov 2007

The Post (18th October)

Kathryn passed me this, which appears to have come as a follow up to the recent piece in the South London Press.  The article talks about the Streatham Society trying to get this great Portogram sign protected and also features the question to Mayor Ken again. I’ve tried to get in touch wth John Brown […]

10 Nov 2007

Bovril & Greys

Andy sent me this great double sign from Bedford in response to my appeal for world record contenders.  Although it isn’t a multitude of signs, the quality of preservation is exceptional. Either they’ve been retouched or they have been preserved by a billboard/adjacent building. redgrittybrick says of the Greys signs: ” I believe the “Greys” […]

19 Oct 2007

Society of Operative Printers & Assistants (RIP)

Some time ago Nick sent me this picture of an old ‘shop’ front on Blackfriars Road. The building is quite clearly not used any more but the signage had survived until very recently.  I cycled past it today and the two sides visible here have fallen off or been destroyed. However, a third side (to […]

16 Oct 2007

Hackney Gazette

Yesterday (11th October) the Hackney Gazette did a nice spread on the project.  I had a few photos taken for this, some of them very cheesy, so I was quite pleased with their eventual selection. It was great to see some more of my pictures in print, especially those that are most local to me. […]

12 Oct 2007

Hackney Council

In preparing an article for the Hackney Gazette a response came from the council as to what they’re doing to preserve old ads.  In principal this is very positive, especially given the large number of signs in the borough (a rare double pictured). The following message came from Emma Britton, Media Officer, Hackney Council: Please […]

8 Oct 2007

Lambeth Council

Following the recent painting over of the Clapham North ‘Music Rolls‘ sign, Ocky got in touch with Kate Hoey, MP for Vauxhall to ask her what Lambeth Council are doing to preserve this signs. The response from Michael Copeman, via Councillor Peck, was as follows: Dear Kate   Keith put exactly the same enquiry about […]

4 Oct 2007

London Tonight

Last night (27th September) there was a feature on London Tonight all about Ghost Signs in London and how they should be protected. I was interviewed for the piece and Alistair Stewart commented that it was a “masterpiece”. High praise indeed!

27 Sep 2007

South London Press

Today there was a feature in the South London Press about protecting ghost signs.  This came on the back of the question to Mayor Ken. Although not credited, the Picture Post photo is one of mine and Robert has added some research to this. I get a mention with a couple of quotes on the […]

25 Sep 2007

Ariel Bikes

This sign from Kennington in south London was spotted by Steve and I photographed it soon after. It’s right beside a library which makes it difficult to get a square shot. It is a mystery why it says “Writers” across the bottom and also interesting that the top left of the sign has completely gone.Ariel […]

21 Sep 2007

Ken Livingstone

Jose recently helped to pose a question, via Murad Qureshi, on Ghost Signs to London’s Mayor, Ken Livingstone. His question and Ken’s response are below. The Mayor makes reference to the ‘London Plan‘ and this would seem to be his suggestion in terms of protecting signs via local councils. `Ghost Signs’ in London, Question No: […]

18 Sep 2007

Redfern’s Rubber Heels

Renovations on Islington property reveal a ghost sign for Redfern’s Rubber Heels after stripping back the paint of another ghost sign and partial whitewash.

14 Sep 2007

Redferns (RIP?)

These great brickads were protected for many years by a couple of billboards, although they weren’t entirely covered.  This meant that some of the outer edges were lost to weathering, cleaning and sandblasting. I must have got lucky that Chris told me about them as when I went to get a better photo on Saturday […]

7 Aug 2007

Gramophones Records (RIP)

I am informed by sarflondondunc that this ghost sign has been erased.  It was just by Clapham North Station and I used it in my recent presentation as an example of a plain text sign which has been designed to fit around the available wall space. It was visible from both the nearby train line […]

2 Aug 2007

John Brown’s Whiskies

Yesterday I hopped on the bike and went out to follow up some leads given to me by friends. On my way to the first sign, the great Spitalfields Gillette, I went past three or four in the same area that I hadn’t expected to see.  This is generally the nature of ‘hunting’, that new […]

22 Jul 2007

Literary London

Today Sebastian Groes and I presented a session on Ghost Signs to c.40 international delegates at the Literary London conference.  This is an event run by the Literary London journal and the key focus this year was representations of London in literature. Despite some technical difficulties early on we eventually got the projector working, albeit […]

20 Jul 2007