Tag: Lewis Carroll

Day 82 – Midland Road – York Way – Copenhagen Street – Caledonian Road

Following an extended summer break, today’s walk sees us return to the area around King’s Cross for the first time in ten years, during which, I think it’s fair to say, quite a bit has changed. We visit the area to the north of KX station which has undergone a massive make-over in the last couple of decades then venture eastward into Pentonville, bordered to the south by the eponymous Road and to the north by Copenhagen Street. All of which is intersected by the Regent’s Canal.

We kick off at the southern end of Midland Road which runs northward between the British Library and St Pancras International (both of which we dealt with back on Day 9). We also covered the always astonishing Renaissance Hotel (née Midland Grand Hotel) back then but as a bit of a bonus we’ll take another look at that at the end of this post.

Adjacent to the British Library, to the north, is the Francis Crick Institute, named after the British scientist who along with James Watson identified the structure of DNA in 1953, drawing on the work of Maurice Wilkins, Rosalind Franklin and others. The Crick, as it is generally known, is home to a partnership between six of the world’s leading biomedical research organisations: the Medical Research Council, Cancer Research UK, Wellcome, UCL (University College London), Imperial College London and King’s College London. The genesis of this partnership was the 2007 Cooksey report which looked at ways to consolidate and enhance medical research in the UK. The institute was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth in November 2016 and was fully operational by the spring of 2017. It now houses over 2000 people and more than 100 research groups.

Beyond the Crick we turn left into Brill Place then follow Purchese Street and Chenies Place back round to Pancras Road which takes over from Midland Road.

Pancras Road partially veers east in the form of a tunnel under the rail lines out of St Pancras then morphs into Goods Way. To the north of Goods Way, sandwiched in between Camley Street and the Regent’s Canal is the Camley Street Natural Park, a little patch of wilderness in the city. The site was once a coal drop for the railways into King’s Cross Station, which was demolished in the 1960s. As it was subsequently colonised by nature the London Wildlife Trust ran a campaign in the 1980’s to save the site from development and create a nature reserve which opened in 1985. Nice café if you’re in the vicinity. They’ll even do you an Aperol Spritz (which I think demonstrates that we’ve now reached peak Aperol Spritz).

After polishing off an Earl Grey tea and ham and cheese croissant at the café we cross the canal via the Somerstown Bridge and enter the heart of the King’s Cross regeneration.

A potted history : In the early 19th century, prior to the arrival of the railways, this area had already developed into an industrial hub with the opening of the canal in 1820 and the Pancras Gasworks in 1824. A number of other “polluting” businesses such as paint manufacture and refuse sorting were also established in the area giving it a somewhat tarnished reputation. In an attempt to offset this, a huge memorial to, the recently deceased, King George IV was erected at a major crossroads in 1836. The memorial attracted ridicule and was demolished in 1845 to ease the flow of traffic, but the new name for the area – ‘King’s Cross’ – stuck. King’s Cross station opened in 1852 and St Pancras station followed around 15 years later. In the latter years of the 19th century both the railways and the gasworks were expanded leading to the demolition of much of the surrounding housing. After WWII and nationalisation of the railways in 1948, the transport of freight by rail suffered a rapid decline and in the southern part of the Goods Yard, most of the rail lines were lifted in the 1980s. Although six gasholders remained in service until 2000, the area went from being a busy industrial and distribution district to a place that was synonymous with urban sleaze and decay, consisting mainly of derelict and disused buildings, railway sidings, warehouses and contaminated land. At the same time it became something of a hub for artists and creative organisations and was closely associated with the illegal rave scene in the 1990’s.

Gasholders, Goods Way, Kings Cross, Camden, 1989

The 1996 decision to move the Channel Tunnel Rail Link from Waterloo to St Pancras became the catalyst for redevelopment by landowners, London & Continental Railways Limited and Excel (now DHL). It took another ten years though before outline planning permission was granted for 50 new buildings, 20 new streets, 10 new major public spaces, the restoration and refurbishment of 20 historic buildings and structures, and up to 2,000 homes. Early infrastructure works began in 2007, with development starting in earnest in late 2008. Much of the early investment was focused in and around the Victorian buildings that once formed the Goods Yard. In September 2011, the University of the Arts London moved to the Granary Complex, and parts of the development opened to the public for the first time. Since then the historic Coal Drops have been redeveloped as a shopping destination, and companies such as Google, Meta, Universal Music and Havas have chosen to locate here. New public streets, squares and gardens have opened, among them Granary Square with its spectacular fountains and Gasholder Park. In January 2015, the UK government and DHL announced the sale of their investment in the King’s Cross redevelopment to Australian Super, Australia’s biggest superannuation/pension fund. I must confess here that there is a part of me which wishes I had thought to undertake this project before all of the above happened.

Three of the Gasholders built for the Pancras Gasworks in 1860-67, known as the ‘Siamese Triplet’, because their frames are joined by a common spine, escaped demolition and were awarded Grade II listed status. As part of the renewal programme these were painstakingly restored over a five year period by a specialist engineering firm in Yorkshire and upon their return to King’s Cross, erected on the northern bank of Regent’s Canal and developed into 145 apartments, designed by Wilkinson Eyre Architects, and completed in 2018. (The photos below are from a previous visit in December 2020).

Stable Street runs through the middle of the development area as far as Handyside Street. At their intersection stands the Aga Khan Centre, the UK home for three organisations founded by His Late Highness Aga Khan IV, the hereditary spiritual leader of the Shi‘a Ismaili Muslims. The building was designed by the Japanese architect, Fumihiko Maki, who unfortunately passed away in 2024. The building is influenced by Islamic architectural history and is clad in detailed pale limestone, referencing the grand Portland stone buildings across London.

The striking Q1 office building at 22 Handyside was built over three listed railway tunnels so the design involved a lightweight structure with a diagonal orientation clad in perforated panels of anodized aluminium.

We head back south on York Way. Prominent on the east side is King’s Place music and arts venue which has been hosting an excellent programme of classical, contemporary and jazz concerts since 2008 and is also home to the London Podcast Festival. Dixon Jones were the architects for the building, which contains the first new public concert hall to be built in Central London since the completion of the Barbican Concert Hall in 1982.

Returning to Goods Way we follow the canal along to Granary Square then turn down onto Kings Boulevard, almost the whole length of which, as far as the north end of King’s Cross Station, is flanked by Google’s new UK HQ. Construction on this, the first wholly owned and designed Google building outside the US, began way back in 2018. Designed by Heatherwick Studio and Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG), the purpose-built 11-storey building, which is 72 metres tall at its highest point and 330 metres long has been dubbed a “landscraper”. The 861,100sq ft of office space will, upon completion, make it the 8th largest building in Europe by office space and provide the potential to house 7,000 Google employees. Those employees are expected to start moving in later in 2025.

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We round Kings Cross Station via Pancras Road and the fag end of Euston Road and find ourselves at the start of Pentonville Road opposite the Scala. I wrote about this back in Day 12 but at that time (towards the end of 2015) the building was swathed in scaffolding so there were no photographs included. I can now belatedly rectify that and also mention (which I didn’t before) that my one visit to the Scala was to attend the 1986 British Jazz Awards all-nighter (an event about which the internet is entirely ignorant it seems – this framed poster still hangs on my bedroom wall).

Across the road from the Scala we enter the Caledonian Road at its southern end then complete a circuit of Caledonia Street, York Way, Railway Street and Balfe Street. Nos. 17 and 17a on the latter are Grade II listed. These mid-19th century terraces must have had some remarkable changes of fortune during their lifetime and I doubt they have ever been more desirable than they are now.

Back on Caledonian Road, the first of the Simmons chain of bars (opened in 2012) has cutely retained the façade of the old style tearoom that preceded it.

From here we swing left round Keystone Crescent (formerly Caledonian Crescent). Built by the son of a Shoreditch bricklayer, Robert James Stuckey, in 1846 this has the smallest radius of any crescent in Europe and is unique in having a matching inner and outer circle. The change of name was effected in 1917 by Robert’s grandson, Algernon, for reasons undocumented. The 24 houses in the Crescent are all Grade II listed; one of them has parish marker plaques that include the names of the local church wardens in 1845 and 1855 and another (no.28) operates as a Private Members’ Speakeasy.

At the other end of the Crescent we’re back on Caledonian Road, naturally enough, and on the opposite side of the road to the Institute Of Physics which I wasn’t able to get a proper shot of due to the ridiculous volume of traffic. Just as well it’s not much to look at then. The IOP as it exists today was formed through the merger of the The Physical Society of London and the Institute of Physics in 1960. The former had been established in 1874, after Professor Frederick Guthrie, of the Royal College of Science, wrote to physicists to suggest a “society for physical research”. The latter was incorporated by the Board of Trade in 1920 with The Royal Microscopical Society and the Roentgen Society as its associate societies. To be honest, it’s not at all clear why two bodies were needed or what the difference between them was. But that’s Physicists for you.

We make our way back to York Way via Northdown Street and Wharfdale Road then just before we reach King’s Place again we turn east onto Crinan Street which loops back to Wharfdale Road. Crinan Street is home the former Robert Porter & Co. Beer Bottling Plant. For some reason I always think of lager as being quite a recent arrival to these shores but (the aptly named) Mr Porter was bottling a Beck’s lager at least as far back as 1927.

Next up is New Wharf Road where you will find the London Canal Museum. Naturally enough, the museum deals with the story of London’s canals but as it is housed in a former ice warehouse built in about 1862-3 for Carlo Gatti (1817 – 1878), the famous ice cream maker, it also, perhaps more interestingly, features the history of the ice and ice cream trade in this country. Gatti came to London from the Italian speaking part of Switzerland in 1847 and began his business life selling refreshments from a stall, a kind of waffle sprinkled with sugar, and chestnuts in winter. Within a couple of years he had opened his own café and restaurant which included a chocolate-making machine that he later exhibited at the Great Exhibition of 1851. Gatti was one of the first people to offer ice cream for sale to the public and, initially, he made this using cut ice from the Regent’s Canal. Subsequently though, as he concentrated on the ice trade business, he began importing ice that originated in the Norwegian Fjords. The ice well he had built at 12-13 New Wharf Road to cater for his first import of Norwegian ice, a consignment of 400 tons, is still on view at the museum. The museum is small but well worth the relatively modest admission charge. The staff are particularly knowledgeable and communicative.

Beyond the museum, New Wharf Street forms a junction with All Saints Street from where we go down Lavina Grove and up Killick Street before re-joining the Caledonian Road. Crossing over the Regent’s Canal again we follow the north bank towpath as far as Treaty Street then continue north onto Copenhagen Street. Here we go west as far as (the miniscule) Delhi Street, York Way Court and Tiber Gardens before doubling back eastward past the Lewis Carroll Children’s Library. The Library opened originally in 1952 and was renovated in 2008 at which time it acquired murals inspired by Carroll’s Alice In Wonderland. Unlike traditional public libraries, the library maintains a unique access policy requiring adults to be accompanied by a child to enter, ensuring the space remains dedicated to its young users. Big up to Islington Council for keeping it going.

On the other side of Copenhagen Street is a stark illustration of the falling school pupil numbers in certain Inner London boroughs. Islington Council decided to discontinue Blessed Sacrament Roman Catholic Primary School, Boadicea Street with effect from 31 July 2024. The school had 210 places but only 76 pupils as at the October 2023 School Census. The School Roll Projections forecast roll numbers for this area to continue to fall across the next five years by a further three to six per cent a year.

A short way further east at Edward Square there is a mural commemorating the 1834 protest at Copenhagen Fields (which was a bit further north of here) by up to 100,000 people in support of the Tolpuddle Martyrs. The mural was painted by Dave Bangs in 1984 to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the demonstration and used local people as models.

Continuing east past Julius Nyere Close, named after the first President of post-colonial Tanzania, we turn south onto another section of the Caledonian Road. You’d probably need to go quite a bit further east to come across another St George’s flag. I guess the owner of this one is either ignorant of or unfazed by the irony of its positioning.

Turning off the east side of Caledonian Road we’re into public housing territory and work our way via Carnegie Street, Bayan Street, Jay Street, and Leirum Street back to Copenhagen Street. From here we take a route back south encompassing Charlotte Terrace, Pulteney Street, Muriel Street. This brings us onto Wynford Road where, just past Fife Terrace, we reach today’s pub of the day, The Thornhill Arms. This is one of those classic Charrington pubs, dating from the mid-nineteenth century with the iconic crimson glazed tiling on the lower floor and red brick with rusticated red/grey brick pilasters forming the exterior of the upper floors. Inside, the building contains many period features including what appears to be part of the original bar. There are tragically few of these pubs remaining in their original incarnation so I was relieved to find that this one wasn’t abandoned as I thought when I passed it heading up the Caledonian Road earlier in the walk.

After a swift half we plough on back south on Calshot Street, Southern Street and Killick Street before switching east again along Collier Street. In between Cumming Street and Rodney Street is a contender for one of the most unkempt bits of green space in the capital. In fairness, I didn’t walk around all of Joseph Grimaldi Park, named after the most popular actor and entertainer of the Regency Era, but the part I did see just comprised a series of weed-covered mounds. Grimaldi died in 1837 and was buried here in what was then St. James’s Churchyard. Unfortunately, I was put off venturing into the park so I didn’t come across Grimaldi’s grave or the musical artwork that was installed in his honour as part of a 2010 re-landscaping. Tears of a Clown indeed.

In between the park and the Pentonville Road is the headquarters of the Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB). The RNIB moved into the Grimaldi Building, an office building designed by Allies and Morrison Architects to reflect the shape of the church that once graced the site, in 2023. Prior to that their HQ was in Judd Street, south of King’s Cross.

For the final part of today’s excursion it’s just a case of winding our way back to King’s Cross station utilising the streets in between Collier Street and Pentonville Road that we’ve already visited other sections of, namely Calshot Street, Killick Street and Northdown Street. For the sake of completeness we’ll also give the 40 metre long Afflect Street a mention.

As noted at the start of the post, we’ll finish today with George Gilbert Scott’s 1873 masterpiece, The Midland Grand Hotel, now brought back to life (fittingly) as The Renaissance Hotel, St Pancras. So here are a few highlights of a tour of the inside of the hotel I took during Open House weekend 2024.

Day 71 – Maida Vale – Little Venice

Switching our attention back to the north west for this excursion which, roughly speaking, covers the triangular area formed by Maida Vale, Warwick Avenue and Edgware Road tube stations. The name Maida Vale apparently derives from a pub called The Maida which formerly stood on Edgware Road near the Regent’s Canal. The pub was named in recognition of General Sir John Stuart, who was made Count of Maida, a town in Calabria, by King Ferdinand IV of Naples, after victory at the Battle of Maida in 1806. In contrast, the somewhat over-ambitious soubriquet, Little Venice, only became popularised in the latter half of the 20th century.

Starting point today is Maida Vale tube station which opened in June 1915 and consequently was the first station to be staffed entirely by women.

We turn right into Elgin Avenue which merges into Abercorn Place and then proceed as far as the junction with Hamilton Terrace. Here stands St Mark’s Church, consecrated in 1847 when this area was on the fringes of urban London. In 1870, Canon Robinson Duckworth became parson. Duckworth’s main claim to fame is that he introduced Alice Liddell, the daughter of his friend, Charles Liddell, to the Reverend Charles Dodgson, aka Lewis Carroll, on a boating trip. Duckworth himself appears in the foreword of an early edition of the Wonderland as ‘The Duck’ and Alice Through the Looking Glass is thought to have been written in the his vicarage.

Like neighbouring, and equally affluent, St John’s Wood, Maida Vale is home to an architecturally diverse array of grand residential mansion blocks. The ones here generally predate those in the former, being mainly of late Victorian and Edwardian vintage.

You don’t employ common or garden removal men round here – you need Master Removers.

From St Mark’s we head south down Hamilton Terrace as far as Hall Road where we turn back west. On the corner of Hall Road and Maida Vale (A5) is the massive Cropthorne Court apartment block, built 1928-30 (one of the few from that era in this locale) and designed by (our old friend) Sir Giles Gilbert Scott (1880 – 1960). Flats here were originally let out for between £375 and £425 per annum. The building was Grade II listed in 2003 and, fittingly, it has its own telephone box.

We turn up Maida Vale back towards Elgin Avenue and at no. 32 find a blue plaque commemorating the actor and music hall star, Lupino Lane (1892 – 1959). Born in Hackney, Lane, whose cousin was the screenwriter/director/actress Ida Lupino, started out as a child performer known as ‘Little Nipper’ and went on to make numerous appearances in theatre, film and variety. He moved to America in the 1920’s and forged a successful career in screen comedies before returning to England in 1929. In a rather neat segue from the last post, he is perhaps best known for playing Bill Snibson in the play and film Me and My Girl, which popularized “The Lambeth Walk”.

Also on Maida Vale is the gated Vale Close with its mock tudor pretensions and throwback attempts to keep the riff-raff at bay.

Going back to my point about the diversity of architectural styles there is a distinct Italianate feel to the brick-built parade on Elgin Avenue.

And on Lanark Road, which we follow next there’s another reminder of the social hierarchy that still feels implicit in these parts.

Sutherland Avenue is home to the Maida Vale Everyman Cinema which was purpose built in 2011.

Randolph Avenue takes us back to Maida Vale tube station where we turn left on to Elgin Avenue this time, proceeding as far as Ashworth Avenue which runs down Lauderdale Road. On the corner here sits the Lauderdale Road Synagogue which is one of the main centres for London’s Sephardi Jewish community. The Sephardi Jews first arrived in England in the 18th century fleeing the inquisitions taking place in Spain and Portugal. Originally, they congregated in the East End but by the late 19th century many wealthier members of the community had moved across to the new north-west suburbs. As a consequence, Lauderdale Road Synagogue was opened in 1896, constructed in the Byzantine style by architects Davis & Emanuel.  From 1887 to 1917 the Sephardi community was led from here by Haham Rabbi Moses Gaster who played a major role in the promotion of Zionism in the British Jewish community and at whose home the first meeting to plan the Balfour Declaration was held. As with the synagogue near Lord’s which we encountered a couple of posts back there was security on site to encourage me to move on, though I think my explanation for my interest just about convinced them.

Turning left, we are soon at five-way roundabout from where we take the first exit anti-clockwise and revisit Sutherland Avenue heading west. This is probably a good point to note just how wide some of the streets are round here (compared to nearly everywhere else in London). Many of them have parking on both sides (and sometimes in the middle) and still plenty of space for two-way traffic flow.

We drop south on Castellain Road then cut through Formosa Street to Warrington Crescent. On the way we call in at the Grade II listed Prince Alfred pub which was built in 1856 and is justifiably on the Campaign for Real Ale’s National Inventory of Historic Pub Interiors. Inside it retains its original “snob screens”, a Victorian invention comprised of an etched glass pane in a movable wooden frame which was intended to allow middle class drinkers to see working class drinkers in an adjacent bar but not to be seen in return. The Prince Alfred was also featured in David Bowie’s Grammy Award-winning short film “Jazzin’ for Blue Jean” (1984).

Warrington Crescent adds to the architectural mosaic with its Regency-style white painted stucco terraced town houses reminiscent of those we saw in Belgravia and Pimlico.

At no.75 there’s a blue plaque in honour of David Ben Gurion (1886 – 1973), the first Prime Minister of the state of Israel.  Ben-Gurion rose to become the preeminent leader of the Jewish community in British-ruled Mandatory Palestine from 1935 until the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. He served as Prime Minister up to 1963 save for a short break in 1954–55. He led military operations during the first Arab-Israeli war which took place almost immediately following the declaration of independence and was instrumental in arranging for the extraction of Adolf Eichmann from Argentina by Mossad in 1960.

PRIME MINISTER DAVID BEN GURION. פורטרט, ראש הממשלה דוד בן גוריון.

Back on the roundabout at the top of Warrington Crescent stands another impressive Grade II listed Victorian pub, the Warrington Hotel, built just a year later than its near neighbour. The Warrington has also retained its colourful original features including mosaic floors, stained glass windows, pillared porticos and art nouveau friezes.

On the other side of the hotel we turn southward again first on Randolph Avenue then on Randolph Crescent. At the end of the latter we turn right on Clifton Gardens and follow this back to the lower end of Warrington Crescent before taking Warrington Gardens to cross behind St Saviour’s church (which we’ll come to in a minute). Now we’re back on Formosa Street which links into Bristol Gardens. The houses on the right side of the latter have a distinctly Moorish feel to them. I came across a picture of these same houses from the early 1970’s that illustrate just how far up in the world this area has come in the last fifty years.

Next we follow Clifton Gardens, Blomfield Street and Warwick Place round to Warwick Avenue and head north up to the eponymous tube station. Also dating from 1915, Warwick Avenue has no surface building, the station being accessed by two sets of steps to a sub-surface ticket hall. It was one of the first London Underground stations built specifically to use escalators rather than lifts. 

As you can see. the Catholic Church of St Saviour stands beyond the station. The current church was built in 1976 replacing a gothic structure dating from 1855 which was demolished in 1972. The original church was deemed too large for its 1960’s congregation and so the site was redeveloped to incorporate a block of flats behind a new brick church building designed by architects Biscoe and Stanton. Local interest groups had lobbied to retain the original tower, as it was felt a vertical feature was desperately needed in the area as Warwick Avenue is one of the broadest streets in London. However, the proposal was ignored in favour of the fiberglass spire we see today.

We retrace our steps eastward on Clifton Gardens then swing round Randolph Road and Clarendon Gardens back onto the southern section of Lanark Road and follow this back up to Sutherland Avenue. Then we return past Cropthorne Court on another stretch of Maida Vale that incorporates two more enormous mansion blocks, Clive Court and Rodney Court, the former dating from 1923 and the latter built in 1915.

Clive Court (1923)
Rodney Court (1915)

We run down as far as Clifton Road which has a suitably upmarket parade of shops including a Village Butcher’s. There’s also yet another red phone box here. This area must have the highest density of them in London.

From Clifton Road we take a peek at Lanark Place and Clarendon Terrace and then work our way down to the Regent’s Canal via Randolph Avenue. Blomfield Road runs along the north side of the Canal through so-called Little Venice. As noted in a previous post the 8.6 mile long Regent’s Canal links the Paddington arm of the Grand Union canal in the west with Limehouse Basin in the east. Construction of the canal formed part of architect John Nash’s grand redevelopment of central north London for George IV (conceived when the latter was still Prince Regent). The first section from Paddington to Camden Town, which includes where we are today, opened in 1816 and included a 274 yard long tunnel under Maida Hill.

We follow Blomfield Road alongside the canal as far as Westbourne Terrace Road just beyond the triangular basin where the Puppet Theatre Barge is moored. The Puppet Theatre Barge began life as a marionette theatre touring company called Movingstage, founded by Juliet Rogers and Gren Middleton in 1978. Several years later, the company acquired a 72ft-long Thames lighter and converted it into a permanent puppet theatre. The stage was specially designed to put on shows using string marionettes, and the seating raked to ensure a good view from every seat. Initially, the Barge was based in Camden Lock and toured the Grand Union Canal in the summer. Then in 1986, it moved its winter base to Little Venice and each summer went up the River Thames, sometimes as far as Oxford.

In the middle of the Basin sits Browning’s Island, named for the poet Robert Browning (1812 – 1889) who lived on Warwick Crescent for most of the latter part of his life. Browning is also credited with being the first person to coin the name Little Venice though there are those who maintain that Lord Byron beat him to it by several years. The island is popular with waterfowl including cormorants, swans, Egyptian Geese and various species of duck.

Westbourne Terrace Road starts with a bridge across the canal which we use to get to Delamere Terrace which runs west parallel to the southern canalside. On the corner here is the Canal Cafe Theatre which holds the dubious privilege of being the only venue to have staged a piece of work written by myself – albeit just a sketch in a 2016 comedy revue. Operating here since the 1970s, the theatre is better known for hosting Newsrevue, the world’s longest running live comedy show (Guinness Book of Records certified) which in March 2020 was forced to close for the first time in over 40 years by the Covid pandemic.

A westward circuit comprised of Chichester Road, Bourne Terrace, Blomfield Villas and Delamere Street takes us through the least salubrious section of today’s walk and deposits us back on Westbourne Terrace Road where we turn back north and then follow Warwick Crescent east beside the south side of the basin. At the end of Warwick Crescent we switch briefly onto the Harrow Road (A404) before turning up Warwick Avenue again. This section of Warwick Avenue skirts Rembrandt Gardens which abut the third side of the basin triangle. A shout out here to Westminster Council for maintaining in the gardens an example of that sorely endangered species, the Public Convenience. Running east from the bridge south of the canal is Maida Avenue which at no. 30 boasts a blue plaque in commemoration of the one-time Poet Laureate, John Masefield (1878 – 1967). Masefield lived here from 1907 to 1912 during which time his wife Constance, who was his senior by 12 years, gave birth to their second child and he wrote his first narrative poem, Everlasting Mercy.

Also on Maida Avenue is the imposing Victorian Gothic-styled Catholic Apostilic Church. This was built in 1891-93 to a design of architect John Loughborough Pearson (1817 – 1897) who worked on around 200 ecclesiastical buildings during a fifty plus year career. The Catholic Apostilic Church, confusingly, was actually a Protestant Christian sect which originated in Scotland around 1831 and later spread to Germany and the United States. Its founder, Edward Irving, was still a minister of the Church of Scotland at the time but was subsequently expelled. Despite his death within four years of its establishment the CAC continued as a going concern until the early part of the 20th century with 200,000 members at its peak. Since then it has been in gradual decline. According to sources, this building, which was Grade I listed in 1970 was home to the last active British congregation as of 2014; though on the day I visited it was completely locked-up with no signs of life.

Maida Avenue runs right up to the Edgware Road (and the canal tunnel I mentioned earlier). We don’t spend long on Edgware Road, turning right almost immediately into Compton Street then following Hall Place, Cuthbert Street and Adpar Street south to Paddington Green. Here we head west past City of Westminster College (originally founded as Paddington Technical Institute in 1904) and St Mary’s Church. The college building was designed by Danish architects, Schmidt Hammer Lassen. The church, the third on this site, was built in 1791 by John Plaw and sits within its own extensive graveyard which contains fine monuments (by renowned sculptors such as Physick, Derby and Blore) to local luminaries including Peter Mark Roget (the Thesaurus man) and Sarah Siddons, actress.

From St Mary’s Square we turn north and make a loop of St Mary’s Terrace, Park Place Villas, Howley Place and Venice Walk before returning past the church on the Harrow Road, in the shadow of the Westway.

Paddington Green is home to a statue of the aforementioned Sarah Siddons (1755 -1831) who was acclaimed for her many performances in the role of Lady Macbeth and who, reputedly, fainted at the sight of the Elgin Marbles. She also played Hamlet on several occasions, illustrating that gender-blind casting is far from a purely 21st century phenomenon.

On the east side of the Green stands the Grade II Listed former Paddington Green Children’s Hospital which is now a residential apartment block. And in its south-east corner, reached via a circuit of Church Street, Edgware Road and Newcastle Place, two more red phone boxes make it at least ten in total for today.

Just behind where that right hand photo was taken lies Paddington Green Police Station, as was. Built in 1971 it became infamous as a location where high-profile terrorist suspects were brought for interrogation. In 1992 a phone box outside the station was blown up by the IRA (not one of the ones above obviously). In 2007, a joint parliamentary human rights committee stated that the station was “plainly inadequate” to hold such high-risk prisoners and despite subsequent major refurbishment its days were numbered. It closed permanently in 2018 and then in February 2020 was occupied by anarchist group the Green Anti-Capitalist Front, who said they intended to turn the space into a community centre. They also discovered that since its closure the station had been used for firearms training for police and special forces.

From here it’s just a few steps to Edgware Road tube station and we’re done for this time.