The Mudlark

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I've done my share of mudlarking as this post of 2010 explains.

The usual definition of a mudlark is someone, often a child, who in Victorian times scavenged the muddy fringes of the River Thames in London in search of anything of value that could be sold for cash. The pub sign in Southwark, London, near the river, that is the subject of today's photograph alludes to these "valuables" in the grubby hand and items shown in the bordering circle.

The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) shows that mudlark has not always carried the meaning that it usually has today. The first entry from 1785 defines the word as slang for a hog, and we can see how that might transfer to Thames-side foragers. The next entry dating from 1796-1800 describes a mudlark as someone who prowls around ships in the mud, receiving plundered goods from them which they sold. Again the connection is apparent. The 1801 definition most closely matches today's understanding of the term. However, there are others. Apparently in the nineteenth century the Royal Engineers were sometimes so called. This must have been due to their often muddy work being equated with the urchins who searched the Thames mud.

I was quite pleased to see this elaborate, original and obviously quite expensive sign advertising the pub. All too often today the traditional pub sign is being replaced by a cheaply printed glossy advert, or the old design is replaced by a "tasteful" often almost monochrome updated version.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Photo Title: Pub Sign, The Mudlark, Southwark
Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 150mm (300mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/320 sec
ISO:640
Exposure Compensation: -0.3EV

A palatial pub

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Can there be any English building that has borrowed its style so readily and so widely as the pub (public house) or tavern. The first such buildings were essentially houses, and the subsequent purpose-built pubs followed the style of the periods in which they were built. So, many were thatched, timber-framed, tile hung, brick-built, stone-built, pargetted etc. Quite a few of these pubs from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century still stand and, where they haven't been converted into dwellings, still serve beer.

However, from the nineteenth century through into the twentieth pubs vied to attract customers. Two devices commonly employed were siting the pub on a corner so that it could be seen from two or more streets, and presenting a decorative exterior that attracted the eye and thence the customer. Backwards-looking styles were often favoured, particularly brick and timber-framing. Part-tiled exteriors that were showy (and durable) were also favoured. Many were decked out with the trappings of grand buildings, featuring towers, turrets, balconies, balusters and more. The other day I cam across an example of the latter in Islington, London.

The inspiration for the style of the Marquess tavern is clearly the eighteenth century English country house, the residence of the landed rich. It has a rusticated ground floor, a piano nobile with tall windows surmounted by alternating triangular and segmental pediments, smaller windows above and a balustrade hiding the low-pitched roof. The three-bay facade is divided up by giant Corinthian pilasters. Brick and painted stucco (no stone here) are the materials of choice. All this is, of course, a historicising veneer, a means by which to attract custom. It was built in 1854 and remains a pub today, a palatial pile in miniature in the tight streets of this north London borough.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 18mm (36mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/500 sec
ISO:200
Exposure Compensation: -0.3EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Photographing St Botolph

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A shopping expedition to Boston, Lincolnshire, when the day's appearance said spring, but the air temperature and wind said the end of winter, found me, not for the first time, pointing my compact camera at the tower of the medieval parish church of St Botolph. And what a tower it is. Many towns and cities are defined and remembered by a noteworthy building and as far as Boston goes this is the one. As I've mentioned elsewhere it is also known by the nickname, "The Stump". Its tower is an oddity of Gothic architecture. The medieval masons started building upwards and just kept on going. When you look at the layers that are piled one on the other it appears that a spire may have been contemplated at one point but then they rejected that conventional topping to the tower. Up and up it went until finally they decided to top it with a pierced, octagonal lantern.

Since that time "The Stump"
has been synonymous with the town, a beacon for ships approaching the port and a marker for weary travellers crossing the flat Fenland hinterland. When you walk around the town the tower rises above the roof tops allowing you to orientate yourself. Only when you go into the market place or nearby across the River Witham do the nave and chancel, themselves almost of cathedral scale but small relative to the tower, make an appearance. The classic photograph of St Botolph is from the town bridge. The appearance of a new "bow-string" design footbridge has changed that view somewhat and on my recent visit to the town I took a shot of the bridge and the tower, though not from the town bridge. Another photograph that suggested itself to me was the tower rising from the blossom of a cherry tree that grows in the lawned precinct immediately adjoining the church. However, the shot I took on Church Street, a location where I've photographed before, is the one I like best. It has the name of a pub - The Britannia - and a couple of promotional union flags, in the foreground, with the tower beyond. I liked the contrast of the bright red with the distant stonework.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen






Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 28.5mm (77mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f5
Shutter Speed: 1/1250 sec
ISO:125
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Ye Olde Red Lion, Bicker

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In England in 1665 the Great Plague, the last widespread outbreak of the feared bubonic plague, began killing about 100,000 people, mainly in London, but also across the rest of the country. The same year Robert Hooke's Micrographia, a book detailing his observations through lenses and microscopes, became the first publication of the Royal Society. In the American colonies the City of New Amsterdam was incorporated in the newly named city and territory of New York. And in the small Lincolnshire village of Bicker a new public house (pub), Ye Olde Red Lion, was built by John Drury who had his name and the date carved in a small panel at the top of the central gable.

That building still stands today. It is currently coming to the end of a comprehensive refurbishment and will soon re-open after having been closed for a couple of years. In these straitened times it is heartening to find a pub that has escaped the fate of most that close for lack of custom - namely dilapidation and possibly conversion to an entirely different use. It is also good to see a pub escape the clutches of a "pubco" and be taken on by a local entrepreneur. Ye Olde Red Lion, like many village pubs, has a long history in the community, and the continuation and re-vitalisation of this venerable building is something to celebrate.

The building itself is a Grade II Listed structure described as being in the "Fen Artisan Mannerist style" i.e. the work of the kind of local builder who constructed in the current and traditional way, occasionally adding a few idiosyncratic flourishes of his own. The basic structure is brick laid in an English bond (alternating courses of headers and stretchers), rusticated quoins at the corners, gable bands, a rudimentary pinnacle on the central gable, and all covered with render. Was it always rendered? The quoins suggest probably not, but it's difficult to tell when the coating was added. The nineteenth and twentieth century additions weren't always sympathetic, but original beams and roof timbers still remain inside.

Incidentally, the "Red Lion" is one of the most common pub names in the country, coming either first or second in the two most commonly cited lists. Its origins are not fully known, but a lion is a common heraldic device appearing in the coats arms of John of Gaunt, the House of Lancaster, Scotland and many families of lesser nobility. The Bicker pub's newly hung sign shows a heraldic red lion rampant with the date 1665.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 32mm
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/400
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.67 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Hard times for pubs

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The smoking ban, increased taxes on alcohol, cheap beer, wine and spirits in supermarkets, rapacious "pubcos" and the recession. In the past few years pubs and their tenants and owners have had a lot to deal with. Small wonder that wherever you go in the UK you see closed premises, "for sale" signs or advertisements for people to run pubs. As a career the management of a public house looks like a one way street to bankruptcy or, at best, penury.

I came across the pub shown in today's photographs on a recent visit to Newark in Nottinghamshire. Ye Olde Market on Boar Lane had clearly succumbed to the belt-tightening that has affected much of the country. But, to lessen the impact of a derelict premises on the surounding shops and streets suitable pictures/window boarding had been commissioned, each advertising a local business. As I studied the images and the building I couldn't help but notice the unwitting commentary on the present-day difficulties of runnning a successful pub that the juxtaposition of the early twentieth century traffic sign and the picture offered. It was either that or a mischievously contrived pairing by an advocate of the temperance movement. It seemed good enough for a picture.

photographs and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 32mm
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/320 sec
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Pubs, hotels and vanishing customers

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Anyone who lives in England or who visits on a regular basis can't help but notice the decline of the English pub. At the end of last year they were closing at a rate of 25 per week as large pub operators and privately-run businesses decided there was over-capacity and that many establishments were unprofitable and never going to be able to produce a profit. A combination of cheaper alcohol from supermarkets, the ban on smoking in buildings open to the public, the tightening of everyone's belt following the banking crash and the increased competition for discretionary spending has resulted in many closures over the past few years. Boarded up buildings can be seen in villages, towns  and cities across the country. This is nothing new of course. A hundred and more years ago even the smallest English village had a pub, and often not one but two, three or more. That was a time when beer was safer to drink than"Adam's ale" i.e. water. Most of these didn't survive the changing circumstances of the twentieth century. What is different about today's closures is the scale and the short period of time over which they are happening.

The down-turn in the fortunes of the pub has been mirrored, perhaps to a lesser extent, by hotels. The rise of mass foreign holidays in the 1960s on the back of increasing incomes and cheaper air fares made a big dent in the custom that English hotels received, and over subsequent decades this only increased. So this sector of the "hospitality industry" has suffered too. The recent economic downturn has offered some relief with more people indulging in "staycations", and the swapping of a stay in a country hotel, travel lodge or seaside resort for a fortnight in Spain, the Dominican Republic or Thailand. But hotels also have a long history of closures, with many buildings being unable to adapt (or be adapted) to modern needs and standards. I wonder if that was the fate of the Stamford Hotel in Stamford, Lincolnshire. This large building, begun in 1810 and completed fifteen or twenty years later after a period of inactivity, looks more like a Georgian Assembly Rooms with its giant order of Corinthian columns in antis. Its scale looks incongruous on narrow St Mary's Street and today it is subdivided and occupied by a number of small businesses. Looking at this Francis Frith postcard it appears that it was still functioning as a hotel in 1922. When did it stop trading I wonder? On a recent day in Stamford I passed through the building, taking this photograph of its fine cantilevered stone staircase that is lit by windows and a glass-topped lantern above.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 17mm
 F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/50 sec
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -1.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

The sign of The Black Swan

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The traditional English pub sign is a joy. It usually comprises an oil painting that illustrates the name of the pub. This hangs from a projecting bracket on the side of the building or on a purpose-built stand. Thus, The Red Lion may have an heraldic lion - rampant, passant, reguardant, rarely couchant - or a shield with the lion as the charge on it. One of the many pubs called The Plough will, in all probability, have a ploughman holding the said implement as he follows his horse. The King's Head will have just that, the particular monarch being chosen either with regard to the date of the building of the pub, or on the whim of the brewery, the landlord or the sign painter. And, because there are so many different pub names, the variety of images on the signs is enormous.

But, in recent years, the insidious growth of corporatism, "branding" and pub designers has led to something of a decline in the number of traditional pub signs. They are still in the great majority, but I notice more and more "modern" signs appearing. These often have a limited palette - usually two colours - and have a simple motif replacing the detail of the traditional sign. Many are conceived in the spirit of a corporate logo rather than a centuries old artefact. And, unlike the older model, the newer ones date very quickly and are usually replaced with something equally inept. A particularly bad example I once saw was on a pub called The Crossed Keys, a common name said to derive from the symbol of St Peter, or perhaps the archbishopric of York. The pub designers had painted black keys - with a trendy ragged outline - on a khaki coloured background. It wasn't eye-catching and the name wasn't spelled out in full: it didn't even warrant a glance, and certainly wasn't of the quality that invites the onlooker to admire the painter's art and reflect on how the establishment's name has been interpreted compared with others you've seen. And, regrettably that's true of most "modern" pub signs.

However, today, whilst on a shopping expedition in Spalding, Lincolnshire, I noticed this modern sign that I quite like. Admittedly it wouldn't work so well on a cloudy day, but the lights on each side of it may well throw interesting shadows at night. I chose a black and white conversion to accentuate its graphic qualities.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 9.3mm (44mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f3.5
Shutter Speed: 1/1000
ISO: 80
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Lament for our disappearing pubs

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The evening shadows slowly enveloping the Red Lion pub at Bicker, Lincolnshire, could be a metaphor for the gloom that is snuffing out pub after pub in villages across Britain.

Those running village inns have been hit by the "double whammy" of the ban on smoking in public buildings and work places, followed by the recession. There were those, and I count myself among them, who welcomed the restrictions on smoking, thinking it would make places like pubs more customer friendly as well as healthier places to be. There was the feeling that whilst the new legislation would be a disincentive to smokers to continue to visit pubs (though many would, using the alternative arrangements that enabled them to smoke outside), this reduction in customers would be made up by the non-smokers who would now find the pubs more acceptable. Well, that doesn't seem to have happened: the number of smokers in pubs did decline, but the increase in non-smokers didn't compensate, and so landlords' incomes fell. That started the closures which hit pubs in cities and towns, but particularly those in villages with their smaller customer base and their reliance on the "passing trade." But it was the tightening of consumer spending brought on by the recession that accelerated the number of pubs permanently closing their doors. There are those who think this doesn't matter, and even some who celebrate the closures. However, the pub is a traditional and welcome feature of British life, offering not just drinks, but food and a meeting place. They inject life into their communities, and many are sorry to see them go.

It won't be all village pubs that close of course: many will find a way to struggle along until an upturn in the economy eases their situation. However, pubs in very small villages, like the one in the photograph, that has seen a turnover of three or four landlords in the past year or so, may well cease trading. This particular pub dates from the seventeenth century (a datestone at the top of the central gable says, "John Drury 1665"), and is built in what is described as a Fen Artisan Mannerist Style. It would be a shame if permanent closure prevented it celebrating, in 2065, four hundred years of serving beer to the village!

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 18mm (36mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/500 seconds
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Self-portrait in Green Bricks

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"If red houses are made out of red bricks, blue houses are made out of blue bricks, and yellow houses are made out of yellow bricks, what are green houses made out of?
from "1001 Jokes for Kids"
(answer below*)

Many Victorians had the feeling that they were living in an age, the like of which, the world hadn't seen before. It was a technological age, an age of new industries, burgeoning cities, mass transport, migration, population growth, exploration and change. Architects were asked to rise to the challenge of designing buildings that had never been needed before. What should a railway station look like? Or a hospital? Or how about an urban school, a museum, or a cotton mill? And with these new buildings came new construction techniques and new materials. Cast iron, steel, fire-proof floors, large areas of glazing, terracotta mouldings, and glazed bricks were all employed to create the new structures.

I came across some fine Victorian glazed brickwork yesterday when I was in Kingston upon Hull, a city and port on the north bank of the River Humber in eastern England. I lived there for several years so I know it reasonably well. As I walked around the marina that has been formed out of the former Humber Dock I passed what I remember as the "Humber Dock Tavern" but is now called "Green Bricks". This changing of pubs' names to suit the fashion of the day is not something of which I approve: old names carry part of the history of an area and shouldn't be expunged on a whim. The best I can say about this example is that the new title at least has a certain logic to it. The Victorians liked to use glazed bricks to face pubs, and green was especially popular, though burgundy, red, blue, yellow and a few other colours can be found in most big cities. Here the elevation also has tiled panels with swags and arabesques, as well as crude capitals on glazed "columns." One of the virtues of glazed bricks is they last remarkably well, providing a smart, easily cleaned, low-maintenance finish that still looks good over a hundred years later: they should be used more today. I've seen a few examples from the late twentieth century - here's some Southwark flats - , and I've posted another image of a pub (now a hotel) with a tiled facade that I saw in Windsor.

My reason for snapping this pub elevation was not only the glazed bricks, but the reflection of the sunlit marina in the window. It was, I thought, another opportunity to add to my ongoing theme of reflected self-portraits!

*Answer: "Glass!"
That joke is only funny if you know that in the UK glasshouses, that is to say the glass horticultural buildings used for growing tomatoes, lettuces, cucumbers, etc., are more commonly known as greenhouses. And, even if you do know that it still isn't very funny!

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 22mm (44mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/125 seconds
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On