Hola everyone. I am taking the opportunity of an all staff meeting to run off, hide and do my blog. Oops. Due to the clocks going forward and me not waking up til 3 yesterday I couldn’t sleep last night and was consequently late for work this morning. Because of this I forgot to shove the 2 books in my bag that this weeks cultural exploration was based around so luckily you will be spared some of the more painful details. I will say that this weeks exploration was the most explorative yet though. Last week I had a dentist appointment mid day on Monday and it was only until about an hour before that I realised I had no idea where it was and couldn’t find our A to Z anywhere. So, as always, I turned to my trustee neighbourhood library which I LOVE. Whilst browsing their travel and maps section I came across several local history guides as well as walking guides for all different places in London including Hampstead and Highgate, both of which I live very near to. There was also another book called ‘The Streets of Hampstead’ by the Camden History Society. Fab fab fab. The delightful, and ridiculously lucky Georgie is currently abiding in a rather massive mansion on the edge of Hampstead Heath where she is dwelling RENT FREE, bitch, so we both decided to do the Hampstead walk so she could be even more smug about her neighbourhood, which in my opinion is far and away the nicest part of London.
Alas it wasn’t until about half way through the walk that I realised the meaning behind the title of the walking tour book. Mystery Readers Walking Tours of London was not, funnily enough, similar to mystery shoppers or mystery diners but was actually a book based around MYSTERY NOVELS. I couldn’t work out why they kept on going on about characters from a random book I had never heard of. Oops. Luckily Hampstead is so pretty and so full of historical wonders that it didn’t really matter. Apologies Georgie. Despite this I managed to glean some very interesting info such as the name Hampstead deriving from the Saxon word for homestead, Boudicca is reported to be buried under Parliament Hill (amazing), it is the highest place in London with the deepest tube and it was once a forest but was stripped bare after the Great Fire of London in 1666 to rebuild the city. There you go, if you’re like me you’re already learning something new today well done!
We started our walk at the tube station and went down the High Street to Rosslyn Hill. The Streets of Hampstead book went on at some length about the history of the high street such as its widening and other fascinating facts like that (?) but interestingly enough some of the streets coming off the high street used to have covered entrances until things like busses got in the way. The guide gave us a choice between going down Pilgrims Lane or continuing on down Devonshire Hill to Keats House which we decided to do. Devonshire Hill was once owned by someone with a title, that’s all I can remember oops but god the houses are nice nice nice down there and the beautiful spring weather made it even more god damn desirable. Ho Hum. I hope the people who live there are incredibly unhappy so there.
I have never been to Keats House before and it was quite enjoyable, although not the most earth moving of experiences. I hasten to admit that alas I am not his biggest fan in the world but that’s definitely due to my ignorance and laziness as opposed to not enjoying his poetry. In fact when standing in the room they think was his study I very much enjoyed reading the laminated card with Ode to a Nightingale on – it was here that he wrote this amongst other great pieces. It actually made me want to read some Keats as some point which I will endeavour to do, at some point. Apparently the garden was also very inspiring to him or something. The entrance fee was £5 which was a bit steep I thought seeing as they didn’t have an awful lot of stuff there but there were some very nice prints and paintings and in general it was a joy to be in such a beautiful Regency property.
After leaving Keats house we returned to Pilgrims Lane which was the home over time of many great artists and arty types including Ben Nicholson who lived at number 1 and Jacqueline de Pres and her man who lived a couple of doors down. There is also a weird nautical sculpture stuck to the wall of one house where a guy called William Johnson Cory once lived. He was a notable Eton tutor and made up the Eton Boating Song which is apparently important to those whose parents don’t love them enough but he was also forced to resign for being a big old gay-o and went to live there. When I Googled him just now to get the correct spelling of his name it said he was married though so not sure if my book was embellishing the truth a bit or if this was a marriage of convenience etc. Anyway, we walked down there onto Willow Road and briefly considered going into 2 Willow Road the National Trust Modernist gem but I am more up for doing that in the summer when I want to laze around on the Heath all weekend and will drag myself in there for half an hour so I have something to write for that weeks blog.
Alas it wasn’t until about half way through the walk that I realised the meaning behind the title of the walking tour book. Mystery Readers Walking Tours of London was not, funnily enough, similar to mystery shoppers or mystery diners but was actually a book based around MYSTERY NOVELS. I couldn’t work out why they kept on going on about characters from a random book I had never heard of. Oops. Luckily Hampstead is so pretty and so full of historical wonders that it didn’t really matter. Apologies Georgie. Despite this I managed to glean some very interesting info such as the name Hampstead deriving from the Saxon word for homestead, Boudicca is reported to be buried under Parliament Hill (amazing), it is the highest place in London with the deepest tube and it was once a forest but was stripped bare after the Great Fire of London in 1666 to rebuild the city. There you go, if you’re like me you’re already learning something new today well done!
We started our walk at the tube station and went down the High Street to Rosslyn Hill. The Streets of Hampstead book went on at some length about the history of the high street such as its widening and other fascinating facts like that (?) but interestingly enough some of the streets coming off the high street used to have covered entrances until things like busses got in the way. The guide gave us a choice between going down Pilgrims Lane or continuing on down Devonshire Hill to Keats House which we decided to do. Devonshire Hill was once owned by someone with a title, that’s all I can remember oops but god the houses are nice nice nice down there and the beautiful spring weather made it even more god damn desirable. Ho Hum. I hope the people who live there are incredibly unhappy so there.
I have never been to Keats House before and it was quite enjoyable, although not the most earth moving of experiences. I hasten to admit that alas I am not his biggest fan in the world but that’s definitely due to my ignorance and laziness as opposed to not enjoying his poetry. In fact when standing in the room they think was his study I very much enjoyed reading the laminated card with Ode to a Nightingale on – it was here that he wrote this amongst other great pieces. It actually made me want to read some Keats as some point which I will endeavour to do, at some point. Apparently the garden was also very inspiring to him or something. The entrance fee was £5 which was a bit steep I thought seeing as they didn’t have an awful lot of stuff there but there were some very nice prints and paintings and in general it was a joy to be in such a beautiful Regency property.
After leaving Keats house we returned to Pilgrims Lane which was the home over time of many great artists and arty types including Ben Nicholson who lived at number 1 and Jacqueline de Pres and her man who lived a couple of doors down. There is also a weird nautical sculpture stuck to the wall of one house where a guy called William Johnson Cory once lived. He was a notable Eton tutor and made up the Eton Boating Song which is apparently important to those whose parents don’t love them enough but he was also forced to resign for being a big old gay-o and went to live there. When I Googled him just now to get the correct spelling of his name it said he was married though so not sure if my book was embellishing the truth a bit or if this was a marriage of convenience etc. Anyway, we walked down there onto Willow Road and briefly considered going into 2 Willow Road the National Trust Modernist gem but I am more up for doing that in the summer when I want to laze around on the Heath all weekend and will drag myself in there for half an hour so I have something to write for that weeks blog.
After this we wandered back to Georgies house so she could pick up her camera learning on the way about the delights of Hampstead as a spa in the 18th century which is where road names such as Well Walk and Flask Walk come from. It was here where people came to sample the health giving Chalybeat spa water. However, it was known to have such a horrible taste a chaser was needed which is why there are so many pubs in Hampstead. On the way back to Georgies we passed by a drinking fountain on Well Walk which claims to pump this out, It wasn’t working alas but had a cool inscription which I didn’t think to wrote down oh well. On googling the word Chalybeat I came across this interesting bit of info which takes me back to my favorite part of my Courtauld Undergraduate degree which was all Victoriana –arama. I had to do an essay on Ford Maddox Browne which incorporated the slightly controversial and politically laden topic of Hampstead Heath during the 19th century. Here you go:
However, was it not for a heroic battle fought by local residents in the 19th century, Hampstead Heath would have long since disappeared beneath a concatenation of Victorian developments. In 1829, Sir Thomas Maryon Wilson, Lord of the Manor, attempted to push the first of several Private Acts through Parliament that would enable him to build on the heath. Local residents, led by the banker John Gurney Hoare, were outraged, and began a campaign to save the heath that would last until Sir Thomas’s death in 1869. On one occasion, Sir Thomas decided to order the planting of thousands of willows, turkey oaks and firs upon the open heath, an action that brought a howl of indignation from Dickens, who protested at ‘such violation of virgin heathland’. However, Sir Thomas’s brother and heir, John, proved more amenable to local opinion, and in 1871, sold his estates hereabouts to the Metropolitan Board of Works and the cause was won.
After a quick tea break at Georgies house we were off again, over to Jack Straws Caste, that poor Georgie was very disappointed by understandably. It is thought to be the highest pub in London and took its name from Jack Straw who was one of the leaders of the 1381 Peasants revolt and apparently addressed the baying hoards here from atop a hay wagon which became known as Jack Straws Castle. Alas it was bombed to bits in World War 2 and that weird ply-wood thing was constructed in its place in 1969, a decade not known for the beauty of it’s architecture. From there we walked down the winding path to the Vale of Health which I always thought of as being more of a street rather than the area it in fact appears to be. According to the internet the name the Vale of Health, recorded in 1801, may have originated as a euphemism which was exploited or as a new name invented in a deliberate attempt to change the image of the place by the local builder as it had been considered a bit of a pestilent swamp type place before this. This is very upsetting to me as I had been lead to believe that it was given that name due to the great plague never reaching its heights, but apparently not. Damn it, hate it when that happens. Anyway it was the centre of all things arty back in the day and Byron and Shelly amongst others lived there as well as DH Lawrence. It was uber pretty, although the residents must be more than a little irked by the massive skanky falling apart caravan site next door for all the people who work at fun fairs to live on. NICE. On that note there was also some kind of gypsy wedding going on round the corner – my god the outfits. From there we walked out across the heath, the very very muddy heath, and home. Very nice day indeed.
