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Camberwell news and chitter-chatter

Just in case anyone else here vapes and buys the bits and pieces for that, I went into caffe vape yesterday for the first time (coldharbour lane near howard brothers) and highly recommend it. There was a big football match on the telly so they weren't doing the whole coffee and cakes thing that's set up in the back of the shop (proper coffee machine etc) but really nice atmosphere - even with everyone watching the match - and helpful knowledgable not snooty at all people.
 
Yeah I suspect we've all got over the trauma of losing the Sun and Doves to Antic. On a similar note I hear the Nag's Head has had a reprieve, but doubt it has long left to live. Would be nice to give it some business but the great atmosphere is utterly let down by shit beer imo. Perhaps The Grove would be good now it has escaped the Grand Union :hmm:
 
mango5 said:
Yeah I suspect we've all got over the trauma of losing the Sun and Doves to Antic. On a similar note I hear the Nag's Head has had a reprieve, but doubt it has long left to live. Would be nice to give it some business but the great atmosphere is utterly let down by shit beer imo. Perhaps The Grove would be good now it has escaped the Grand Union :hmm:
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The Nag's Head is permanently back open afaik, the landlady ended up accepting the new very expensive lease.
 
Looks like Camberwell Boxpark has had the brakes put on it. Personally, I think it's a bit of a shame.

DKxM6TFX0AEAn6V.jpg
 
sealion said:
This is where nando's now stands on Coldharbour and Denmark hill. After the cinema shut down it became a jeans warehouse. Can't remember if it was called Dickie dirts or Dirty dicks ( Probably the the former ) :)
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I remember our family driving up from Brighton to go to dickie dirts - makes sense that it was a cinema cos in my very vague memory it was strangely unlike a normal shop, really expansive and I remember descending wide stairs
 
lefteri said:
I remember our family driving up from Brighton to go to dickie dirts - makes sense that it was a cinema cos in my very vague memory it was strangely unlike a normal shop, really expansive and I remember descending wide stairs
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I remember the wooden floors being very shiney and good to slide about on. The stores were quite vast, im guessing because they were mainly old cinemas and dancehalls originally.
 
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Located in the south London district of Camberwell. The Odeon Theatre was built on the site of the Camberwell Empire Theatre, later the New Empire Cinema. It was designed by Andrew Mather, assisted by Keith P. Roberts for Oscar Deutsch’s Odeon Theatres Ltd. and was the largest Odeon built in London (the fourth largest built for the circuit). It opened on 20th March 1939 with Fred MacMurray in “Men With Wings”.


Where the New Empire Cinema had its entrance on the apex of the corner of Denmark Hill and Coldharbour Lane, the new building had seven shop units located. The Odeon was designed with two matching entrances on both roads. Each had a square fin tower that were clad in light yellow vitrolite tiles and carried the ‘Odeon’ name.


Inside the large auditorium were 1,484 seats in the stalls and 986 seats in the circle. The decoration was quite plain with a honeycomb pattern of vents on the splay walls beside the proscenium and a painted band across from the side walls over the ceiling. Lighting was via fittings suspended from the ceiling.


The Odeon suffered some minor bomb damage on several occassions during 1944, but things were quickly patched up. In its last years of operation, only the circle was in use and the entrance on Denmark Hill was closed off. The end came suddenly on 5th July 1975 with Dirk Bogarde in “The Night Porter”.


It stood empty for six years until 24th January 1981 when it became a Dickie Dirts emporium selling jeans at greatly reduced prices. This was only a brief respite, as the business folded and the building sat decaying for another ten years, often occupied by squatters. In spring 1993 it was demolished and a block of flats for homeless young people called ‘The Foyer’ was built on the site.

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Radicals and Rioters

19th Century Camberwell may have been a middle class suburb but also had a local working class tradition: possibly originating in the tradition of London trades traveling out to rural pubs for days of merriment and sometimes political debate.
In the early 19th Century, with working people being increasingly forced off the land and into urban areas, with the growth of factories and massive spread of Cities, working class people were rapidly becoming politicised and conscious of themselves and their class interests. Working class organisations, radical clubs and early Trade Unions formed a growing network across many cities... London was no exception.
In 1832 the National Union of the Working Classes met at the Duke of York, Camberwell New Road (opposite the modern Union Tavern). The NUWC had arisen from an alliance of radical artisan societies in London, who had been organising both on economic levels, fighting for better wages and conditions, and politically, seeing parliamentary reform and more rights for working people as fundamental to achieving economic improvements... The were involved in encouraging working class pressure in support of the campaigning for the 1832 Reform Act; however, the Act enfranchised the middle classes and reformed outdated constituencies and corrupt practices, but did nothing for the workers. More radical elements of the NUWC together with other groups, prepared to step up their activities - many felt armed uprising would be necessary to achieve change... This led to confrontations with the new Metropolitan Police as at the Battle of Coldbath Fields in 1833, when a NUWC rally was attacked by the Met and a policeman killed in the ensuing riot (it was later found by a Jury to be Justifiable Homicide in self defence, due to the police attack on the crowd!).
In 1833, Camberwell’s Sawyers Arms (which we haven’t yet located) hosted meetings of the 91st Class of the NUWC, in particular they held a dinner for the acquitted George Fursey, a defendant from the Battle of Coldbath Fields.
 
Interesting photos of the camberwell odeon while being squatted. Sealion. Never come across those before. In the piece just posted radicals and rioters, The Sawyers Arms was on George Street now known as Lomond Grove
 
ska invita said:
excuse the derail but can you remember the name of the jeans shop somewhere very close to Stoke Newington Bookshop? It survived a good long while I think, but cant see it on googlemaps now
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I'm am not your man for clothes and fashion related biz, but could it have been "Mr H"?
 
There was a second little independent jeans shop next door to the camberwell one wasn't there?

Remember my dad being annoyed in the late 70s as he could take me to the Dirtie Dicks in Camberwell, rather than up to the wholesalers around Petticoat Lane / Spitalfields.

Petticoat Lane meant coming home with sticks of sugar cane and indian sweets.
 
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