An abbey late

Last week we took up an invitation to visit Westminster Abbey after hours, that is to say from 1900 to 2000, with our actually arriving at around 1830.

A cold evening, which meant, in the event, that I should have worn a more serious sweater under my duffel coat and scarf. A silly omission given that I have several very serious sweaters which do not see much action.

On exit from the tube we were pleased to find that the walkway out from the north western side of the station, carrying one across York Road was up and running again. A walkway I used to use every morning in the olden days, when I used to walk from Waterloo to Westminster every morning, via the front of what used to be County Hall. A place with a lot of first class stone detailing.

More open space in WeWork than this snap would suggest

A walkway which carried us down into a flashy new development which started with a WeWork office, the ground floor of which seemed to be given over to marketing. Read all about it at reference 1. There was plenty of space and plenty of seating, and I dare say we could have had our picnic there, but the canned (popular) music was turned up high enough to deter older people. Perhaps younger people like it.

Public area - one

Public area - two

Into a striking looking public area, from which we got to some benches into the re-laid Jubilee Gardens, complete with lots of benches for us to take our picnic on. Three rat sightings, possibly all the same one. All look the same.

Playground left, (turning) wheel right

The re-laying included a nice looking children's park and somewhere along the way we learned that the wheel people are doing a redec on some of the pods to celebrate its twenty years - with one pod being made into a very small public house. I associated to an engineer from Atkins once telling me that the axle of the wheel was a very specialised bit of steel which had to be able to take huge bending forces, not something that he would have wanted to get involved in and probably not something that could be done in England at all. The Atkins which was proud to be from Epsom and is now owned by the Canadians (the French sort).

All in all, we were pleased to have seen what they have made of this bit of Waterloo. A bonus.

Map from some combination of Baedeker, PlanetWare and Bing

And so over Westminster Bridge and into the back door into the Abbey, in Dean's Yard. Security reasonably elementary and no-one took our names or anything like that, but we did get blue wrist bands which marked us as extra lates, rather than common or garden lates. Maybe about a hundred of us altogether, scattered about what is quite a big place.  With the north transept seeming much bigger than usual, more or less empty of people and all the clutter of the audio guide people.

We had the handy map above with us, not only handy, but I also learned that the north and south transepts are not the same, which one might think would disturb the balancing of the large forces involved. But they have been there for a while, so they probably got it more or less right. Except for the bending noticed at reference 2.

Nave lights, by the west door

On the other hand, we were reminded how bright and ugly the nave light were - they could do much better for themselves. Much more numerous, much bigger and uglier than the snap above suggests. Found on Flickr by Bing. Perhaps they were the gift of some important donor, perhaps some friend of the Dean, and we are stuck with them for a bit.

Priestman out of Bing. Second left

We were interested to come across the monument to one Henry Priestman, a senior naval officer and bureaucrat of roughly the time of Pepys. But as it turns out, while they might well have come across each other, Priestman was active some decades after the period covered by the diary and does not appear there. See reference 3. We were also interested to the next door monument, left in the snap above, a design which cropped up several times during the visit: a casket with a central pole, the pole with perhaps three horizontal features, diminishing in size from top to bottom. Was it a design which evolved to fit the standard niche, while keeping the casket itself within sensible proportions? Were they all executed by the same mason?

I was pleased to find out that the narrow shrines for Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots, both executed by Elizabeth and the mother of her successor, were equal and opposite, flanking Henry VII's new Lady Chapel. And amused to find that there were various interlopers in the first shrine, in the form of odd tablets and memorials. Even the fairy queen did not get a shrine to herself and she had to put up with the same clutter as everybody else, jostling for place and position in a crowded abbey.

In one or two places we got that around the back feeling you get in Catholic churches when you find yourself at the rather scruffy back of something which is very grand and ornate when seen from the front. Probably in the ambulatory which runs around the back of important fixtures for the high altar and the shrine of St. Edward (the confessor) behind it. In connection with this last, Wikipedia reminds me of how the English, Norman and Danish royal houses were all very mixed up, well before the Norman Conquest. Helped along by a busy and much married queen, Emma of Normandy. But for around the back, see reference 4.

The French version of the abbey

Odd that we did not use the occasion of a near empty abbey to take in much of the building as a whole, seeming to spend our time on the clutter of monuments, the rather pompous and self-satisfied indoor cemetery. Which, to be fair, were a lot more accessible than usual, with my not usually bothering with all the side chapels when the place is busy. Do mainland churches go in for this sort of thing in the same way? The French do have an abbey where they used to bury their kings, but I have never been there. See reference 8.

Brewer's hatch

Came across an ancient hatch in the cloisters, rather like a miniature version of the hatches out the front of hundred year old pubs. Have to find a trusty who knows what it is or what it was for.

Demonstration

Out to an odd little demonstration on a corner of Parliament Square. One of those happy demonstrations with a bunch of happy people swaying, smiling and singing to the lead of what appeared to be some popular musician. Also holding clipboards and handing out what looked like leaflets. We were too cold to hang around and find out what it was about.

Down the still impressive hole to the Jubilee Line at Westminster, emerging in Waterloo to take something that warmed in Le Cabin above platform 1. Gavi de Gavi good and we were pleased to see that they have finally managed to get a platform indicator working in the corner. On the other hand, the barman explained to me that food was completely off for the time being. No more of the excellent bacon and egg sandwiches that used to be available, at least for now. Luckily, having picnic'd there was no need. But for an occasion when there was need see reference 5.

On the way home, I was able to brush up on the connection between Vauxhall cars and Vauxhall, picking up a connection with the Myers bed factory along the way. Of interest to us as long time owners of a fine Myers double bed. Sadly, while Bing turns up plenty of histories of the company, this morning it is not turning up the one which makes the connection to Myers, something to do with needing more space than was available to them in the Wandsworth Road, roughly where Sainsbury's used to be.

Home to tea, bread, cheese and peanuts. These last in their shells, small and sweet. Plus a drop of Bells, that once popular brand, now seeming to be staging something of a comeback. Perhaps they have been bought by someone with an aggressive marketing department.

The piano that someone dropped

Closed the evening by reading of the demise of Angela Hewitt's very expensive (£150,000) Fazioli piano. All very traumatic for her. Possibly the very instrument noticed a couple of years ago at reference 6 and snapped at reference 7. Did the piano accompany her everywhere? From what height does dropping mean write-off? And thinking back to the removal we watched and noticed at reference 9, it would be easy enough to drop a piano while lifting it from its trolley onto terra firma.

Reference 1: https://www.wework.com/en-GB/buildings/10-york-rd--london.

Reference 2: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/01/abbey.html.

Reference 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Priestman_(Royal_Navy_officer).

Reference 4: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/10/at-lyme-regis.html.

Reference 5: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/2016/02/master-builder.html.

Reference 6: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/2018/08/hot-goldberg.html.

Reference 7: http://pianofortephilia.blogspot.com/2017/05/angela-hewitt-piano-recital-review.html.

Reference 8: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basilica_of_Saint-Denis.

Reference 9: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/2017/09/queen-anne-show.html.