Open Art Surgery

Brockley Cross gallery (and "People Before Profit" electoral campaign hangout) Tea Leaf Arts is organising its first open submission exhibition for local artists.

As part of the Brockley MAX arts festival, they're inviting anyone to submit their work, which they will curate. A registration fee of £8 will be charged on each artist's submission, to cover administration costs.

The exhibition will run from May 28th - June 12th 2010 and the public will be asked to vote for their favourite work, with the winning artist invited to stage a solo show, later in the year.

Visit the site for more details.

People, be not afraid

"On this road there are no godspoke men. They are gone and I am left and they have taken with them the world."
— Cormac McCarthy, The Road

On Sunday we went to Bow, to a cafe called The Counter on the unpromisingly-named Roach Road. Tucked away down streets of industrial estate, it sits next to a canal that forms part of the perimiter of the Olympic Park. If you can put up with chaotic service then we can heartily recommend their bacon sandwiches, but this site does not need another cafe review right now. We want to talk about the waterway next door.

Aside from the dynamic backdrop provided by the Olympic park works, it's not that different from some of the places you'll find east of Greenwich, towards Charlton and Woolwich. But compare. It's possible to walk for miles along some parts of the Greenwich riverside, without seeing a soul. In the twenty minutes we spent walking the Bow towpath, these are some of the things we saw:

• A woman, sculling down stream
• A man landing a 14 pound pike – and other people gathering for the weigh-in
• People cooking on their houseboat
• A man drinking wine on his balcony
• An blank brick wall made extraordinary through a huge grafitti mural
• People cycling

A landscape that feels industrial and desolate when deserted, becomes a wonderful short work with the addition of people. The people that animated the towpath also sustain a cafe on an industrial estate and another built from shipping containers.

The best bits of London have lots of people in them, the worst bits are empty. Some of that is effect, much of it is cause. We're looking forward to more people discovering Brockley when the East London Line comes.

The butt-brush express

"I'm meek, but I could probably stand to be meeker."
- Ned Flanders

A couple of Sundays ago, we spent the morning in a lecture theatre in Portmeirion, listening to the CEO of Envirosell Inc talk about how to design shops. It’s more interesting than it sounds. Paco Underhill is a consultant who started off filming traffic from New York rooftops and realised that he could apply the same techniques to studying people’s behaviour in shops. He looks at the minutiae of the shopping experience in thousands of shops in dozens of countries to help shops sell more stuff.

Among his many discoveries is the existence what he called the “Butt-brush factor”. Women don’t like shopping in narrow aisles, in case someone brushes past their bum. If it’s a woman who makes contact, that’s bad enough, but the women’s reactions he showed when men brushed past them – pure horror. On the other hand, don’t stock items for alpha males in the middle of a narrow aisle. They will block the way as they examine the contents of a packet of razor blades.

The butt-brush theory came flooding back to us this morning, as we incurred the wrath of a woman behind us, infuriated that the two of us were in contact in the narrow space by the doorway of a crowded train. The trouble began at New Cross Gate, when a couple more people got on the train, necessitating that everyone else budge up a little to let them get to work. That was enough for her to kick off. First with some conspicuous wriggling and then muttering and finally, direct confrontation.

We spent the journey rooted to the spot, examining our conscience and our posture. There was a little contact at the shoulder blades, a little extra pressure when the carriage swayed, but nothing unusual. The guys in front of us were bearing more of our load. It was a squash, but we’ve been squashier.

Perhaps this was butt-brush theory in practice. Perhaps Brockley Central stands badly. Perhaps she is not a nice person (our preferred theory). But we know two things: 1. the countdown clock on the right cannot spin quickly enough and 2. we’re glad that the ELL trains will have plenty of standing room by the doors. We'll swap the outside prospect of a seat for a smaller chance of a fight.

Community garden for Breakspears Road

When you drive, society becomes an obstacle. Pedestrians, bicycles, traffic calming, speed limits, the law: all become a nuisance to be wished away. The more you drive, the more bloody-minded and individualistic you become.
- George Monbiot

Nature abhors a vacuum. So too do car owners. Life finds a way. Drivers will find a way to park on it.

Planting began this weekend for a new community garden at Lilac House on Breakspears Road.

The project received funding from Brockley Assembly and involved clearing an overgrown, rubbish-strewn area to create a small garden that will eventually offer people benches to sit and enjoy the place.

Of course, no sooner had the area been cleared than people started parking their cars where the garden was supposed to go. The area is being gated-off, to keep the cars out and allow the plants to grow.

East London Line: First Contact

Calculon: The year was 2019, and I was just a lowly robot arm working on Project Satan, a savage, intelligent military car built from the most evil parts of the most evil cars in all the world. The steering wheel from Hitler's staff car. The left turn signal from Charles Manson's VW. The windshield wipers from that car that played Knight Rider.

Fry: Knight Rider wasn't evil.

Calculon: His windshield wipers were. It didn't come up much in the show, though. Anyway, only after bringing Project Satan to life did they discover they had made a horrible mistake. For you see, it was pure evil!

- Futurama

Brockley Central is delighted to bring you the first verified photographic evidence that the East London Line train service is coming. Taken in New Cross Gate, here is a train shot on the move and at rest.

Until now, all we had to go on were rumours of sightings and discoveries of abandoned tracks.

So, the question has been answered definitively. The people of Brockley are not alone in the universe. But a greater question remains: do they look more like "tube" trains or "overland" trains?

Peter James, Ewhurst Road

Ben has been in touch with this heartwarming piece of local business co-operation, which is something Brockley does well. It also gives us an opportunity to devote a thread to the Ewhurst Road butcher Peter James, which has a group of acolytes so devoted that almost any thread becomes an opportunity to pay tribute:

A small thing that I thought might be of interest, particularly following the recent discussions about Ewhurst road is a bit of praise for Peter James the butcher. Having shopped there intermittently since we arrived, have always been impressed by the produce and the customer service.

Shopping there on saturday, however, and we were given a free gift of a either a bottle of wine at Mr Lawrence or a pice and mash at Sweeneys over the road, accompanied by a thank you note for the continued business in a tricky time. I thought it was a really nice touch, and reflected really well on both Peter and his excellent shop, but also the local area and community. Just thought it worth a quick mention, as it just goes further to reinforce the appeal of the area, and the case for good, small businesses, of which there are some great examples in Brockley.

Hop scotch, Honor Oak

Hop scotch
72 Honor Oak Park
Honor Oak
London
SE23 1DY
t 0208 699 8998

Zoe, whose review of Le Querce is still one of the best and best-read articles on this site, more than two years after she wrote it, is back with this review of Hop scotch:

I have now been a happy resident of Honor Oak Park's main parade for exactly a week. This follows five happy years on Tyrwhitt Road, having a coffee & a muffin in the Broca nearly every weekend since it first opened its doors.

As I've commented in a few threads - not too bitterly, I hope - having recently had a baby and in need of more space, my husband and I found ourselves priced out of Brockley (oh the sting of all the recent press hailing it as the new affordable corner of London!). So far, so good and I think we will end up liking HOP as much as we did Brockley. We are just a short walk down the road and can still use many of the amenities we've grown accustomed to like the Shop on the Hill and Degustation. In any event, I was keen to checkout the immediate coffee offerings at the newly opened Hop scotch.

Hop scotch continues the trend of recent (and welcome) arrivals - Brockley Mess and The Orchard, looking to court the area's particular mix of young professionals and young families. Until 8 months ago, I was part of the former and am now part of the latter so I consider myself part of their target market.It serves a selection of hot and cold drinks, real ale and has a full bar that is open late on Friday and Saturday evenings. The menu consists of light snacks such as paninis and mezze platters, as well as child-friendly options.

I was greeted warmly from my first visit and found very generous pushchair access. The proprietors themselves have relocated from East Dulwich and have a toddler. They are keen to provide an atmosphere equally suitable for those with little ones or those just looking to work on their laptops. They have gotten the balance right. I was slightly disappointed on my second visit to see that the menu offerings had contracted, eliminating more substantial dishes like shepherd's pie and fishcakes, though from a business point of view, simplicity is prudent and many readers may recall that Brockley Mess did the same after its first few weeks.

The staff are friendly and serve good coffee. Having followed BC's advice to check out the Monmouth Coffee stall in Lewisham Market, the bar has been set exceptionally high. Hop scotch has an appealing selection of homemade cakes but having tried both a cupcake and their chocolate cake on different days, I found their recipes a bit dry. Full disclosure: I am a cake obsessive and was let down that Jam Circus just yesterday have tried their hand at making their own carrot cake rather than continue on with the local woman who was previously providing such a delicious and moist one. The result was a rubbery slab, but I digress...

I get the sense the Hop scotch owners really want to make a positive local contribution and if the packed tables on the weekends are anything to go by, they will. I wish them every success - and some moister cakes to sell me.