Pining for the fjords?

Sculpture in the grounds of Davenport House, Greenwich

Ever wondered about the statue at the top of Greenwich Hill?

Folk Olympics: James Wolfe - Battles, Brothels And Broken Hearts (Londonist/SongsFromTheHowlingSea) (by thehowlingsea)

A fascinatingly ramshackle looking view of one of East Greenwich’s wharfs

Blackheath Chair Lifting (by notseveredhead)

Spring seems to be a time when our most folkloric instincts come out. The tradition of chair lifting is practised in Greenwich by the Blackheath Morris Men

http://www.blackheathmorris.com/Blackheath_Morris_Men/Home.html

Living perilously close to these caverns I am fascinated by their usage and history and like this survey map showing where they are in relationship to the surrounding streets. 

This film titled Greenwich Naval College starts with some unexciting footage of a marching band in the Naval College but around 4mins 40 the film begins to document a 1970’s disco/party for about 6mins of fantastic fashions and giddy camera work before it cuts back to the Observatory and meridian line. This certainly isn’t Pathe News..a home movie they acquired perhaps?

Astronomers are funny looking men with long whiskers who sit on the roof at night trying to discover new stars

House of Hidden Time

This short film by artist Niamh Murray is a dreamlike study of the interior of a house in Crooms Hill, Greenwich.  

Thanks to Niamh for allowing us to use this film

(Source: youtube.com)

Book illustration of ‘Greenwich - in the Season’ from the preface to ‘London: a Pilgrimage’ by Blanchard Jerrold and Gustave Doré, 1872. Jerrold writes: “A happier or sunnier spot is not near[er] London … than the river front of Greenwich on an early summer evening, when the whitebait eaters are arriving, and the cooks are busy in the remote recesses of the ‘Ship’ and the ‘Trafalgar’.” The Season was when the fashionable world assembled in London for business, pleasure and amusement. Traditionally the Season was when the royal family were in residence in London, from April to July and October to Christmas.

Greenwich based blog Greenwich Phantom included this picture of a snow sculpture created in Greenwich Park in 2010. The work would appear to represent the Snow Goddess guardian of the west side of the park. Would be interested to know more about the work and who created it 

Rosie Oliver of Dotmaker Tours has drawn my attention to the play Whitebait at Greenwich - which really reflects just how much the town was associated with whitebait dinners

The Thames from Greenwich, London by John Minton

Blow Up remains a quintessential piece of 60s film-making by one of the greats of cinema, Michelangelo Antonioni. It caused quite a bit of consternation in the family when it was screened on TV and was branded boring and pointless but I loved the mysteries it contained and its images of a swinging 60s London that I was born too late to enjoy.

The film’s pivotal scene was filmed in Maryon Park in Charlton, where the photographer, David Hemmings, photographs an image of a possible murder scene. The film still has the power to beguile and delight an audience as its screening on location in Maryon Park in 2010 proved. 

The location shots here come from The Museum of Cinema website and there is a film comparing the location then and now. Does anybody have any other photographs of the film being made or memories of the filming that they could share with the Cabinet of Curiosities? 

A wonderful Pathe film from the 1950’s documenting the Wapping artists group meeting up to capture the Thames