Impressions of the Elephant & Castle gathered in the mode of Mass Observation first hand research: June 2009
First stop: St Mary’s Park.
Intervention: community landscaping, Marshall’s paving, decking. Yellow and white Belisha beacons, derascinated, suggesting a zebra crossing, bringing traffic iconography to a pedestrian space, invoking the spirit of transport in a calming space for people to walk in.
Cantilevered benches (for one). Here I eat my lunch, while the pigeons behind me prefer the grasslands of old St Mary’s Churchyard. Buried bodies, long lost tombs under mown grass. A rumble of underground disturbs the waking and sleeping denizens of the Elephant. The pigeons creep nearer to inspect my Tesco’s bag.
Big plane trees standing as sentinels guarding hallowed plots. Disturbance: molehills of red and orange. Eruptions: concrete balls. Playground: younger generations dancing on the graves of their forebears. Memorials: fallen headstones lying in state.
A municipal landscape overlooked by new, affordable housing, blankly staring. Leisure centre: its back turned against the open space. Vent shaft, aircon unit, locked door in bright lipstick colour, CCTV.
Railings: play here, walk there, sit here. Beyond the railings: a traffic tableau. Within: a single rose, hybrid tea, pale orange. Trendy landscape architect’s bunkers of grasses. Ground cover: geraniums, hellebores, alchemilla, wood chip, decking.
Big glass box: ‘Connecting the people of Southwark to London and Europe.’
Why? How? Solar panels, wind turbine. Passers-by: all non-European.
I talk to a college student at the bus stop. She is from upstate New York, studying photography. I ask about the regeneration. No to shopping malls, to corporations. More community, cultural, open space.
Shopping centre:
No clear entrance, boarded-up, dump bins, slow-walking people.
Little open food area: Caribbean, Latin American, Thai, all together. An open space like in Kuala Lumpur, or Newton Circus, Singapore.
Upstairs: The London Palace casino: grand, swirly carpet, bingo, shuttering – a boxed-off den of vice. Bowling alley: like something out of the Big Lebowski, but with none of the people. No one, nothing, just imagery and sound.
Downstairs: I meet Maureen in the Tesco’s queue. She has lived in the Elephant & Castle area for most of her life. She shares a terraced house with her daughter. I enquire about the changes, the regeneration. Her eyes light up: Bill Clinton – Elephant & Castle in the news. “You’ve got to live here to understand the change. A new shopping centre will be a good thing; the place is getting cleaner. But we’ve lost some of our power. We talk, people listen, but little happens. We are a minority now.”
