Xtra Diary: Half a century of Carnaby Street

Half a century of street

NORMALLY Diary doesn’t go in for anniversary stories, especially when the thing we’re celebrating is just a humble street. But this time we will make an exception, because the thoroughfare in question is none other than Carnaby Street, which to many culture aficionados, is as close as a strip of paving stones and concrete can get to a sentient being. In celebration of its 50 years as the nerve centre of popular culture, an exhibition documenting its finest moments will be opening later this month. Among the highlights are a 3D timeline and a series of historical exhibits on loan from the Museum of London and the Victoria and Albert Museum. One of the area’s most famous residents was William Blake, whose powerful imagery of the plague and documentation of social injustices will also be featured. The exhibition Carnaby Street: 1960-2010 is being held at 38 Carnaby Street and begins on February 26. It will be followed by a series of live music events throughout the year.

Gangs’ change of direction

We reported that Westminster Council would be sending 20 gang members from the Mozart estate to the wilds of the Lake District. Holidays for Hoodies, Gangsters’ Paradise, Hate District to Lake District – all headlines that would no doubt appear in seamier publications. Second homeowners were checking out the price of private security, village shops were taking orders of bullet-proof glass and rifles were being readied for the stampede of pit-bulls. Apparently our green and pleasant land is no place for “undesirables”. They would upset the Countryside Alliance too much. But now it seems we made a false start with the report in our last issue. Our Lake District source has been put in line because, as we were told by an insider at City Hall, it would be politically and publicly “catastrophic” for the council to be seen to be sending gangsters to the lakes. So where is this six-day residential course then? Feltham? Deep Cut? Guantanamo? Well, actually, they will be staying in the heart of Surrey’s stockbroker belt, just south of Guildford in a small village called Ewhurst – home to Eric Clapton, Jim Davidson and Kenney Jones from The Who. Not all that different then.

Hard-to-swallow healthcare

If people are stupid enough to buy it, who are we to stand in their way, was the reading-between-the-lines excuse the country’s favourite high street chemist gave in response to the mass homoeopathy “overdose” protests which took place across the country this week. Gone are the days where you tootled down to Boots to buy those embarrassing items that nobody else sold. These days it seems to be a sort of three-for-two department store with more room given to Tropicana than tooth­brushes. Perhaps put out by the indifference, protesters moved their demonstration to the House of Commons this week. They are calling on the government to stop NHS subsidies for homoeopathic healthcare. Should Westminster let the market speak for itself? Maybe MPs should volunteer themselves as human guinea pigs. Just don’t test them with sleeping pills. Judging by the number of members apparently sleeping during PMQs, we would be none the wiser.

Robben Island school trip!

Those darned digital cameras. It’s all very well being able to see the pictures on the screen, but when it comes to getting them off it, our hyper-accelerated times suddenly don’t seem to move so fast. “Travelling without moving” is what the great Jamiroquai calls it. So it’s with great pleasure that Diary can finally give you photographic evidence which shows that the great St George’s school trip to South Africa did in fact happen. Four pupils from the Maida Vale secondary spent a night in the cells on Robben Island that were once home to Nelson Mandela, after taking part in the Model United Nations debating conference in Cape Town just before the Christmas holidays. Loic Menzies, then teacher at the school who accompanied the pupils, said: “The standard of the debates is extremely high and requires extensive knowledge of international relations at close to degree standard.” Diary remembers school trips being a soggy packed lunch, and a brisk walk around a sodden National Park. How things have changed.

A colossus in town

He has been described as a “colossus, bestriding the Atlantic, with feet planted in two very different worlds”. Now work of the late Guyanese artist Aubrey Williams is set for London, with an exhibition at the October Gallery in Bloomsbury.
Aubrey Williams: Now and Coming Time runs until April 3 at the Old Gloucester Street venue.

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