Not far from Archway tube station, just off the Holloway Road is a street named St. John’s Villas lined with imposing early Victorian houses on one side and a later, more run-of-the-mill terrace on the other. The street is a cut off Holloway Road heading towards Hornsey Road and like many 19th century city streets […]
Tag: street trees
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Persian Silk in Globe Street
I was transfixed by the charms of a Persian Silk Tree (Albizia julibrissin) in Southwark today. A most majestic and unusual (for England) street tree, in fact a rarely-planted tree anywhere in the UK, street or otherwise. This is perhaps a cautious test planting to see what happens – the tree has a reputation for […]
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Field Maple’s urban resilience
I admire this gawky and unloved Field Maple – acer campestre – on the Hornsey Road in north London. It couldn’t be further away from the bucolic landscape implied by it’s name. This one fills a space on a busy main road by a row of local shops soaking up traffic fumes and witnessing round […]
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North Americans surround City Hall
More London is the could-do-better new development of the usual eateries, open spaces and largely unremarkable office buildings on the southbank just west of City Hall. It does try hard though and has some interesting bits like the water feature running the length of the dramatic diagonal pedestrian conduit between Tooley Street and the river. […]