Author Archives: Kennington Runoff

Eco Chamber Free Event

Posted on by
Reply

Like a pig to a truffle, you can be assured that we here at the Runoff are always sniffing out free stuff for you to do. St. Mary’s Eco Church has been created by Lambeth Palace and Southwark Diocese in response to the climate and biodiversity crisis. Once a month they organise free and mind expanding talks called the ‘Eco Chamber’ and the next one is coming up right here in our manor. 

The upcoming Eco Chamber will be chaired by Radio 4’s Point of View Presenter Tommy Shakespeare and he’ll be joined Green Peer Baroness Jenny Jones and Professor Joanna Haigh. The topic will be the elimination fossil fuels and carbon emissions and questions if Net Zero initiatives will be sufficient to do this. Their talks will be followed by a group discussion and all are encouraged to ‘join is with juice, a glass of wine or a beer’. The venue is the Duchy Arms pub in Sancroft Street. 

The Eco Chamber takes place on 18 April and free tickets can be obtained here. And it’s a good thing that it is being held at the Duchy Arms, as the place seems go through more management changes than the Tory party and we’re a bit concerned about their future. 

Email Sharon if you have any questions: hello@stmarysecochurch.org

[jetpack_subscription_form show_only_email_and_button=”true” custom_background_button_color=”#ff6900″ custom_text_button_color=”undefined” submit_button_text=”Subscribe” submit_button_classes=”wp-block-button__link has-text-color has-background has-luminous-vivid-orange-background-button-color” show_subscribers_total=”false” ]

The Mavericks of Bonnington Square

Posted on by
1

Bonnington Square is a tiny, verdant and abundant community in the middle of Vauxhall and has a fascinating history. It’s easy to miss, and if you’re not familiar with the place now is the time to get your little springtime legs in motion and explore. 

Bonnington Square was laid out in the 1870’s to house railway workers. As workers preferred a pension to a home, the community evolved into a typical working classes enclave of families until the late 1970’s when the Greater London Council made a compulsory order of the now run down neighbourhood in order to build a school. The sole holdout was a Turkish shopkeeper, who through legal means was able to halt the demolition until GLC gave up in the 1980’s. In the meantime squatters moved into the empty flats and gave the place life again. Amazingly, the squatters established a wholefoods shop, a vegetarian café, and even a garden (more on that later). Through a bitter fight they were able later to negotiate leases with the ILEA.

The Bonnington Square we see today is a botanical oasis hidden in the midst of Vauxhall and the place maintains its maverick spirit, with busses and annoying Uber Eats drivers giving way to palm trees, flowers, and vines. This is the result of a concerted effort in the 1990’s for Bonnington Square residents to again assert their uniqueness by making their little patch of terra firma stand out from the rest. The result is more of an urban park than inner city neighbourhood. 

The central communal area, open to all, is called the Pleasure Garden and is planted as a semi tropical garden with a number of unusual features including a nine metre waterwheel. The Bonnington Sq. residents association purchased the derelict garden after Lambeth Council forgot (coughs) they owned it. Harleyford Road Community Garden is another quiet and almost deserted place to read, relax and generally chill. Please ignore the fact that its upkeep is ironically maintained by notoriously unquiet nightclub ‘Fire’. 

Below is a video of Bonnington Square and the history of the people who squatted there. The soundtrack sounds a bit like an adult film but if you can tune that out its very interesting. The cafe is sadly gone.



 

Greater Kennington’s Greatest Occult Painter

Posted on by
1

The eccentric and independent nature of Greater Kenningtonians runs deep in our history and veins. In our midst we once had living a visionary artist who was cast out by the artistic establishment due to his refusal to accept to artistic norms and being from south London. Maybe this piece will go a small way in reviving his legacy. 

Austin Osman Spare (1886 – 1956) and his family moved to Kennington Park Gardens when he was a boy and Spare trained as an illustrator and artist. He got his first big break when he was just 17 with an exhibit at Newington Public Library (now the Art Academy) in Walworth Road. He followed this success with having a picture displayed at the Royal Academy, and was soon lauded as the new enfant terrible of his generation. This was spurred on by Spare’s wild hair and love of giving outrageous interviews. 

In spite of his increasing fame, Spare decided to pursue his own style which proved increasingly out of step with the art establishment. He dabbled into the furthest reaches of his imagination with coded paintings and illustrations depicting the unconscious, the occult, graphic images of sex, and paganism. Spare achieved this by painting in what he referred to as trance like states enhanced by mysticism. You can imagine his body of work was not exactly in step with post Victorian tastes as he was far ahead of his time and was marginalised as a result.

Unsurprisingly, as Spare’s art was not to everyone’s tastes he faded into obscurity and penury. However, our local boy continued to give interviews and churn out work from his tiny flat/studio at the top of Walworth Rd. He believed that art should be enjoyed by everyone, and he often displayed his art in local pubs. After his studio was bombed in WW2, Spare lost much of his collection and confidence and began to build up both gradually. The culminated in a large exhibition of his work at his local, the White Bear pub in Kennington Park Road in 1953. When this turned out to be a flop he retired and died several years later. What we are left with is his groundbreaking oeuvre of work and a realisation that we can all leave impressions after we’ve departed Greater Kennington. 

The best way to appreciate Spare’s work today is to examine online collections, as his work is still usually not on display. He also had an endearing side hustle in painting his friends and neighbours. The BBC clip below relates to a 2010 exhibit of his work at the Cuming Museum: 

Ten Best Places to Eat in Greater Kennington

Posted on by
Reply

(+ One Sunday Roast)

#3 PALADAR

The extremely hip restaurant ‘Paladar’ has been on our radar since it opened in 2018 and after the stingy Runoff management team finally agreed to pay for our meal we recently visited. It has shot up and nabbed the number 3 spot in our countdown. It is probably as close to ‘fine dining’ as you can get in our area, so we suggest doing for a special date. Or if you’re trying to make up with your other half.

Paladar is a Latin American fusion restaurant in St. George’s Circus near Elephant & Castle/Lambeth North. The restaurant doubles as an art space, and on our visit featured work by Ecuadorean artist Ulises Valarezo. The crowd is more West End chic than we would expect in these parts, and in fact we sat next to ‘Leave a Light On’ pop star Tom Walker and loads of people laughing while flicking their hair.

  • Pork Belly
  • Lettuce Hearts

The menu is, you guessed it, sharing plates and five items served two people just fine. We were served by a precise, chirpy and professionally drilled service staff who knew quite a bit about what they were serving and actually spoke Spanish to one another.  Highlights were  texture rich tuna tartare tostadas accompanied by a fragrant salsa which  reminded us ever so slightly of a delicious, yet expensive, hand soap. The pork belly tacos had an interesting Chinese crispy duck sticky quality and were wrapped in lettuce leaves as opposed to a tortilla. On the veggie front, we enjoyed compelling, deep fried tapioca croquettes which were savory but just verging on being sweet. We also indulged on chargrilled lettuce hearts with a nut based topping.

Croquettes and Tuna

With a bottle of wine the total bill came to £84 which is by no means cheap but it will teach the management team a thing or two before they tell us that we’re not worth the dosh. Money well spent even if you don’t get the chance to sit next to a minor pop star in a bobble hat. 

Paladar also sell South American wines in their adjacent wine shop.  We enjoyed a divine £26 Montes Colchagua Valley Merlot which was less than a tenner more than was going in the shop. 

[jetpack_subscription_form show_only_email_and_button=”true” custom_background_button_color=”#cf2e2e” custom_text_button_color=”undefined” submit_button_text=”Subscribe” submit_button_classes=”wp-block-button__link has-text-color has-background has-vivid-red-background-button-color” show_subscribers_total=”false” ]

Ten Best Places to Eat in Greater Kennington

Posted on by
1

+ One Sunday Roast

#6 Daebak

Since opening a few years ago Daebak in Vauxhall has been delivering consistent and hearty Korean fare in a very cool street Seoul setting. Word has now spread and it’s more popular than ever, with so many Korean patrons that you’d think a minor member of BTS was inside.   The folks are  probably enticed by their Korean down home treats such as kimchi pancakes and…wait for it….. potato chips with cream cheese powder, best consumed with the Korean beer Cass. 

For our meal the three of us ordered soy garlic Korean Fried Chicken (or KFC, a speciality, above), spicy bibimbap,  Katsu curry, crispy tofu, and gyoza. Let me tell you, reader, we were rolling out of there by the end of it. We could have easily dropped one of the main courses as they were huge. We highly recommend the various kinds of fried chicken on order (crunchy, subtle) and the Bibimbap is delicious and comes with two veg. options. I would also experiment with a starter like octopus balls. Overall it is great food, and pretty kind on the pocket. 

Daebak is small and charming, but if you are going on a weekend it might be a good idea to book, as last time we couldn’t get in we had to go across the street to ‘Jihwaja’ which was the opposite of charming. Well, unless your idea of charm involves hen do’s, stale kimchee and blaring K-Pop. And if it does then this blog might not be for you…..

Pros – It has wide open doors overlooking Vauxhall

Cons – It has wide open doors overlooking Vauxhall

[jetpack_subscription_form show_only_email_and_button=”true” custom_background_button_color=”undefined” custom_text_button_color=”undefined” submit_button_text=”Subscribe” submit_button_classes=”undefined” show_subscribers_total=”false” ]

Ten Best Places to Eat in Greater Kennington

Posted on by
Reply

+ One Sunday Roast

#8 The Jolly Gardeners

The number eight spot goes to the only pub in our countdown, The Jolly Gardeners in Vauxhall. The Gardeners sprang to life in 2021 and now occupies the same kitchens formerly used by a German themed pub, which we once correctly described as ‘food best enjoyed when you’re not entirely sober’. But fear not, the Gardeners boys and their sustainable and well sourced kitchen know what they’re doing. And it’s 50% vegan. 

The menu at the Gardeners changes periodically, but at the time of writing (March 2023) we’ve enjoyed a cauliflower wings (a bit of a staple), lightly grilled leek with almonds, and the breaded cod filet swimming in spinach cream sauce with kale. The format in this huge pub is that it is 50% is set out as a dining room with the other half as a pub, but food can be consumed in both. The pub also features an outside dining/drinking area that rather reminds us of a ski lodge or sauna. 

While it might have missed out on the top spot in terms of Sunday roasts, we can definitely recommend the Gardener roasts. As the food keeps coming it almost has an ‘all you can eat’ element to it. In the past we’ve enjoyed the silverside beef and Dorset lamb. Also keep your eagle eye out for their spicy peri peri fries and mustard green salad. On the drinks front, they work hard to source from local breweries such as Coalition or even closer ones from Brixton. 

The Gardeners guys also operate a zippy little sandwich place two doors down called Simply Bread. When asked if one of the sandwich makers is none other than Mick Hucknall himself, the 20 something employee replied with a perplexed stare. 

[jetpack_subscription_form show_only_email_and_button=”true” custom_background_button_color=”#ff6900″ custom_text_button_color=”undefined” submit_button_text=”Subscribe” submit_button_classes=”wp-block-button__link has-text-color has-background has-luminous-vivid-orange-background-button-color” show_subscribers_total=”false” ]

Ten Best Places to Eat in Greater Kennington

Posted on by
2

+One Sunday Roast

#10 CAFE VAN GOGH

Coming up at the rear of our very best is vegan institution Café Van Gogh in Oval. The Café operates as a not for profit social enterprise and many of the people working there live with challenges which would exclude them from most of the job market. They also aspire to be zero waste and all of their takeaway containers and coffee cups are fully compostable. According to their website ‘our social purpose is more important than making tonnes of cash’. TICK! 

Your noble scribe tucked into the shiitake shawarma served in a bowl with flatbread. The generous portion was augmented by baked butterbeans, yogurt, dukkah and sprinkled with coriander. The flavours worked well and the meaty mushrooms melted in my mouth very quickly. In a sense it was amazing that this was vegan at all, and reflects what must be a great deal of experimentation in the kitchen. This very much had a home cooked feel. 

Mike from our IT team had the Van Gogh burger. This is a house speciality with the burger being based on shiitake mushrooms, with likely some beetroot in the mix for a bit of colour. This was at the softer end of veggie burgers but agreeable and was elevated by an excellent soft domed roll and some spicy vegan mayo. Served with this were some thin cut chips dusted with a kind of fake bacon (fakon?) powder, which was a fun addition. Mike has a very complex, and some would say tortured, relationship with vegan cheese, so it did not make an appearance. 

Overall, Café Van Gogh is a gently Bohemian and effortlessly welcoming space, and the Van Gogh prints on the wall and Starry Night ceiling reminded us of those immersive art installations that are all the rage at the moment. If you don’t take our (meat eating) word for the quality of the food at Café Van Gogh, it was recently recognised as one of the top vegan restaurants be no less than Conde Nast Traveller! They are also very much open in the evening, and sell a rage of vegan wines and beers. 

[jetpack_subscription_form show_only_email_and_button=”true” custom_background_button_color=”#ff6900″ custom_text_button_color=”undefined” submit_button_text=”Subscribe” submit_button_classes=”wp-block-button__link has-text-color has-background has-luminous-vivid-orange-background-button-color” show_subscribers_total=”false” ]

The Walworth Farce @ Southwark Playhouse

Posted on by
3

If you’re a committed Runoff reader (and when you think about it, why not?), you’ll be aware that we’ve been closely monitoring the opening of the new Kennington facing Southwark Theatre and we toured the place last summer. It’s now open for business with the geographically appropriate dark comedy ‘The Walworth Farce’ and we’ve just checked it out for you. 

Set in three claustrophobic rooms in a council block in Walworth Road, Irish brothers Blake and Sean live with their father Dinny and spend their day recreating a script of their previous life in Cork. In some scenes Blake and Sean play younger versions of themselves. In other scenes they depict older members of their family in various scenarios primarily centred on murder and inheritance, to an audience of no one. As the older sibling, Sean vaguely remembers what actually happened to his family in Cork and presents this to Dinny, who has an vested interest in reinterpreting the narrative. 

Sean is the only member of the household allowed to leave the flat, and in his daily visit to Walworth Tesco he befriends Hayley, who turns up to drop off some shopping. Seemingly obvious to her presence, the trio continue to depict their series of tragic events and struggle to bring Hayley into the narrative. We won’t tell you if the arrival of Hayley becomes an existential threat to their endless play or if she can liberate Sean to safety. The play’s theme of physically and emotionally trapped characters, compelled to act out narratives in an endless loop, certainly reminded us our lives in 2020 and 2021. 

The Walworth Farce is on now until 18 March and £15 tickets can be purchased here. Or you could just sit at home and watch a programme about Katie Price doing her house up. The choice is yours. 

And only five days to go until we unveil our Ten Best Places to Eat in Greater Kennington (+ One Sunday Roast)!

[jetpack_subscription_form show_only_email_and_button=”true” custom_background_button_color=”undefined” custom_text_button_color=”undefined” submit_button_text=”Subscribe” submit_button_classes=”undefined” show_subscribers_total=”false” ]

Getting Classy in Vauxhall

Posted on by
Reply

OK people, now that you’ve completed that new year’s resolution of running around Kennington Park six times, it’s time to work on your grey matter. It’s that time in the Greater Kennington cultural calendar (it’s a thing, trust us) to enlighten you about the ‘Classical Vauxhall’ series of concerts at St. Mark’s Church in Oval from 2 to 5 March. The press release boldly describes it as ‘a four day festival of live music and song, featuring top artists and four centuries of composers’. While the revival of dead white men might not sound like a merry blast, it seems that these artists have their own unique twist on things. 

The concept behind these five concerts is to put on shows that are varied, lively, and accessible to people who (like us) are not habitues of the Royal Opera House and might otherwise be a bit intimidated by this genre.  Each night is set to a theme, from jazz in Hollywood to finding comfort in chaos (very hard to do in Vauxhall) and feature a range of artists performing short pieces. The last day is a freebie and is dedicated to young artists learning their trade.  

The director of the festival and the brains behind the whole thing is Fiachra Garvey and he is joined by artists Clifton Harrison, Tamsin Waley, Rakhi Singh, and the Julian Bliss Septet. To be honest we have no idea who any of these people are – But– we have seen some of their work on YouTube and it’s beautiful. Rakhi and her amazing violin are featured here.  

Tickets are £22.15 so not exactly cheap, but a great way to support local culture and artists who have probably didn’t have much work during the pandemic. Some folks from KR towers went in 2022 and they described it as both amazing and great fun.  A nice way to get a little culture in your life without venturing much further than your local pub. 

Only 10 days to go until our ‘Ten Best Places to Eat in Greater Kennington (+ 1 Sunday Roast)’ countdown, people! 

[jetpack_subscription_form show_only_email_and_button=”true” custom_background_button_color=”undefined” custom_text_button_color=”undefined” submit_button_text=”Subscribe” submit_button_classes=”undefined” show_subscribers_total=”false” ]

Shorts at the Cinema Museum

Posted on by
Reply

And like the prodigal child, or some random naughty kid, we are back and we hope you enjoyed our month of history writing, picked especially for you as they get the most hits the history of Greater Kennington is important.

As you may or may not know, our greatest ‘at risk’ asset in is the wonderful Cinema Museum located in Charlie Chaplin’s old workhouse. To celebrate LGBTQI+ history month they are putting on series of screenings one is coming up this Thursday (the 16th) seems particularly interesting. It’s a series of shorts about aging, coming out later in life, and disabilities. Afterwards there is a QA and we all have a chance to ask the directors and actors questions about making and acting in the films. And there’s a bar. We’ve been to a number of shorts screenings at the London Film Festival; they’re great fun and an intriguing way to learn more about how films are made.

If you’ve never been to the Cinema Museum it’s a treasure trove of cinematic ephemera and your ticket to this event will allow you access to check out some of it, from ticket stubs to chairs, lighting and props. And the films are shown amongst the collection. A great even night out regardless of sexuality or even if you’re not a film buff. Did we mention there’s a bar? 

Doors open at 18:00 for a 19:00 start this Thursday and tickets can be purchased here for £8 a pop. A lot cheaper than the BFI.

[jetpack_subscription_form show_only_email_and_button=”true” custom_background_button_color=”undefined” custom_text_button_color=”undefined” submit_button_text=”Subscribe” submit_button_classes=”undefined” show_subscribers_total=”false” ]