Pullens Yards

Posted on December 1, 2013 by Kennington Runoff

In the early 20th century, East Kennington’s magnificent Pullens Estate, AKA the Pullens Buildings, comprised almost 700 properties and stretched all the way to Manor Place. In the seventies the surviving buildings were threatened with demolition. Residents and squatters fought back (Kennington owes a lot to the preservation efforts of squatters) and thank goodness they did – these are some of London’s last surviving Victorian tenement buildings, and their workshops host a thriving community of creative people, as well as providing film sets for the likes of The King’s Speech (in the scene where the king goes to visit the speech therapist for the first time).

Twice a year they host an open day and their Christmas event is coming up next weekend. It’s the ideal opportunity to look around these unique spaces and pick up unusual Christmas presents. How about some Alex Monroe jewellery for a fraction of the Liberty’s price, or some pottery moulded from vegetables, or a handmade loot, or some architect-designed furniture, or a print of all the regions of the shipping forecast? It’s all here, in the most amazing and rather Christmas-y setting.

More info here.

Pullens Yard, with workshops along both sides:

An installation of umbrellas from a previous open day, an idea that later made it to Carnaby Street:

Naomi Campbell used to live in Iliffe St, below, and, wait for it, the young Charlie Chaplin lived in one of the Pullens Buildings for a while:

The loot making workshop, who supply all Kanye West’s loot needs:

Make Space Studios

Posted on November 27, 2013 by Kennington Observer

Make Space Studios is a complex of arts and craft studios run by the people behind Studio 180. If you want to see handbags made out of recycled material, screen printing of posters for leading alternative bands, and savagely accurate parodies of twee middle class consumerist products, get along to their Christmas open evening ~~today~~ tomorrow, Thursday, from 4pm to 9pm (sorry we got the date wrong initially). There will be mince pies, mulled wine and special magic punch*.

Make Space runs alongside the railway lines going in to Waterloo Station, while the entrance is on Newnham Terrace in North Kennington, opposite Lambeth North Tube. They also have an art gallery, The Simulator Gallery.

Follow the pink bannister below to enter and on no account allow yourself to be diverted into CP Hart, the world’s largest and therefore most terrifying bathroom showroom.

* we can’t be sure but it seems like that kind of place

Apple Day at Roots and Shoots

Posted on October 5, 2013 by Kennington Runoff

The Roots and Shoots HQ is one of the best modern buildings in South London. Designed by Paul Notley and finished in 2005 on the site of a former Meccano warehouse, it’s the kind of building that will make you think “Come back Tony Blair, all is forgiven”. Momentarily.

Roots and Shoots is a charity providing agricultural training for young people from the surrounding area, a little like Kennington Flowers but on a much bigger scale. They have an eco-training centre, a plant nursery, a shop, a wildlife study centre and a wild garden. The garden is one element that can be visited all year round, but by appointment only.

If you’re not a 16 to 19 year old in need of education or training then the easiest way to visit is their annual Apple Day which takes place this Sunday October 6th. Learn about and sample the hundreds of varieties of apples that are all-but extinct nowadays, plus you can buy plants, local honey and second-hand books, and all that other good stuff one sees at these events. COMMUNITY.

Snap up the apple juice before Kennington’s own Prince Charles does – apparently he sends his butler down every year to buy most of what Roots and Shoots press.

It’s open from 11am to 4pm and it’s £1 to get in, or free for children.

Bedrock’s 15th birthday party at Fire

Posted on October 4, 2013 by Kennington Runoff

Nowadays, as readers of this blog will realise, we like nothing better than to spend our evenings visiting the pubs, restaurants, art galleries and yoga centres of Kennington. But once upon a time, a night out for Kennington Runoff might have involved a trip to a nightclub – and one of our favourite club nights for its amazing atmosphere was John Digweed’s Bedrock. Back then, Bedrock took place at Heaven in Charing Cross, but like many of London’s more adrenaline-fuelled club nights, it has since relocated to West Kennington. Bedrock celebrate their 15th anniversary this Saturday at West Kennington’s own superclub Fire with a seven hour set from Mr Digweed himself. We won’t be attending – the only place we’d spend seven hours for entertainment nowadays is a test match at the Oval – but we’re sure it will “go off” as the kids may or may not still say. If you haven’t got a ticket, get down by 10pm when there will be 150 tickets available on the door.

Lambeth Open

Posted on October 3, 2013 by Kennington Runoff

Lambeth Open sees artists and makers across the borough open their doors to the public from 10am to 6pm both days this weekend, October 5th and 6th.

Both the spaces on display in Kennington are new to us so we look forward to having a nosey around:

Eszter Szicso is a Hungarian-born painter based at 6 Gaysley House, Hotspur Street in West Kennington, SE11 6TS.

Three different artists are based at 331 Kennington Lane, also in West Kennington.

Elefest

Posted on October 1, 2013 by Kennington Runoff

Elefest is the festival for North and East Kennington and runs from October 4th to 6th. In previous years we’ve enjoyed the The StockMKT, a night market on Friday and Saturday from 5pm-10pm with great food, craft beer, arts and crafts, live music and DJs.

This year you can also go on a tour of the subways under the north roundabout with David Bratby, the artist who painted the murals on their walls, and there’s an art exhibition in the old doctor’s surgery on the soon-to-be-demolished Heygate Estate which has got to be worth a visit for lovers of ruin porn. There’s a screening of The Harder They Come, which features one of the Kennington Runoff’s favourite records, Many Rivers To Cross by Jimmy Cliff, followed by a DJ set from Don Letts.

More Elefest events here.

The Elefest branding is really great this year, and will be even better when the festival is given its rightful name, North Kennifest:

Always Be Comedy at the Tommyfield

Posted on September 29, 2013 by Kennington Runoff

One of London’s best small comedy nights takes place every second Thursday upstairs at Kennington gastropub The Tommyfield. Sign up to their email list to find out about occasional big name attendees like Russell Howard, Russell Kane and Jason Manford, but even when the big names are absent the line-up tends to be more hit than miss. Foster’s Edinburgh Comedy Award Nominee Carl Donnelly headlines this Thursday. Don’t sit in the front row unless you want to participate – last time around the actor Marc Warren was there and was roped into more than one routine. Tickets are £6 online or £7 on the door – a bargain for five acts plus some energetic compering.

That Pair at Always Be Comedy at The Tommyfield

Open House Kennington

Posted on September 17, 2013 by Kennington Runoff

Open House London is this weekend and Kennington is well represented.

First up, places that are varying degrees of difficult to visit outside of Open House:

60 Ambergate Street, a “small but well-crafted flat renovation” near Kennington tube

The Mobile Gardeners Park, which we wrote about here

Morley College, the adult education centre in North West Kennington. While you’re there, why not visit London’s largest guerrilla gardening site, located directly in front of Morley College in the giant, lavender-filled flower beds in the middle of Westminster Bridge Road:

Guerrilla tulips in bloom at the Guerrilla Gardening on Westminster Bridge Road, London April 2011, by Richard Reynolds

The Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain

The Cinema Museum, a true labour of love in the former Master’s House of the Lambeth Workhouse, a Victorian Gothic building where Charlie Chaplin once stayed with his destitute mother. It can be a little tricky to organise tours of the Cinema Museum normally, and there’s a charge, so going during Open House is recommended.

Perronet House, a concrete council block on the north roundabout in North Kennington. If this looks or sounds unpromising then wait till you see the inside – fantastic views across London from two sides, outstanding use of period features, and a sun-drenched terrace full of plants. The photo of Elephant & Castle Shopping Centre below was taken from Perronet House.

Then there are these places which can be visited easily enough outside of Open House:

Beaconsfield, which we wrote about here

Siobhan Davies Studios, which we wrote about here

Lambeth Palace, the official London residence of the Archbishop of Canterbury in England which dates back to the 13th century, is fully booked during Open House, but you can buy tickets for future tours here.

Inside City & Guilds of London Art School

Posted on September 12, 2013 by Kennington Runoff

Kennington Runoff presented itself at the Private View of the MA Fine Art Show tonight, a giddy high point in the Kennington art world calendar. If you’ve never been inside City and Guilds Art School, housed in a row of Georgian buildings along Kennington Park Road, the final shows are an excellent opportunity to poke around this labyrinthine space.

The show, titled Red Thread, runs from 12th-15th September, and is so-called because ‘in East Asian mythology the gods tie a red cord around the ankles of those that are destined to share the same fate – be it death, love or working on the 2103 MA Show at London’s City&Guilds Art School.’

The Kennington Runoff Prize goes to Mark Morgan, for tricking us more than once with his clever excavations. Special mention also goes to Jelena Bulajic and her mammoth-scale portraits. Go and see the show in person, because these photos don’t really do it justice.

Tarek Tuma:

Anja von Kalinowski:

Jelena Bulajic (this is impressively huge in real life):

Mark Morgan:

Kennington: celebrity party zone with Cara Delevingne and Rita Ora

Posted on August 15, 2013 by Kennington Runoff

We may be a little late in covering the #DKNYArtworks party that took place at the old Lambeth Fire Station on Whitgift Street earlier this summer, but we have good reason: we pride ourselves on lack of hype here, and we wanted to make sure that when we said that Kennington hosted this summer’s hottest party, nothing was going to trump that. Now in mid-August, it’s safe to say that SE11 can take the crown, after a night that featured Cara Delevingne stagebombing Rita Ora’s set (attempting a duet and showing off her very own take on the twerk), and appearances from an array of London’s bright youngish things including Eliza Doolittle, Henry Holland, Nick Grimshaw, Professor Green, Millie Mackintosh, and Bella Freud.

The old Lambeth Fire Station is part of an historically important fire brigade complex, sitting just behind a fire practice tower, and the more architecturally remarkable art deco moderne London Fire Brigade Headquarters on the Albert Embankment.

The Kennington Observer

Surreptitiously observing Kennington, including the suburbs Vauxhall, Oval, Walworth, and Elephant since 2012

Category Archives: events