Shoe tree re-born

The shoe tree rises again, this time on actual trees on the edge of the park, very close to the former location (a wire running across Pedley Street, outside Shoreditch tube).


































This is how it used to look (Film still from August 2006)

diversion on the diversions

I went to see if I could get through from Pedley Street to the foot bridge today, but it seems like it will be permanently inaccessible as the rising east London line extension emerges from underground right across the pathway.






















The signs on signs, diversion over diverted.......

Paul Trevor Photographs

Paul Trevor's collection of photographs of the East End has been partially digitised and is now online through VADS. There are 2 photos showing the flying hut at Pedley Street. The collection overview is at:
http://www.vads.ahds.ac.uk/collections/EEP.html
One of the photos is from 1978, the year the City Farm opened (I think) click here to view

permission to reproduce kindly granted, © Paul Trevor, 2007 all rights reserved










and the other is from 1992, with an intervention in the flying hut, if anyone knows who this was by......
click here to view



permission to reproduce kindly granted, © Paul Trevor 2007, all rights reserved

some aerial views

I just discovered that various online aerial photos haven't been updated for a while and still show the flying hut and other now departed features of the Pedley Street/Fleet Street Hill area.
Here are a few

Baba Yaga

Chicken Legs Hut

Alongside the recently appeared drawings of The Flying Hut (see earlier blog entries below) - etched into wet concrete - there is a piece of graffiti that has intrigued and puzzled me for some time. It appears to be written in the same 'hand' as the drawings, or at least at the same time, but is quite difficult to interpret. The first words are simple enough 'LONG LIVE..' But the final words were barely legible. Now, with some help, the whole graffiti has been interpreted - and sheds an interesting new light on the history and origin of The Hut. It reads 'LONG LIVE BABA YAGA'.

Baba Yaga is a common figure in Slavic and Russian folklore. She appears as a wild old woman or witch, who flies in a mortar using a pestle to steer. Crucially, in relation to The Flying Hut, BABA YAGA LIVES IN A CABIN ON DANCING CHICKEN LEGS. She flies in and out of the cabin on her mortar - entering through the chimney, as it has no windows or door. This folktale may relate to a popular construction method of Siberian peoples for the purpose of preserving supplies from animals - a cabin without windows or doors is built on the stumps of two or three trees - which look very like chicken legs. There is also evidence, discovered by the archaeologists Yefimenko and Tretyakov in 1948, that the ancient Slavs used huts of a similar construction in their funeral traditions – traces of corpse cremation has been found inside such huts. The drawing by Nicholas Roerich, c.1905, is of a ‘Hut of Death’, and clearly shows the resemblance of the tree-stump supports to chicken legs.

So, it appears that The Flying Hut is alternatively known as Baba Yaga’s cabin – and indeed there are some Flickr pages recently brought to my attention that refer to The Hut in its Baba Yaga guise

http://flickr.com/photos/albedo/267111527/

And under the pseudonym ‘House On Stilts’ there are images of the drawings in still wet concrete – perhaps we have found the originators of both the drawings and the Baba Yaga cult?
http://www.flickr.com/groups/396081@N24/

Flying Hut Over Railway Footbridge

The Railway Footbridge AKA Shit Bridge

Flying Hut

Flying Hut

Flying Hut

Steps Down to the Arch - Smells of urine, sometimes of shit

The Boys

As we came over the railway footbridge, I could hear voices coming from round the corner, down the stairs. The voices were muffled, I couldn't make out what was being said. But there was an urgency to the sound - I thought luckily I'm not alone, it's a dodgy place. I wonder what's going on. At the end of the bridge we turned to go down the stairs, the voices louder as we turn again to go down the last few steps. We were suddenly confronted by three boys at the bottom of the stairs. Or maybe they were surprised by us. I could smell burning now, coming from below. One of the boys, in a red hoody, looked imploringly at us and pointed to his right, towards the railway arch. He said 'Those boys just made a fire. Those boys. They ran off.'
At the bottom of the stairs we turned into the railway arch, where the three boys were now, and the smouldering pile of fire in the corner. The boys looked at the fire and looked at us, convincing us, wondering what we thought. 'Those boys…' the red hoody boy said again, pointing away down the arch. I laughed and kept on walking.

*This isn't the smouldering pile mentioned above...but another Pedley Street pile.

Steps Down to the Arch

Smells bad. Be careful not to step in things.

Under the Arch

Under the Arch

Flying Hut Drawing 3

Flying Hut Drawing 2

Flying Hut Drawing 1

Three drawings of the Flying Hut have been discovered inscribed into fresh concrete, which was recently poured partially over the cobbled surface of Bratley Street. These drawings were made after the demolition of the original Hut.

Obstacle

Winos' Brazier, out of action

Flowers

Corner of Buxton and Shuttle Street