History Editor CJ DeBarra (history@leftlion.co.uk)
Literature Editor Andrew Tucker (literature@leftlion.co.uk)
Food Co-Editor Lucy Campion (food@leftlion.co.uk)
Distribution Dom Martinovs
Featured Contributor
Zhara Millett is a queer British-Indian illustrator based in Nottingham, who has been drawing, scribbling and painting since she was a small child growing up in Derby. Since graduating in 2020 from Birmingham City, she has worked with private clients, running an Etsy storefront, and most recently illustrating for Leftlion. Her work is full of her love for bright colours and dynamic lines, and a focus on evolving with each project. She is inspired by the independent creative scene in Nottingham and online.
Outside of work, Zhara can be often found in Blend cafe scribbling away in her stickercovered sketchbook and filming the creative process for her online presence. In her downtime you may find her tucked into a fiction novel in the nearest café or absorbed into her Nintendo Switchthese days she is rarely spotted without her noise-cancelling headphones.
See Zhara’s illustrations on page 37 and follow her at @zharamillett.
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House and Proud
In 1991 Smokescreen Soundsystem decided to ‘do it themselves’ and started holding parties on a hill above the city. We trace the legendary party crew from the political rumblings of the time to the present day.
Concrete Jumble
Long Live The Bodega!
To celebrate the 25th anniversary of that special spot on Pelham street, we take a trip down memory lane with the people that have helped make the space a cornerstone of our city’s nightlife.
With once busy city centres across the country becoming rife with empty buildings, Editor Sophie Gargett explores how Nottingham could reinvent itself ready for an ever-evolving future.
Step into his shoes
We give you a snapshot of our live interview with film and TV legend Shane Meadows, who tells us why Notts is his go-to location for young acting talent.
Out in the Sticks
We chat to popular YouTube urban and rural explorer Ant Daykin about our innate ‘right-to-roam’ in the country and town.
Write Black to the Beginning
Marking fifteen years of Nottingham Black Archive, poet and archivist Panya Banjoko talks to us about history, creativity, and collaboration.
Dear readers,
Welcome to the November edition of LeftLion, an issue dedicated to rebels, roamers, ravers and reclamation!
As anyone getting stuck into a spot of research will find, it is often the inevitable tangents and rabbit holes which can lead to the most enjoyable explorations. Back when we were first planning this issue, we intended to hone in on Nottingham’s long history of rebellion - but snaking alongside, another theme started to arise, interwoven with rebellion; that of land, ownership, boundaries and reclamation.
As Nottingham battles with lack of funding, empty retail units and redevelopment, we have delved into some of the more offbeat ideas around use of space. Speaking to writers, roamers and ravers we have looked at our relationship to the land in the city and beyond, raising questions such as, who has a right to the land? Where are we restricted
20th Century Boy
From the personal to the countercultural, we talk to St Ann’s born-and-bred author Simon Smalley about the pivotal moments of growing up as a gay man in the 60s and 70s .
Breaking Ground
As they turn professional, Notts Forest Women tell us about the future of their club, both on and off the pitch.
Man Hours
We visit Lakeside Arts to take a look at Grayson Perry’s Man Hours: a satirical exploration of contemporary life featuring bold woodcut prints and a mixture of mediaeval and antique maps.
Wonder Wall
Thanks to the Friends of Wollaton Park, Wollaton Walled Garden, once fallen into disrepair, is now singing with life once again. We meet the volunteers helping out.
Behind the Curtain
We meet two members of Kino Kolo Notts: a community cinema spotlighting Eastern European films for East Midlands audiences.
from venturing? What areas are lost to us? And how much do our spaces actually benefit residents?
Whether it be Nottingham Forest Women’s team making their new home at the Forest Ground (p. 29), poet Panya Banjoko creating the Nottingham Black Archive to record Black history and voices (p. 28), or Ant Daykin’s explorations of lost industrial heritage in the Nottinghamshire countryside (p. 22), we’ve merely scratched the surface of this fascinating topic.
I hope as you read this compilation of articles and interviews, it will spur some questions in your own minds as you wander our city streets and countryside. How can we contribute to our spaces, what can we create, and when do we need to stand our ground?
Until next time,
Sophie Gargett
“This is what I miss about Down South - they sell vapes in the toilets there.”
“She definitely sells mamba to (Manchildren.”pointing at me)
“Don’t mek us a Yorkshire tea. Meks me tung gu rate furreh.”
“Have you heard there's an open casket call for the new Harry Potter?”
“You can't just burp and then keep on talking where you left off”
"This is the Pierre of the resistance."
Child 1: “If you don’t brush your teeth, they’ll go black or Childgold.” 2: “Gold?!” Child 1: “Yep. There’s someone in Year 1 with a gold tooth.”
Pick Six
For this month’s Pick Six we turned to comedian Katie Mitchell, who will be performing her show Spine Hygiene at Nottingham Comedy Festival on Saturday 9 November @katiezoemitchell
Passerby to builder: “Are you building new builds, then?”
"Go hard, then go home."
In the ladies loo: "I can see little eyeballs... What's going off?"
“He can't be 60, he's talking about beef Monster Munch.”
Historical Figure
So I can get my goth points by bringing up Big Boy Byron, but my favourite historical figure is still with us. I love The Lion King. You may witness him on any given Saturday, sitting proud and delighted on the Left Lion itself. Flowing is his beer, silver plastic is his crown and cane. I’ve never understood a word bellowed from above, yet it assures me that a city is a collection of unique people, not chains and coffee shops.
Notts Spot
My favourite place - and this is ephemeral and selfish - is Club Wormhole. The Arboretum is gorgeous and full of memories, but it’s also full of strangers and weed smoke where my friends used to be. Covid hit right after uni, and I had a break-up right after lockdown. Nottingham wasn’t home anymore, just somewhere two hours from everywhere else. Rosa and Lee built us a gang of silly, clowny, alt-comedy weirdos and I feel my roots in Nottingham again.
Notts Nosh
If you cracked open my soul like an egg, at a molecular level it would be made of the Vegan Tan Tan at Everyday People. I’ve tried to replicate it at home, I’ve thought about it in dreams, and I frequently use it as a large carrot to force myself to do unpleasant tasks like cleaning, taxes, or learning my own jokes. It is creamy, spicy, wholesome and wonderful.
By saying ‘without further ado’, you just further adooed a little
Computer Game
Many years ago, a boyfriend bought me Morrowind - I was trying to quit World of Warcraft cold turkey, as my addiction to the Legion-era Frost Mage was ruining my studies. WoW is a fantasy game from 2003 where everyone hates you. Morrowind is a fantasy game from 2003 where everyone hates you. The switch was clean and allconsuming. I’ve not come across a story so rich, an aesthetic so unique, game systems so indepth. The combat mechanics, of course, are rubbish.
Book
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin, is a platonic love story about two friends who make video games together, charting their creative, personal, tumultuous lives as they climb their industry and tear themselves apart, and rescue each other time and time again. I fell in love with my girlfriend when we were writing a sitcom together, and I started in comedy at eighteen, surrounded by men twice my age. It feels so tailored for me I’m scared of people reading it.
Film
Everything Everywhere All At
Once is such a perfect blend of everything I want to make artistically - it brings absurdity, physicality, comedy, families, grief, belonging, fear, kindness, all at once. It’s so effing fun as well. And good! It juggles it all. It breaks my heart and heals it, and that’s only the hotdog fingers. It’s the benchmark for all I want to achieve.
words: Dani Bacon
Poets Corner
The Magpie and The Sale
In association with
With the lightness of dawn delayed, magpie awaits, her rattling calls one, for sorrow. Window ajar, she taps her message on the salt cellar, discharging stinging shrapnel-like specks, over my shoulder, dissolving the left behind. Gaining ground, with fateful trepidation, the cracks begin to grow.
by Sarah Wheatley Q]@sarah_poetcreative
nottinghampoetryfestival.com
UNDERCOVER ARTIST
This month’s cover artist Jenny Mure talks about drawing Ned Ludd, life as a comics artist and getting inspiration from myth and folklore.
Tell us a bit about yourself… I'm an illustrator and comic artist working mainly on sci-fi and fantasy work, and character design. I grew up in Mansfield, went to uni in London, and then found myself back in Notts, where I share an artist studio with some mates in Hockley.
What is the story behind the cover?
I was really stoked when the folks at LeftLion approached me about doing a Ned Ludd piece! Initially I thought about imagining a modern day look for Ned, but I ultimately ditched that, as I wanted him to be recognisable, and there was something powerful about a folkloric figure out of time encouraging the rebels of today. The items that the hands are holding are supposed to represent the tools people can use to get their message out; a phone broadcasting the scene, a spray can to spread a message with the city as a canvas, and the placard is probably obvious! I'd been stuck for a background but they wanted to keep a burning lace mill from the history of the Luddite movement and that really tied the whole thing together. The colours came from a photo of a vivid sunset over the Market Square I took some time last year.
What inspires you as an artist?
Nottingham’s most opinionated grocers on...
The burning of Nottingham Castle in 1831
Was that about? Not being able to vote I suppose… As we keep saying, women got the vote a hundred years ago, but the common man only got it in the parliament before, so there weren’t any free men really if you were poor. One of our customers, her father worked for the Le Marchants who owned Colston Bassett Hall and all the land around it. If you worked for them it was on the verge of slave labour, and when her father died they had a fortnight to get out because it was a tied cottage. And this was in the 60s, so not that long ago.
Forest Women
We thought they already were a professional team. But Notts County Women's were just as good. Didn’t they have four England players at one point? They disbanded when the new owners took over unfortunately. Maybe they could do a collaborationa joint Nottingham women’s team. Years ago in the 60s they wanted to have a shared ground for both teams on Holme Pierrepont because they can’t play on the same day as the police can’t cope with it.
Raves I tell you what, we were on the way to Southwold a couple of years ago and there was a rave going on. The police had cornered the whole lane off and the traffic was snarled up just because some kids wanted to play some loud music in a barn. We don’t know what all the fuss is about, as long as there’s no trouble of course and they don’t get too excited on the alcohol. It’s just dancing in a field. But the sound is always poor if there’s a wind. Anyway I’m allergic to wasps so I’m not going to go to one.
I take a lot of inspiration from mythology and folklore from all over the place! I'm especially fond of stories that are smaller in scope, or from worlds that don't really exist anymore, whether that be an Arthurian tale or a story from working on the railroad in the early American west. I grew up in a pretty creative family of illustrators and poets, and my dad loves to play folk tunes (often the more darkly comedic the better!) so I think I have that to thank for a lot of my creativity.
Tell us about some things you’ve worked on in the past…
A couple of years ago I put together a comic anthology called Badlands with a group of about eleven other artists. I gave everyone the word ‘badlands’ as a theme, a limit of two to twelve pages to work in, and waited to see what they came up with. It was a lot of fun and we got a bonkers mix of stories; from the tale of a tragic office worker who believes he's a cowboy, a pair of knights looking for their friend in a nuclear wasteland, to the worst Megabus journey of the apocalypse. It was really good fun and I'd love to put another one together when I can find the time.
Do you have any tricks for getting started and staying inspired as a creative?
I guess it feels obvious to say but surround yourself with the kind of wonderful, singular art that makes you excited to make something. The stuff that lights you up and you could talk at any moderately willing victim for hours on end. Don't let yourself fall into the trap of thinking creatives are a ruler to measure yourself against, we're all our own beautiful little weirdos with ideas inside that only we can bring into the world.
If you could sit down and chat with any artist in your field, who would it be and what would you talk about?
I think Taiyo Matsumoto, he's a manga artist who's worked in a wide range of genres. His artwork has this amazing energy to it that you can just feel off the page (seriously check out Ping Pong if you get a chance, it's bonkers) and he's got a real compassion for all the characters he creates. I think I'd want to talk about how you get so into a character's head, but realistically comic artists are sad sacks and we'd probably end up talking about pens for a good chunk of that time.
Is there anything else you’d like to tell the LeftLion readers?
I'll be selling comics at the Thought Bubble festival in Harrogate on 16-17 November. It's a really great weekend, so if it hasn't happened by the time you're reading this I'd definitely recommend popping up if you've got even the faintest interest in cool indie comics, and hopefully I'll have a new book out by then too!
@slowedmountains
Nadia on...
protest
Nottingham, the Rebel City, is known for its spirit of protest. From the Luddites, a group of local textile-workers who protested against wage reductions in the 19th century, to the anti-racist protests during this summer, our local communities have always been vocal in standing up to injustice. But protest is not just about raising voices; it’s also about physically taking up space to demand visibility and acknowledgment. Yet our rights to do so were seriously eroded under the Conservatives. So much so that last year, the UK was downgraded in freedom rankings as a result of the previous governments’ ‘increasingly authoritarian’ drive. Now, the new Labour government has the opportunity to reverse this.
In 2022, the Tories passed the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act, which gave the police unlimited power to restrict protests and marches. In 2023, the introduction of the Public Order Act and Serious Disruption Regulations meant that the police could impose restrictions on almost any demonstration it deemed ‘seriously disruptive’.
This isn’t right. Protest is meant to be disruptive. It’s about asserting the right to be seen and refusing to be sidelined. Protest is often the last port of call, after all other avenues of resistance have been exhausted.
These new laws have had a chilling effect on our democracy. Activists and organisers now face the constant threat of arrest and legal repercussions, even for peaceful demonstrations and especially since people can technically be prosecuted if their protest unintentionally veers outside of an approved route or timing. Non-violent climate protesters have been jailed for up to five years for attending a Zoom call. The vague definitions of ‘serious disruption’ allow authorities to stifle dissent arbitrarily, targeting gatherings that question or criticise government actions. No one should have that kind of unchecked power.
This culture of fear can stop people from participating in protest and exercising their democratic rights. A recent survey found that 94% of campaigners across the country said there were threats to the freedom to organise, contribute to public debate, influence political decisions or protest. In a democratic society, the ability to advocate for change is vital. It’s how activists of the past won rights we now take for granted – women’s right to vote, the minimum wage, the end of the apartheid in South Africa, and same sex marriage.
When the freedom to protest and express dissent is curtailed, there are fewer checks on those in power, increasing the likelihood of policies that may harm vulnerable groups and even violate human rights. From speaking out on unsafe conditions in a workplace to demanding climate action from relevant public bodies and private companies, the right to take up space and protest improves accountability and empowers individuals to drive meaningful change. What kind of city would Nottingham be without its radical history of protest?
We can’t build an inclusive and progressive society without processes for accountability and justice. Protest is foundational to both
If people can’t voice their grievances or oppose decisions that harm them, the very fabric of public trust begins to unravel. Communities are weakened, resulting in lower civic-engagement. The silencing of dissent doesn’t just stifle individual voices – it drives a wedge between citizens and their government, creating a disconnect that provides fertile ground for authoritarianism to take root. A country with a weakened democracy is also more susceptible to harmful external influences such as foreign interference in elections and the spread of disinformation. We can’t build an inclusive and progressive society without processes for accountability and justice. Protest is foundational to both.
The new government now has the responsibility to reverse these authoritarian measures introduced by the Conservatives and strengthen our democracy. Peaceful mass demonstrations, which form a big part of our local and national history, should always be permitted. Labour promised change when it was elected to form a government, and restoring our hard-earned individual freedoms must surely be a part of that agenda.
nadiawhittome.org
words: Nadia Whittome photo: Fabrice Gagos
words: Caradoc Gayer
Notts Resi-story
Many of us are familiar with Nottingham’s history as Britain’s resident ‘rebel city’. When it comes to standing up to authority or challenging the status quo, few locations across the nation have done it quite as well as we have. However, what’s sometimes overlooked are the sites across Notts that give rise to these rebellions: those shrouded in the mists of myth or legend and those well documented and grounded in history. In the lead-up to our November issue, we at LeftLion were set wondering about these places, so decided to provide a rundown of important sites of resistance in-and-around Notts.
Sherwood Forest
We all know the age-old tale of Robin Hood and his Merry Men, who waylaid rich travellers and gave back to the poor, likely some time in the mid-twelfth century. It’s a timeless story that continues to remind us that unequal distribution of wealth is a problem that’s long plagued society.
What’s not often focused on however, are the social conditions that likely gave rise to that legend. During the twelfth century, just about one fifth of Nottinghamshire was covered by woodland, which meant that there was lots of common land for use by common folk, outlaw or otherwise. It wasn’t until Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries, that former religious locales like Newstead and Rufford Abbey fell into the hands of landed gentry.
The gentry in turn transformed the surrounding land into carefully cultivated parklands and gardens, which forever changed surrounding nature and alleviated most fears about hostile outlaws in the English Countryside. Perhaps it’s worth thinking of the Robin Hood story as representative of a time when wild, lawless spaces were of equal use to anyone who engaged with them, facilitating the rebellion of that mythic man in green.
The Lace Mills
Many of us have heard of the Luddites, those disgruntled skilled lace-workers who in early 19th century Nottingham, rejected the onset of wider, lace-making frames, set to put them out of a job, by congregating under cover of darkness, smashing up the frames then fleeing from the law away into the night. For many, this pivotal moment in Notts history signifies a brief uprising in favour of the rights of the individual over the onset of technology: workers standing up for their artistic integrity.
This rebellion occurred in midst of huge technological advancement in 19th century Britain, as well as economic downturn which had happened as a result of the Napoleonic War. Economic issues had already negatively affected working conditions, and with the prospect of their replacement by poorly paid, low skilled workers to operate these wider frames, the ‘Luddites’ sought to negotiate better pay and the introduction of new labour standards.
It was only when negotiations broke down that these groups turned to vandalism and sabotage. What’s more, their predictions about the Industrial Revolution turned out to be very much correct: poor pay and low quality working conditions became an issue characteristic of the Victorian Era, that people like Charles Dickens advocated to change. Still today, the story of the Luddites reminds us to ensure the challenges of that time aren’t recreated, by keeping worker and artist rights at the forefront of our minds.
Nottingham Castle
The castle overlooking the city centre has gone through many changes, and seen many rebellions over the centuries. The English Civil War, for example, saw Nottingham set up as a Parliamentarian stronghold against the armies of King Charles I, at the centre of which was Nottingham Castle. By the 1830s however, people in Nottingham had become disillusioned and frustrated with the corruption of parliament and its withholding of the right to vote from a majority of boroughs. This of course led to the most notorious act of protest in our city’s history: the burning of the Castle on the night of 10 October 1831, after which, it is supposed, the people of Nottingham took over the empty grounds to use as allotment space to grow food.
Today of course, the castle has been revived as more of a museum: a mish-mash of Robin Hood related installations, art, sculpture, Nottingham history displays, and even a ‘rebellion gallery’ which relates the burning down of the castle: a relatively meta turn of events in our opinion. Heading over there and enjoying what the site has to offer, puts us in mind of how cities are affected and changed by their rebellions: they’re often rebuilt, or remodelled with a strong consciousness of the social issues that mattered to the people protesting.
City Centre Pubs
The cultural hotspots in our city centre have seen their own types of rebellion, often those enacted in paper and ink by forward-thinking writers and thinkers that have congregated at pubs. The Peacock Pub at Mansfield Road is one, reputed to be the favoured haunt of DH Lawrence, the 1920s writer and firebrand critic of just about everything about post-industrial UK society. Some rumours say that Lawrence penned part of his novel The White Peacock, under those rafters: a story that explores the tragedy of mismatched marriages.
Another site of literary rebellion is rumoured to be (what was once known as) The Old Angel Pub, which was frequented by Lawrence’s successor in the line of rebellious Notts writers Alan Sillitoe, whose writing made a stand against the systems of 1950s Britain and lack of opportunity for working class people. Sillitoe’s famed novel: Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, is one of the best examples of this, a vivid depiction of working class life in post war Notts, from the working men’s clubs to the bicycle factories. Sillitoe would no doubt have got lots of inspiration for the story from taking in the hubbub of Notts life at his favourite watering holes.
Thinking back on the literary awakenings of Sillitoe and Lawrence, the importance of keeping our grassroots, cultural venues alive and funded comes to mind. Today, there’s no shortage of writers and thinkers that congregate in our city centre’s cultural hotspots, but if those hotspots start going under without the capacity for us to revive them, then who knows when we’ll get the next great Notts literary rebel?
Concrete Jumble
A pertinent question is being asked across the country: what to do about the once busy city centres now rife with empty buildings? Bereft of the bustle, and with a derelict shopping centre to boot, Sophie Gargett explores how Nottingham could reinvent itself ready for an ever-evolving future.
When the Broadmarsh Shopping Centre was built just fifty years ago, the idea that in a mere number of decades it would sit in ruins was pretty much unthinkable to local people. For city planners of the 1970s, an era of brutal redevelopment, the gargoyles and gables of the Victorian times were out. Deemed unfit for a modern city, the tight winding roads and crowded buildings of Drury Hill and the wider Broad Marsh quarter had given way for a concrete monolith of commerce. Historic conservation and how cities might operate far in the future was a problem for another time. This was the future. In an age of space races, early sci-fi and progressive liberation movements, the excitement of modernity led to streamline design and a stripping away of the past, and Nottingham was not immune.
It’s easy to see how the craze for shopping malls caught on. During its early years, the Broadmarsh Centre was the first of its kind in Nottingham - the destination of the day, offering ease and variety, much like the internet does today. Shoppers hungry for novelty and cosmopolitan goods could find fashion and furniture at British Home Stores, try American-style fast food at Wimpy, and pick up the latest electrical mod cons at Currys, all under one roof, out of the way of the precarious British weather.
Fifty years later, faced with its demise, the derelict Broadmarsh is now a symbol of changing times, reminding us that most things will move on and even the most familiar and well loved high street brands are susceptible to falling. Nottingham is certainly not unique in this aspect - throughout the UK, COVID lockdowns, the boom of online shopping, rising rents and market dominance from monopolies such as Amazon have made the sturdy tradition of bricks and mortar retail incredibly difficult. The past five years saw Britain lose 6,000 retail outlets according to the British Retail Consortium. Like old friends passing away, the loss of brands like Woolworths, Topshop, Debenhams, and most recently Wilkos (RIP) exemplify how the high street has begun to crumble before our eyes. And while empty single units are perhaps easier to fill, the question of what we do with our shopping centres is still one to figure out.
Surprisingly, the first shopping centre in England still exists today. Dating back to the sixteenth century, The Royal Exchange, situated near Bank in London, was opened by Queen Elizabeth I herself. Featuring Corinthian columns and stone friezes, it is worlds apart from the sprawling modern mortar structures we are familiar with, and despite having seen its own destruction a couple of times throughout the centuries, it has been lovingly rebuilt with the same craftsmanship and pride of its first structure. Would modern architecture, purely focussed
on frugality and function over historic grandeur or longevity, receive the same treatment?
And so, as many agree, city planners of the 1970s have a lot to answer for. Many in Nottingham still comment with ire on the demolition of The Black Boy Hotel, Long Row’s intricate Watson Fothergill building which was replaced by the concrete eyesore that now houses Primark. But with those architects gone before they could answer for their crimes, there’s little use in looking back in anger. Instead, we need to peer into tomorrow and work out what our cities need, both now and in the future.
With those architects gone before they could answer for their crimes, there’s little use in looking back in anger. Instead, we need to peer into tomorrow and work out what our cities need, both now and in the future
As councils and landlords desperately try to come up with ways to fill our empty city spaces, the need for investment is, of course, a constant elephant in the room. Nottingham has received about £100 million less each year from central government over the past ten years, so while we wait for a fabled wealthy benefactor to look upon Nottingham with sympathy, perhaps it’s worth identifying renovation and regeneration that has worked in the past, in both Nottingham and beyond.
Over the past fifteen years, Nottingham resident Rob Howie Smith successfully transformed a number of dilapidated buildings into creative spaces in the city through The Howie Smith Project. These once-empty buildings include much loved spots such as Five Leaves Bookshop, City Arts, The Arts Org (now Hopkinson’s Vintage, Antiques and Arts Centre), and The Writer’s Studio (now The Carousel).
Rob’s approach to combat empty spaces follows what he calls ‘meanwhile’ use - getting people in - most often creatives and small businesses - allowing them to work with relatively affordable rent, whilst also demonstrating how the space can be used.
When the Council called for ideas on what to do with the Broadmarsh area, Rob’s suggestion followed the approach taken by Boxpark, the world’s first pop-up shopping mall in Shoreditch, London, which has now taken over spaces
in seven other spots, from Birmingham to Bristol. Combining independent traders in fashion, arts, food and drinks with regular events, these small scale units, created from shipping containers, allow an adaptable space for start-ups that can be dismantled or rejigged according to what is needed at the time, along with offering flexible rental contracts that range from one week to three months.
“If you create something which you can then move, you can take it somewhere else when you’re ready to use that space when you have the funding,” says Rob. “You can look at lots of other models in the country - containers being used, yurts, timber structures, you have open spaces for performance, weekly pop-ups etc.”
An idea built on the premise that cities are ever-evolving, it also recognises the value of artistic communities, who are traditionally adaptable, creative and well-versed in making a lot out of very little.
Over in Budapest, Hungary, the trend of ‘ruin bars’ has reinvigorated the once crumbling Jewish quarter. In overgrown courtyards and run down tenements, these multi-use spaces are chaotic and creative, with pop-up libraries, markets and workshops throughout the day and DJs and live music in the evening. Most definitely a mark of the people living there, they’ve also gained a reputation for attracting tourists from across the world.
The concept of ‘meanwhile space’ can however be a double edged sword. In most cases these creative ‘bohemias’ created by artists, such as Soho or New York’s Greenwich Village, inadvertently lead to gentrification and subsequent higher costs.
“We’re very aware of gentrification, and we can’t stop it,” says Rob. “If it costs £100,000 to make a building workable again, you’ve got to make that £100,000 back. But we slowed it down by using those buildings in the interim when the costs weren’t so high. If a landlord was saying ‘I’m not able to rent my space, I don’t know what to do with it’, then we were saying, ‘Well we do.’”
Whether what worked in cities like London or Budapest can be successful in Nottingham is of course a gamble, but the traditional format of department stores, shopping centres and big retail is unlikely to come back any time soon. What is clear to see is that we need to rethink our urban jungles, create cities of the future that work for the people who live in them, rather than the faceless corporations and landlords who offer little more than empty space.
words: Sophie Gargett
illustration: Veronica Nilsson
House & Proud
Being home to two of the UK’s greatest underground house sound-systems, DiY and Smokescreen, Nottingham has been spoilt for quality deep house music - but what were the origins of these now legendary gatherings, and how did they fit into the politics of the time? We asked the individuals who lived out those joyful days firsthand about the history of sound-systems in Nottinghamshire and beyond.
“You can’t choose your family, but you can with a soundsystem,” says Smokescreen Soundsystem founding member Laurence Ritchie. “Some would liken it to spirituality. We’ve become like a phonic family, a sonic commune that grows stronger over the years. It’s so much more than the sum of the parties.”
Two years after DiY Soundsytem was formed in 1989, another collective of like-minded friends was beginning to form in Sheffield, all outsiders to the city, looking for a welcoming space where they could enjoy their music peacefully. Influenced by the spirit of 1991, they decided to ‘do it themselves’ and started holding parties on a hill above the city. At first they struggled to find DJs and equipment, but it eventually came together with ease. It was when they saw DiY’s Simon DK heading up the hill towards them with his records that they decided to buy their own PA.
A huge collective of people helped, flowing in a steady organic stream, with some like Giddy Fruit DJ Gav joining the collective by quiet passion and persistence: “I hung around with my record bag for long enough and eventually they let me play,” he explains.
The crew went on to be one of the UK’s busiest, putting on a near-weekly party from 1993-4. “We had an inclusive, noncliquey vibe and welcomed anyone who wasn’t an arsehole,” said Max Heath. A larger crew gradually formed as Fran, Rob, Andy, Tubby, Steve, Max and Gav joined founding members Vicki, Laurence, Jon, Martin and their ever-growing team of helpers. After putting on solo and link-up parties all over the country, they eventually moved their base to Nottingham in 1997.
Like pioneering old-skool sound-systems like Spiral Tribe, Circus Warp, Bedlam, Lazyhouse, Exodus, DiY, Tonka, Pulse, Sweat, Techno Travellers and the Free Party People, Smokescreen wanted a better world, and for a moment they glimpsed one. Embracing a completely alternative way of life, they provided a joyful escape from the bleak existence of Thatcherite 80s Britain and Major’s 90s. The early days felt utopian - almost revolutionary. Inevitably, they weren’t allowed to continue unhindered.
Smokescreen joined All Systems No, a non-hierarchical collective of soundsystems envisioned by Alan (Tash) Lodge to raise funds to fight the Criminal Justice and Public Order Bill (CJB) of 1994, clause 63 of which would criminalise gatherings of six or more people accompanied by “sounds wholly or predominantly characterised by the emission of a succession of repetitive beats.”
The collective funded coachloads of Nottingham’s protestors to demonstrate against the CJB in London, as well as a van and a side loader lorry packed with DiY’s PA, ready for them
and Smokescreen to play. Around 50,000 people protested, including The Shamen’s Mr C, who jumped onto their lorry, took the mic and in a surreal moment started rapping to the crowd.
The first two protests had a festive feel at Trafalgar Square and on the march to Hyde Park. The last one took a much darker turn, with mounted police attacking and dispersing crowds. Shortly after, the 1994 Bill became an Act, but it didn’t stop the free party movement. The fundraising collective defiantly became All Systems Go.
“I think there was definitely a transition from naive idealism to a more political stance post-Castlemorton,” says Andy Riley. “All of a sudden dancing in a field felt political. When you have the long arm of the law encroaching on your life just because you want to go to a party, you become politicised by default. To be honest, we didn’t get into too much trouble post-CJA because our parties were relatively small and we took time to choose locations that wouldn’t piss people off.”
When you have the long arm of the law encroaching on your life just because you want to go to a party, you become politicised by default
They’ve adapted to survive. So today, when you go to their night at the Hidden Warehouse, whether you know it or not, you’re joining the tail end of three decades of defiant rebellion.
Smokescreen put on a now-legendary campout to celebrate their thirtieth birthday in 2021. “We recreated our natural habitat: friends and vehicles in a field with house music. Only this time we had a licence!” grins Steve Lee, now director of youth music education outfit Fast Forward: Direction Thru Music.
The events Smokescreen and DiY put on create what Hakim Bey terms ‘temporary autonomous zones’, pop-up moments and spaces that defy the normalising authority of social conditioning. Self-organising collective efforts like Smokescreen’s parties create utopian ruptures in the fabric of day-to-day reality. The space Smokescreen offers is therapeutic, giving people agency, enabling them to find themselves, re-energise, reconnect, forget their troubles and dance.
The culture’s peaceful, caring vibe was the opposite of the drunken violence plaguing the city centres. “Instead of being
tribal, suddenly everyone was being inclusive,” explains DJ Rockin’ Rob.
“A lot of people changed,” continues Laurence. “It was a form of therapy because they could all just be themselves.”
In September 1996 the group travelled to war-torn Bosnia, coincidentally bumping into Desert Storm Soundsystem, who were on the return leg of an aid and party expedition, at a famous punk squat in Slovenia’s capital Ljubljana. Matthew Collin, author of Altered State, travelled with them to document the journey.
“We teamed up with other soundsystems and organised with pro-environment direct action movement Reclaim The Streets for Nottingham’s own protest in ‘97,” says Mark Francis, known as Fran. “The plan was delivered with precision,” he continues. “Derby Road ended up getting blocked off for the whole of Saturday afternoon, decks on the ground, PA pumping, people dancing and chalk-drawing on the streets.”
In its time, Smokescreen travelled extensively; it was the first soundsystem to provide an oasis of house music at the Czech Teknival in 1997. “Czech Tek was only two years after the revolution there, it was an incredible experience,” said Rob. “It was just another level. The vibe was amazing. People had never heard tunes like it before, they loved it.”
Gav created an offshoot of the scene when he moved to New Zealand in 2015 after meeting his future wife while on tour out there with Steve as The Littlemen. They were also involved in the last few anarchic Travellers’ field parties outside Glastonbury festival in ’98 to 2000.
Many of Smokescreen have had successful international DJing and production careers. Those who know their house music will be familiar with production duos The Littlemen and Inland Knights, as well as labels Mobile Trax and Drop Music.
Overall they’ve offered peace, love and unity, bringing together and inspiring people from all over the UK and beyond, connected by a passion for music and dancing. Not a bad culture to build and inspire.
“Loads of people got connected through it,” says Steve. “People got together and had families, our kids grow up to be part of it, everyone feels safe and we’re all still together, still going strong. There must be something in that.”
To read more about the history of Smokescreen Soundsystem, look out for an extended version of this article on the LeftLion website. To follow Smokescreen Soundsystem, head to their Facebook page of the same name.
The Smokescreen lorry flanked by police during the anti-CJB march in London, 1994. [Matt Smith]
Crich Quarry party [Gary Pfeiffer]
Castlemorton Common, May 1992 [Alan Tash Lodge]
‘Battle of Hyde Park’: an anti-CJB protest in 1994 with the Smokescreen and DiY side loader lorry [Matt Smith]
Steve at Reclaim The Streets on Derby Road, 1997 [Alan Tash Lodge]
Smokescreen Club Night. Sept 1992 [Alan Tash Lodge]
Director's Seat
Shane Meadows is a legend of British film and television. In the mid-90s he was making lots of short films around Nottingham before releasing his debut feature TwentyFourSeven in 1997. Since then he’s gone on to create masterpieces like A Room For Romeo Brass, Dead Man’s Shoes, This Is England, Gallows Pole, The Stone Roses: Made of Stone and more.
Shane joined us for the fifth instalment of LeftLion Live at the Library, a series of live interviews that we’ve been hosting since July at Nottingham Central Library. In front of a live audience, LeftLion Editor-in-Chief Jared Wilson chatted to Shane about his illustrious career, covering everything from the Nottingham Television Workshop to Notts County FC. Here we’ve treated you to a snapshot of the conversation, which is available in full for your auditory pleasure on Spotify, YouTube and Apple Podcasts.
When writing, you often use the word ‘scriptment’. Could you explain a bit about that in relation to your process?
Yeah, so a scriptment is basically the compromise I’ve made with the world at large, as it’s a working document. During This is England, so much changed as we were making it; when some of the executive producers came to see the film, what was written on the script was that there was a big fight on a beach at the end. It was meant to be a microcosm of England at large, but they were expecting a big Quadrophenia mods and rockers fight.
What I learned from that was that when I deliver these scripts, people are disappointed because they don’t get what they thought they were getting. Scriptments fill this neat little hole where they get a sense of what’s coming, but you haven’t filled in every single colour. I often say that if you want a finished script, you should buy a book because these are just starting points.
Scriptments will have lots of images. I’ll create Spotify playlists, there’ll be character breakdowns, a tagline, a log-line, photographs … there’ll be thirty to forty different pages: half the size of a script. It’s a bit more immersive. For Gallows Pole, it didn’t really work, because improvisation in the 1700s is quite tricky! If ‘that’ pub doesn’t work, you can’t just go to the Wetherspoons up the road, you’ve got to build one.
What they do with improvisation I’ve never seen anywhere else on the planet, let alone in the UK
Gallows Pole seemed like quite a change in your work. Obviously, there’s a lot of ‘you’ in your work. Gallows Pole was the first thing not set in the 20th century and it’s an adaptation of someone else’s book. What was it that led you to want to make that?
When I made The Virtues, it was probably the most personal thing I’d done up until that point. After that, there was the sense of a full stop to some degree. I kind of needed a break from the autobiographical thing. When I got the book, I loved the fact that the main character was basically Robin Hood. You can’t really prove that Robin Hood existed, but not much further up in Yorkshire in the 18th Century there was a guy who was taking gold coins [at a time] when there were about 237 things you could be hung for, all to stop you just wandering around freely on people’s land. I was really taken by that. You worked with Michael Socha in the Gallows Pole. Tell us a little bit about his qualities as an actor and what he brought to that part.
The sad thing about Gallows is that we only got three episodes in, before COVID took us down a bit at the end. The first series was meant to end with this guy who’s been a bad man, but is trying to be
spiritually better and give back to the community, before he comes out of retirement as a bad guy again. A lot of people who auditioned saw this guy as a Heathcliffe type-of-character, but I kept saying to Michael, ‘We’ve seen that a million times: the Robin Hood thing, the Braveheart character, leading an army.’
I love the idea of a guy who is as hard as nails but isn’t so good at talking. Michael was really honest and said ‘I’ve never played a character like this’, but I thought it was really interesting to investigate that. I loved the idea of Michael bringing a softness and a comedy, so that when it got to the moments where the character actually changed, you see who he was and what he could be. Michael was nervous about those big moments, but I thought that was a nice way in.
Michael’s also one of many actors that you discovered through Nottingham Television Workshop. About a third of this audience are probably from the Television Workshop, but for the other two thirds, can you tell us what it is, and why it’s important to both you and Nottingham?
I was at a fundraiser last night, which brought home a fact that I never really realised: they had no funding whatsoever. The principle behind the Workshop, fundamentally, is training actors irrelevant of their financial situation. With no funding, it’s hard to make that viable, because if the people in your classes are from backgrounds where they’ve got no money, they’ve got limited funds. That ethos struck a chord with me, because I was given similar opportunities.
For Twenty FourSeven, I went to London, where I did some auditions and went to a couple of different drama schools. I didn’t realise at the time, but I look back now and realise that I wasn’t finding the right kind of people. I was almost thinking ‘maybe we’ll cast that guy we saw in Watford’, but then I went into the Workshop, and it was like night and day. You gave them a script and a scene, and the gang that I got introduced to, everyone in that audition was in the film the same day. That was because they’d all grown up together in the Workshop: they start at eight or nine years old, and some of them stop at 21.
What they do with improvisation: I’ve never seen that anywhere else on the planet, let alone in the UK. Going from making these crazy improvised short films for the cost of a tape, to walking on set with Bob Hoskins, for a film costing a million and a half quid, with people sawing wood on set and making things… I don’t think I would have made it through that job if they hadn’t been there with me. When I went back for Romeo Brass I didn’t go searching the country, I started in Nottingham, and I start in Nottingham every single time I need people in that age group. I owe a great deal to the Workshop.
To grab your (free) tickets for our live interview with actress Chanel Cresswell on 6 December, head over to leftlion.co.uk/library
interview: Jared Wilson photos: Natalie Owen
NOTTS SHOTS
Want to have your work featured in Notts Shots? Send your high-res photos from around the city (including your full name and best web link) to photography@leftlion.co.uk or tag #nottsshots on Instagram.
Aurora Over Attenborough
Erin Softley
Playhouse Lights
Sam Williams
Market Circle Isaac Bertulis-Webb
When it Rains...
Zoe Swift
A Fair View
Charleigh Keemer (Echo Mountain Photography)
Art Fest on Film
Charlie Hindhaugh
Pete Doherty at The Grove @Natalieowenphotography
Out in the sticks
Bulwell’s Ant Daykin has accumulated nearly thirty thousand followers by posting category-evading content on his YouTube channel: Trekking Exploration. Having spent days exploring derelict, industrial sites in-and-around the Peak District and abandoned corners of towns between Derby and Notts, there are few people as familiar with East Midlands industrial history as he is. We met Ant to chat about hiking, history and his feelings about our innate ‘right to roam’ in the country and town.
Ant Daykin isn’t just your typical urban explorer. While the label encompasses people who explore derelict spaces in-and-about cities and Ant, without a doubt, is an enthusiast for urban history, he spends far more time in the Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire countryside than in the city, investigating those strange, liminal spaces where industrial heritage and rural life collide.
“I’ve always had a fascination with canals and narrowboats,” he says, recounting the origins of his popular YouTube channel: Trekking Exploration “While walking canals I found an abandoned railway and followed it through instinct. I ended up somewhere between Ilkeston and Derby. That led to exploring more places, like old tunnels, buildings, and Peak District reservoirs that went dry a few summers ago. I’m like a fisherman latching onto things with a rod, thinking ‘oh that sounds good’.”
On his channel, currently sporting 28,000 subscribers and nearly 400 videos, Ant intricately maps out the industrial heritage of Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire. From railways, to mines, to water towers, to mills, there are very few post-19th century historical tidbits, in-and-around the Peak District, that he hasn’t covered online.
“Lots of things do get forgotten about. The Old Bulwell Hall; a lot of people didn’t know it was there. It’s Grade Two Listed but has been left to fall down. Lots of history gets bulldozed in the city too, which is sad. Lots of the places that I share are right under the noses of people who’ve lived there for thirty years, who say to me, ‘I always wondered what that bit of land was for’. You will eventually get a generation who won’t even know what a coal mine was, but I suppose that what I do keeps it alive in some form.”
Hiking, trekking, exploration, whichever word we prefer: they’re by no means unpopular hobbies. In November 2020, a quarter of Brits described themselves as hikers, probably a result of lockdown during which we got a renewed appreciation
for getting into the great outdoors. Even in January 2024, there were 84 million uses of the ‘hiking’ hashtag on social media. Ant however sets himself apart by doing what many people probably wish they had the time to do: following his nose, taking as much time as he needs to investigate the landmarks he encounters, and weaving stories in video form about a Britain that’s fast fading into the annals of history.
You will eventually get a generation who won’t even know what a coal mine was, but I suppose that what I do keeps it alive in some form
“At the Ladybower reservoir I found three openings to tunnels in the hillside,” he says. “My friend that knows about Derbyshire history told me that they topped up Ladybower and the other Derwent reservoirs by pinching water out of rivers. One tunnel goes towards Castleton, the other towards Edale, both going under popular hills like Win Hill and Mam Tor, but nobody knew that they were there. There were railway tracks outside one, and nobody knew what they were for. I eventually figured out that they’d dug out these tunnels with little industrial trains that carried out the rubble. I went back with a metal detector and followed the route for about a half mile, and found all the rails buried under soil and grass.”
In an ideal world we’d all have the chance to make historical discoveries like this, but unfortunately most of our countryside and city history is barred from us. Still today, much of the discourse on hiking and trekking is centred on the public’s ‘right-to-roam’, which we aren’t always afforded. According to the ‘Right to Roam’ campaign group, the public have rightof-access to only 8% of the countryside, an issue that’s been discussed extensively in politics, and also in places like London where there’s been AGMs on an ‘urban-right-to-roam’, as cities
get more densely populated.
“There’s a lot in Nottingham I’d like to see, but there’s just so much red tape nowadays,” says Ant. You can say to people, as nice as you like, 'I'll be half an hour’ but they just don’t want you doing it. My opinion is that if they don’t officially let you into these places, then they’re just encouraging others to force their way in. People are going to do it anyway.”
Ant, we can 100% affirm, is not one of those people. With as big a platform as he has, he resolves never to access anywhere that he’s not supposed to, or explore spaces in any way that draws close to illegality.
“I’m not going to go around breaking fences and windows, because you get backlash. I sometimes see people posting themselves online in places that they really shouldn’t be. On Facebook this morning I saw three lads walking around inside the recently defunct Ratcliffe Power Station. They were showing their faces and everything, and there were lots of comments saying ‘you really shouldn’t be in there.”
Until any legislation says otherwise, we’ll have to speculate at the history of off-limits, prohibited urban spaces. For Ant, they’re nice to think about all-the-same, as there’s always hidden history around us, like the many underground caves in Notts that we of the city don’t get to see.
“A lot of the old Broadmarsh area is still there, but covered up or blocked off,” Ant says.”Mansfield Road way there’s a couple of underground quarries that were turned into World War II air raid shelters. There’s a graffitied, stone wall that’s actually an entrance into an underground sand quarry.” As the adage goes, even though we think we know our home-city like the back of our hand, there’s always new things to discover.
Follow Ant at www.youtube.com/@TrekkingExploration
words: Caradoc Gayer photos: Ant Daykin
Long live The Bodega!
Ah that special spot on 23 Pelham Street. From countless life-affirming gigs and hazy club nights inside the venue, to summer sessions outside in the quaint back alley of Cobden Chambers, The Bodega has been one of our city’s chief memory makers over the last quarter century.
Now to celebrate the iconic venue’s 25th anniversary this month, we thought we’d take a trip down memory lane with the bands, promoters and staff that have helped this space to endure as a cornerstone of our city’s vibrant music scene and nightlife, by reliving some of their favourite Bodega moments.
Ben (DHP Promoter)
“In a previous life, I was in a band named after an actor who only did extras work. We were lucky enough to support Future Of The Left at Bodega. It’s the only gig I’ve ever seen where the bass player climbed off the stage along the bar, served himself a pint, all whilst still playing note perfect - long live the diamond of Pelham Street!”
Kasper (Divorce / Do Nothing / Ex-Bodega Staff)
“My favourite memory is from a staff party - we played a huge game of hide and seek and it took so long to find everyone! We thought we’d finished it after about an hour but after another hour, someone else appeared from underneath the seating in the main bar having fallen asleep in there! They didn’t even really get to celebrate because we’d already crowned a winner – oops!”
Laura (Assistant Duty Manager)
“The Wytches’ Halloween show two years ago was literally amazing - everyone was dressed up and it was so spooky and angry. One of the best gigs I‘ve ever seen here! There’s too many to pick from over the years but some of my favourite artists that have played here and totally blown me away were Wand and The Murlocs - two that I will remember for the rest of my life!”
Georgie (Girlband! / Ex-Bodega Staff)
“I think the Girlband! headline show was pretty special, but we also did a secret set at Dot To Dot at 3am, which was mad, chaotic and wonderful. Then many personal memories with friends too, we called Bodega home because we spent more time there than our own house! Of course, working behind the bar was always vibes - it’s just the best place!”
Will (Duty Manager / Quiz Host)
“Dot To Dot 2021 - I was on the upstairs bar all day long and it was super busy. It was quite intense and there had been a couple of problems…then Drug Store Romeos came on stage with 'Vibrate' and I instantly felt at ease, like I was in a dream. Later that night, Yard Act played to a completely rammed room with energy I'd never seen from a band. In many ways, it was one of the best live shows I've ever seen.”
Mik (Bar Staff)
“I always remember my early days of The Bodega, being in the original smokers, packed like sardines. Chatting nonsense to the Priest at Pop Confessional and dancing my heart away to club classics on a Saturday. But I will always cherish the moments of meeting people that I now call my friends and seeing bands and artists like Greentea Peng, Theon Cross, Do Nothing and Divorce, the latter of which have recently smashed four sold out nights here. The Bodega has always been home to the homegrown and the hub of togetherness and community - it just makes this city a better place to live.”
Anwyn (DHP Marketing)
“My earliest memories of The Bodega are from 2010 when I was in my first year at NTU. As part of the Music Society, we always chose Electric Banana over Ocean Wednesdays as our midweek social. Soon after that, I was regularly attending and playing at the acoustic night run by Under The Tree in the downstairs bar, but my first gig experience in the actual venue (being a poor student who prioritised Bodega Lager money!) wasn’t until 2012 when I saw Kyla La Grange.
However, one of my most memorable gig experiences was seeing Frank Carter and the Rattlesnakes play to a small crowd upstairs in June 2015 - the drummer ended up in the middle of the floor for most of the show, as well as being held up with his kit above the crowd for some of it. The show was the same level of chaos even back then as has been typical of Rattlesnakes shows ever since!
Over the years, I’ve seen some of my favourite artists play some of my favourite shows at The Bodega, on top of the bar being our go to spot for post-work drinks, end of nights after every Dot To Dot and Beat The Streets festival, and first-choice destination for all major footie tournaments since the 2014 Brazil World Cup. Long live The Bodega x”
Fin (Promotions Assistant)
“Having worked at Bodega for a couple of years already, I was well versed on what a good show looked like upstairs, but Geese's show blew everything else out of the water. I was unfamiliar with their music at that point but the energy in the room and the fact that the singer looked almost identical to one of my good friends (who was jumping around in the audience) shaped it up to be the perfect introduction.”
Ella (Shift Supervisor)
“My favourite memory would be going on our staff trip to Notts County Women FC! Was so lovely being able to watch the football team we sponsor and wear our venue logo on their kit. Felt very collaborative and it was lovely being able to have a drink and chat with the team afterwards.”
Sia (Office Manager)
“The really random rider requests from bands. From a tin of pilchards, towels made into the shape of snakes, jelly moulding, winning lottery tickets…but my favourite was being asked to get 'a very small man immersed in cottage cheese.’”
Anton (DHP Director of Live)
“So many shows over so many years – the legendary ones like The Strokes and The White Stripes, but also the ones that aren’t household names but were still incredible, Song of Zarathustra and The Blood Arm for example. New bands still on the rise like The Meffs & Sprints, and the pure WTF ones such as Lewis Capaldi in the Bodega bar at Dot to Dot!
But I think I’ll go back to 11th April 2000, and the magnificent …and you will know us by the Trail of Dead’s first tour here and my first chance to experience the beautiful chaos of their live show. Fell in love and became friends with them instantly, with that night leading to many adventures. So that’s the one!”
Joe (DHP Promoter)
“We had Ezra Collective play in 2017 - even then you could tell they were something special. It wasn’t even sold-out, but the room felt amazing. Yazmin Lacey on support too! Think you’d need a much bigger venue if you put that line-up on now.”
Amelia Hope (Indie Wednesdays DJ)
“Best gigs I’ve been to at Bodega would be Sea Girls in 2021 and Wunderhorse last year! I’ve got too many good memories to pick from but DJing my first Indie Wednesdays after going to so many as a student was very special - the energy of Bodega crowds are the best in the city! I’ve met some of my favourite people ever at Bodega, so wouldn’t change it for the world.”
Sancho Panza (Artist)
“I have met so many of my best friends at The Bodega, with Sancho Panza and Wizards Can't Be Lawyers both being formed in the smoking area! My favourite gig we played was the first one back after the pandemic, 29th August 2021. It was so good to party with everyone after so long. My favourite gig I've seen at The Bodega would be The Wytches Halloween 2022 - those guys were sublime!”
Sam (Promotions Manager)
“Feel so lucky to have seen some amazing gigs and nights in these four walls over the years! It’s so cool being able to see artists go from 220 people to arenas within a few years (like Sam Fender and Easy Life), but my personal highlights were gigs from Palace, Julia Jacklin, The Big Moon, Spring King and Boy Azooga (and buying 20 Greggs sausage rolls for IDLES!). There’s nowhere else like The Bodega!”
Sonia (Resident Bar DJ)
“It was not your “normal” gig at the Bodega, I think then known as The Social. I went to see (or more accurately experience) a talk by the legendary Bill Drummond of The KLF. He had brought in a massive oil painting, a real masterpiece of work he had said! But instead of discussing it, he had decided to cut it up into sections, each of which auctioned off to those in the audience at The Social. With the objective, from what I recall, being that it shouldn’t be worth anything anymore, however it was now a shared collective prize!
I wish I had bought a piece of this puzzle for sure, but to experience this at the now Bodega is priceless as it will always stay in my memory!”
Guy (Head Engineer)
“Too many to mention but highlights include Coldplay (supporting Terris), The White Stripes, The Strokes, Scissor Sisters and finally, Conor from Bright Eyes falling off his chair mid-gig!”
Tom (Venues Promo)
“Two of my favourite memories recently are seeing The Nightingales supported by Ted Chippington in 2022 and Do Nothing as secret headliners for Dot to Dot in 2021. I'm glad we can still proudly host gigs by influential older artists and great new bands (and I'm happy Chris from Do Nothing finally got to crowdsurf here!).”
Maddy (Production Manager)
“I was in my second year at Uni here when me and my best pal, Alex Blake, decided to start a band: Cherry Hex & The Dream Church (RIP). We weren’t going to do any live shows, just remain a bedroom band in the safe enclosure of our house. But then we’d been asked by none other than The Bodega to support BORNS at his sold-out show, so we thought we had better give it a go - it was The Bodega after all and we loved it! The show was great, the crowd were amazing and after that, we got the itch. We were back the month after supporting Oscar and then a month later again supporting Let’s Eat Grandma! I 100% wouldn’t be singing in my new band Midnight Rodeo now, nor would I have worked for the good ship for the past 7 years, if it weren’t for that night!”
Karl Blakesley (LeftLion Magazine)
“I’ve had some incredible memories made at The Bodega over the years. From messy Pop Confessional club nights, winning Shrek & The Sopranos themed quizzes, to the most bizarre Album Launch Party for Working Men’s Club at the height of lockdown, to even watching the Lionesses’ Euros triumph in the downstairs bar.
However, in terms of a favourite, I have to go back to my very first Dot to Dot Festival in 2015. From watching The Amazons play to a near empty room (except for fellow Readingbased outfit Sundara Karma who were there to support them) at 2pm, to then watching two of my hardcore favourites in Cymbals Eat Guitars and The Hotelier at 2am the following day, The Bodega granted me - and to this day continues to grant - a near-private audience with some of my favourite bands.”
Rob Green (Artist)
“The Bodega has such a special place in my heart! My first ever gig was there in December 2011, opening with Lazy Habits. A year later in December 2012, I did my first ever ticketed headline gig to launch my EP, Learn To Fly - which sold out! That packed venue and the unbelievable crowd really lit the fire of my career and my music. The closeness with the audience in Bodega, the low stage and wicked sound always makes for an unforgettable show - so much so that ten years later in 2022, I knew that Bodega was the right place to mark ten years since my first ticketed headline and my first headline after two years of lockdown.
That night in Feb 2022 was the night of storm Eunice, and there was a lot of speculation that nobody would turn up - after all it was the biggest storm in over a decade. But people came from all over that night and still packed out the Bodega. My favourite moment was us all singing ‘Life Goes On’ - a track I released in lockdown about accepting life and moving forward positively - jumping, chanting the hook and shaking the room. For me it marked a real moment of hope, that live music could make a comeback after the devastating few years for the industry.
That venue stands as a rare grassroots opportunity for artists to build, dream big and establish a fan base - long live Bodega!”
The Bodega are celebrating 25 years all month long, including a very special sold out show with Sleaford Mods on 30 November 2024.
bodeganottingham.com
words: Sam Keirl & Karl Blakesley
photos: Nigel King, James Birtwhistle, & Sam Nahirny
20th Century Boy
words: CJ De Barra
The history of St. Ann’s has always been a fascinating one. Today, the idea that the council could bulldoze entire areas of communities separating neighbours and friends is one that is difficult to imagine. However, for those who lived it, it’s still all too real. CJ De Barra speaks to St Ann’s born-and-bred author Simon about growing up in the area as a young gay man in the
That Boy of Yours Wants Looking At, Simon Smalley brought the story of his childhood and St. Ann’s to life, effortlessly capturing the reality of the working-class community amid the relentless sixties need for modernity. His Chucking Putty at the Queen, is ready for release on 1 November, and rejoins Simon at a pivotal point in his young life as he gets to grips with the idea of recovery both from the loss of his St. Ann’s home and the death
“It was quite a sentimental journey and very poignant in lots of ways. I’ve not lived there in 25 years, but the old St. Ann’s that I lived in has all been demolished. A lot of street names have been adapted for modern walks and closes as the network of streets is no longer there,” he explained. “It’s all in my head and in old photographs. People didn’t realise how close-knit the community was or how many shops there were so you didn’t
“Everything was on the corner like grocers, butchers or newspaper shops. There was a pub on every corner it seemed and lots of factories,” Simon explains. “The infrastructure of everything you needed for everyday existence was there.”
Peter Parker, a fellow historical writer and author of Some , recently referred to the 1960s as ‘the edge of history.’ This makes accounts of places like this all the more valuable. Although there are plenty of studies on the clearance of working-class areas, it is accounts like Simon’s that help bring colour to black and white photographs.
“It was very comforting,” he recalled. “I was able to close my eyes and I was back there. In one chapter, I was coming home from my junior school to the new house in St. Ann’s. I had to go past where my old house was but it wasn’t there anymore. It was a yearning to go back to when life was happier before my
“It was my psychological disarray that drew me back to where those streets were as that sense of community seemed to have gone. It was that tremendous sense of loss, knowing it's gone and not being able to override that need to go back to how it was with familiar faces, kids playing football or the telephone wires that had shoes hanging from them. Little things like that were tokens of how vibrant it used to be.”
One of the great parts of both books is Simon’s ever-present love of music. A love of the rebellious nature of artists such as Sid Vicious and Marc Bolan of T-Rex. Make sure to open your Spotify account as you read in order to really complete
“I remembered reading in the music press about the early rumblings of punk and I was fascinated by it. On ATV Today in 1976, they featured local punks from Birmingham who were in the early DIY gear, chewing gum and wrap round shades with ripped trousers. It fascinated me. The idea of being yourself and doing something different was really important to me.”
“I identified with this rebellious thing of knowing that by being gay, you are an outsider in society anyway. So this whole movement seemed so opposite from what the accepted norm was. It felt like a place where you would be welcomed, accepted and not condemned for what or who you are.”
Throughout both books, it's very easy to identify with and root for Simon’s happiness. It’s this that has won the first book much praise. In the second book, we join Simon as he takes his first steps into Nottingham’s early gay scene. We hold our breath with nerves as he explores the Hearty Goodfellow on Maid Marian Way and wish him well as he walks into the hedonistic world of La Chic Part Two on Canal Street.
“I had been waiting for this all my life. That’s what it was for me. That first night down in the Hearty Goodfellow and then down at Part Two, I had never experienced anything like that. To see this place was just fabulous. It was a sense of liberation, of arrival and emancipation from absolutely everything else that seemed so humdrum,” he remembered. “It felt like I had arrived and fitted in. I embraced it totally. It felt like a drug that I couldn’t get enough of.”
The stories of La Chic Part Two are something of gay legend in this city. From footballer Justin Fashanu’s appearances on the cruising section to the drag queen Divine’s performances from a toilet seat throne to naked mud wrestling, you had to have been there. For many of us who were not, the envy is palpableespecially now in a quieter scene of closing queer pubs.
As well as the closing of queer pubs is the closing of queer alternative press. In the spirit of rebellion, as the mainstream newspapers ignored the growing queer scene, activists such as Chris Richardson and Richard McCance recognised the need for more voices, especially in the era of HIV/AIDS for information. They started their own newspapers, Metrogay, Gay Nottingham and Outright. Simon joined Outright in the 1990s.
“I appreciate other people telling me what an important lifeline that was to people in the East Midlands. We would have one or two copies stocked by daring librarians or community centres where there were reports of them being ripped up or complaints about ‘that filth.’ You know you are doing something right when you get that reaction.”
“We covered things about legalities or what to do if you were arrested and what your rights were. The main thing was that it was free, accessible to everyone and paid for by the advertising we did. We had free personal ads which were people’s ways of connecting,” Simon added. “The fact that it was ‘do it yourself’ and independent was vastly important to me because it tapped into the punk, fanzine ethos and the counterculture press of the hippie and radical underground 1960s press. Looking back, we had a profound positive effect on the people who were able to get copies.”
You can buy a copy of Simon Smalley’s first memoir, ‘That Boy of Yours Wants Looking At’ from bookshops including Five Leaves and online from Amazon. His second book, ‘Chucking Putty at the Queen’ will be launched on November 1 at Five Leaves Bookshop and available online and through Amazon.
simonsmalley.com
Write black to
the beginning
This year Nottingham writer and archivist Panya Banjoko celebrated fifteen years as head of the Nottingham Black Archive: a community project that enlivens black cultural history in Notts. We caught up with Panya to talk about her residency this summer at the New Art Exchange and her long career as one of Nottingham’s foremost creative individuals.
Notts writer Panya Banjoko is a difficult-todefine-creative; throughout her life her work has spanned both poetry and historical archiving to an equal degree, especially ever since she founded Nottingham Black Archive, which celebrated its fifteenth anniversary in 2024.
“It’s so muddy that even I, at times, don’t know what’s going on, because one feeds the other,” says Panya. “Sometimes the poetry is more dominant and I’m looking for a way into a theme, to write, and at other times the archive is dominant and there’s a photograph, a pamphlet, or an interview with an elder that will spark the poetry. Even if it’s not in terms of the content of my work, I’m still very much aware that as a black writer here in Nottingham, I am standing on the shoulders of the other black writers and artists that came before me. I also need to leave behind a legacy. “
Nottingham born-and-bred, Panya found her way into a long-and-storied writing career after developing an interest in Rastafarianism and poets like Jean ‘Binta’ Breeze as a young adult. A lot of the driving force behind becoming a poet, she says, was being told at a young age that she couldn’t, and believing that it was her choice to write good or bad poetry. It was also a dissatisfaction with the status quo that led to the founding of Nottingham Black Archive (NBA) fifteen years ago. Hoping to preserve the histories she’d heard growing up from her community elders, in 2009 she completed an MA in Museum Studies at the University of Leicester.
“I embarked on the MA hoping that it would open the door for me to work with museums and share my skills and expertise in how they would diversify their collections and their offerings, but that wasn’t to be the case, as the museum sector is very incestuous,” says Panya. “People in the community like Len Garrison who was the director of the ACFF: I’m building on his work. But fifteen years ago nobody was taking black history in this city seriously, and by nobody I mean the mainstream heritage sector.”
Since 2009 the NBA has made its name as one of our city’s most beloved cultural resources, holding photographs, articles, newsletters, books and political letters dating back to the 1940s, laying out Afro-Caribbean oral histories and those of Black community organisations in Nottingham. To mark the grand anniversary in Summer 2024, The New Art Exchange provided Panya with a residency at their brand-new purpose-built artist’s studio, where she launched an anthology: Seeds of Resistance, which collated the poetry and art of creatives linked to Nottingham with some of the NBA’s most notable artefacts.
“I wanted to create something that was special, memorable and resonated with as many people as possible,” Panya says. “It looks back at one of the first anthologies produced in this city: CHROMA, which stood for chronicle of minority artists. That organisation was set up in the 80s to bring African, Caribbean and South Asian communities in a shared goal of amplifying their art, also mobilising on a literary level against what was then, and still is now, to an extent, a very exclusive literary landscape. I wanted to celebrate work produced by contemporary artists and artists from the past, and share some of the literary history, which is why there is a chapter focusing on the various organisations like TURBO and the ACNA, showing that although the status quo didn’t necessarily support black art and artists back then, the actual community did.”
The result of Panya's ambitions is a thoughtprovoking collection of words and visual art with
a kaleidoscope of artistic styles and themes. There are many different viewpoints from many different writers in Seeds of Resistance, from the fragmented imagery of poets like Stanley O Ayodeji, to the impassioned, socially conscious proclamations of others like Manjit Sahota. The visual art displayed inside the book is also just as diverse, encompassing collage, oil paintings, and sculpture photos.
“When I contacted the artists and the poets I didn’t say there was a theme. The only thing I said was that this anthology marked fifteen years of Nottingham Black Archive and was to celebrate artists in the city,” says Panya. “I was also surprised that the poetry and the work all gelled together really well. It looks as though I knew what I was doing! For me that was an indication of the fact that these are issues that are pertinent to black people now. Poets were writing about these themes back in the 80s and they still are in ‘24.”
Something’s going wrong somewhere in this country if we’re still producing people who can’t see the value of people from different cultures being here and contributing, because we have contributed, then and now
Panya’s own poems included in Seeds of Resistance aren't the ardent edicts for social justice that people sometimes associate her with. Instead, they’re on the more abstract, impressionistic end of her writing, seeming to capture those ephemeral moments at which we might become intensely aware of the waythat-the world around us is.
“My work is broad. Right now, I’m working on a collection that is about love and relationships. I don’t only write about social or racial injustice or writing stimulated from artefacts in the archive,” says Panya. “The work I do write about social and racial injustice, I write for myself. I’m not writing it to educate anyone or sway anyone. I’m writing it for my own mental health and sanity. If I don’t put those things down on paper, then they’re in my head.”
Nevertheless, back in the 1980s and still today, it still seems that racial justice and a consciousness of black history emerges more from individuals and grassroots communities than truly at an institutional level. For Panya this is an indication that progress she’s often hoped to see is still slow.
“We want to see black history being seen as world history, that black history is more than slavery that this is then reflected in terms of the school curriculum and university curriculum, and how the museum sector presents its objects and artefacts. We’ve had about four counter protests to the EDL here in Nottingham, I’ve been on two of those. Something’s going wrong somewhere in this country, if we’re still producing people who can’t see the value of people from different cultures being here and contributing, because we have contributed to this country then and now. Those are the issues.”
To browse the Nottingham Black Archive and hear about upcoming events and projects head to their website below. ‘Seeds of Resistance’ can be bought from Fives Leaves bookshop, Old Market Square.
nottinghamblackarchive.org
words: Caradoc Gayer
photo: Nigel King
Breaking Ground
Nottingham Forest Women are making themselves comfortable at the top of the table, following their recent announcement that they’ll be a full-professional club by 2025/26. Megan Hill caught up with Amber Wildgust, Head of Women and Girls Football at Nottingham Forest, to find out what turning pro means for the future of the club, both on and off the pitch.
After a league win in 2022/23 (a narrow loss in the playoff saw them miss out on promotion), and a promising performance in 2023/24 that left them just shy of the top spot, this year Forest Women’s sights are firmly set on promotion to the UK’s second-flight division of women's football, the Barclays Women’s Championship. The club announced the news of becoming a full-professional club in July, but the development has been years in the making – a product of the hard work of staff and players and an influx of investment from big boss Marinakis.
Amber joined the club in 2023 and has played a pivotal role in driving the transition. “[Forest Women] has been a very sustainable investment for the last couple of years,” she explains. “With the growth of women's football coming to a head, it felt like now or never for us to push on and secure promotion to the Championship and ultimately the Super League. This has been a long time coming. It was just a matter of asking: ‘When are we really going to kick this on?’ And it just felt right to do it now.”
At this point, Head Coach Carly Davies pops her head in for a quick confer – it’s transfer deadline day and the team are busy rounding out their promotion-hunting squad. Naturally, the investment in the club will be largely spent on attracting and retaining quality players. This season, all Nottingham Forest Women’s players will be able to give up their day jobs in favour of full-time football. Until now, players were juggling full-time employment with an intense training schedule leaving them little time for crucial rest and recovery. Amber explains, “We were only getting a snapshot of them in the evening after a long day at work – which is not necessarily beneficial and they weren’t always able to give us their 100%. Now that we have more access to them as players, we'll be able to look after their nutrition, their sleep, and their physical performance.”
New investment also means swanky new facilities. The Women’s team have taken up sticks at the recently redeveloped Holme Road training ground, once host to Cloughy’s Champions League winning side – here’s hoping Amber’s team find the same good fortune there!
The renovation saw the addition of two grass pitches and a goalkeeping area exclusively for the women's team.
And more improvements are in the pipeline, “We're redeveloping Holme Road as a women's and girls centre and there are lots of exciting ideas being proposed, so who knows what the future could look like in that space for women's football.”
And the cherry on top: match days at home now means a trip to The City Ground. Which, suffice to say, Amber and the team are pretty pleased about: “Well, it's ridiculous, isn't it? It's the stuff that you dream of as a kid. It’s really cool. We really enjoy it there.” But despite being the stuff of dreams, it was also the only logical development. “The women's team should play in the main stadium. That just makes sense and that's why we've done it.”
The new home ground is a win for the players, who get to play on a fantastic pitch with a great atmosphere. A win for the staff, who have the infrastructure to do their best work, and a win for the fans who now have another opportunity to access the infamous City Ground
The new home ground is a win for the players, who get to play on a fantastic pitch with a great atmosphere. A win for the staff, who have the infrastructure to do their best work, and a win for the fans who now have another opportunity to access the infamous City Ground.
Over the years, Forest Women have built up a loyal fan base in their previous ground at Long Eaton. The hope is that playing at The City Ground makes the game accessible for a new wave of fans. If you’re a fan missing out on tickets for the sell-out men’s games, go and watch the women's games. Or if the effin’, jeffin’ and chants associated with the men’s game aren’t your thing, Amber points out that the women's game might be more appropriate, “It's not as loud, and there's more space –it's a lot more child-friendly shall we say.” That is not to say the atmosphere is any less electric. “When they sing Mull of Kintyre it puts the hairs on the back of your neck
up. It's fantastic. Plus Carly's got the players playing a fantastic brand of football which is great to watch – and we're scoring a few goals off the end of it too, which everyone can enjoy celebrating!”
Accessibility is a foremost consideration in everything Amber and her team are building. The club are constantly evaluating their processes to make the game more accessible, especially for young talent. For example, girls' academy training used to happen on the outskirts of the city, which meant those without access to a car and parents/guardians with free time to take them were unable to participate. Now, training takes place on the grounds of the Girls High School, which means it is accessible via car, bus, tram, and foot.
This commitment to innovation is a shared value amongst all staff and players at Forest Women. Amber talks of her club’s contributions to the women's game with pride, “We want to be relentless in our pursuit of making sure that girls can play football, relentless in our pursuit of female health research, and relentless in making sure that girls feel comfortable talking about their ovarian hormone profiles, menstrual cycles, bra health and things like that.”
Amber expects the same fierce determination from her players on the pitch, “Last season, we were only winning games by one or two goals but that’s not gonna be enough this year. We want to be relentless in scoring lots of goals in games.” The team’s 9-goal win over Stourbridge at the start of the season indicates that Amber’s message is being received.
The club’s sites remain firmly set on promotion to the Barclays Championship, but that doesn’t mean they can’t have a good time getting there. “I hope we entertain people. I hope they come to the games and they enjoy it as much as we do. Ultimately, we want players and staff within the building to be proud to be playing and working for Forest and we want fans to be proud of us and proud to be from Nottingham.”
Forest Women play Stoke City Ladies at The City Ground on Sunday 17 November 2024
words: Megan Hill
photos: Nottingham Forest FC
Man Hours
words: Charlotte Pimm Smith
Lakeside Arts presents Grayson Perry’s Man Hours: a satirical exploration of contemporary life featuring bold woodcut prints and a mixture of mediaeval and antique maps of imagined territories. Initially popularised by his decorative pottery and subsequent winning of the Turner Prize in 2003, this exhibition presents the diversification of Perry’s media with this tongue-in-cheek social commentary in print.
Perry’s Selfie with Political Causes introduces visitors with a sharp critiquing of the rise of ‘Social Justice Warriors’ in modern-day society. This vibrant and colourful woodcut print displays exhaust pipes emitting toxic fumes representing the growing lack of tolerance in communities, especially in online spaces. Intolerance underpins the neighbouring colour etched piece The American Dream. This map depicts Perry’s ‘culture war’ polarising society via social media. The godlike figure atop - Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerburgphysically embodies the power imbalance between social network billionaires and the user, as the former utilises advertising and algorithms to exploit the latter’s money and time. Perry insists that this attention grab is achieved by fuelling the ‘culture war’ - encouraging conflict and divisiveness to engage and outrage the masses into more online activity. He incorporates social movements such as climate change and Black Lives Matter into the piece, inscribing them onto the fighter jets colliding with presidential plane, Airforce One. This crash encapsulates the conflict bred by these networks between ‘Woke’-ism and governmental bodies, this divergence being the primary propagator of social intolerance.
Perry is strategic in his teasing of the upper classes, as while he may criticise the super-rich for their lifestyle, he is acutely aware that the rich are those who can afford to hang his work on their walls alongside the beloved county maps he mocks with his own
This ‘culture war’ rages on in Perry’s three-plate etching Print for a Politician. Produced for an exhibition in Venice, this panoramic map details a world of total intolerance with a Venetian battleground split between two groups of opposing belief systems in total warfare. Within the (seemingly) seventeenth century landscape, a fissure created by religious and political differences splits Venice in two, polarising the land. This social commentary highlights the general social readiness to have fixed opinions on issues without room for healthy debate - a mindset which Perry considers to be both self-righteous and unsustainable in our modern-day society.
British politics come into play in this exhibition with Perry’s sizeable selfportrait as Margaret Thatcher, Vote for Me!. This woodcut print exposes the assumption that artists and their audiences are exclusively left leaning in their politics and criticises it for the subsequent alienation that it causes of the half of their viewership who lean right. Perry also notes the relationship between politics and income with this piece, remarking how, as his, and expectedly others’, income has grown, his political stance has become more and more right leaning, inviting the viewer to consider this political hypocrisy within the art world that remains hidden under the guise of the ‘progressive’.
The English commentary builds in Perry’s adapting of maps from the past. Map of an Englishman is an etched piece inspired by the county maps typically found
in upper-class homes. This piece is said to be a map both of Perry’s mind, and that of the English everyman’s. The shape somewhat resembles the crosssection of the brain with emotive phrases scattered throughout the imagined lands, providing this window into the artist’s stream-of-consciousness. This emotional re-branding of the upper-class wall art both ridicules the pretensions that the middle class is somehow socially superior to other classes while highlighting how, emotionally, we are all in fact rather similar. Perry is strategic in his teasing of the upper classes, as while he may criticise the super-rich for their lifestyle, he is acutely aware that the rich are those who can afford to hang his work on their walls alongside the beloved county maps he mocks with his own.
The super-rich exposé persists with the woodcut print Sponsored by You. This provocatively titled print sees Perry’s childhood teddy, Alan Measles, and female alter-ego, Claire, speeding along Silicon Valley in a flashy supercar. Perry claims that “super-rich people spend a lot of money on supercars, art and handbags” and visualises this phenomenon with the lavish joyride of a large green sportscar inscribed with the names of various tax havens spanning Luxembourg to the Cayman Islands.
This focus on the socio-political power of the wealthy elite ties into the side room of the exhibit smoothly, as we are greeted with Perry’s Animal Spirit The monochrome woodcut print spans six panels and dominates this side of the exhibition with its exploration of economic forces at work. The title plays into the theme, as market commentators used the phrase regularly to disguise the widespread mismanagement of resources that led to the 2008 financial crash with this abstract ‘spirit’ no one could have tamed. The hybrid bullbear is cut cross-sectionally, revealing innards labelled with various sarcastic adjectives. Perry’s bull-and-bear being is not the only allusion to popular stock market phrasing in this piece, in fact many economic symbols are involved; an abandoned baby lies beneath the beast, three black crows sit atop it, and a hanging man haunts the background. Here, we see Perry’s overt criticism of the men whose negligence and ‘bullish’ spirits brought about the crash, and the general lack of accountability faced.
To the left of this hyper-political piece, the exhibit takes a personal turn with Perry’s ‘idealised self-portrait’ Reclining Artist. With visuals comparable to Titan’s Venus of Urbino and Manet’s Olympia, Perry’s naked form spans a couch set amongst a chaotic scene of artist’s paraphernalia, some of his own pieces, and multiple different forms of Alan Measles. The introspective work showcases Perry’s transvestitism as he is adorned with both male and female anatomy, blurring the lines between the masculine and the feminine and capturing the duality of his identity as Grayson Perry and, other times, as Claire. This combination of intellectual reference and Perry’s personal reality sums up Man Hours quite neatly, posing both satisfaction and a subtle challenge to his educated middle-class viewers.
See Grayson Perry: Man Hours at the Djanogly Gallery, Lakeside Arts until Sunday 5 January 2025. Free entry.
After the End of History
Over at Bonington Gallery an unfiltered time capsule of working class life is on display in the latest exhibition, After the End of History. Prompting questions about both change and continuity in British culture, over three decades of everyday life is revealed through the lens of 22 different photographers, including Richard Bilingham, Serena Brown and Rob Clayton.
The summer of 1989: the cold war was finally ending, and the Berlin Wall had not yet fallen. American political scientist Francis Fukuyama publishes an essay called The End of History describing a triumph for the West, and confidently predicting that civilization was finally reaching its ‘logical destination’. Although this may take time to come to fruition, Fukuyama believed that the evidence was already there - from high politics and out into the consumerist Western culture on display, from China to Moscow, from Japan to Prague, and onto Tehran. But what about in working class Britain?
Taking its name from Fukuyama’s essay, this exhibition has been curated by Johny Pitts, a self taught photographer, writer and broadcaster from Sheffield, and presents over 120 photographs exploring how this ‘triumph’ has worked out, on the ground, for the working class in Britain.
Pitts wants to ensure the audience leaves their stereotypical images of the working class, shaped by earlier photographers, at the door of the exhibition. Photographers, mainly middle-class, such as Roger Mayne and Shirley Baker are, for Pitts, too often provided as the reference point, and Pitts provides a more personal view; informed by his own, inevitably partial, life experience, focusing on the gaps he believes need filling – an important note to make to ensure that new caricatures of the working class aren’t formed and that both continuity and change are reflected.
There is a certain ‘messiness’ to the curation, which Pitts notes, was used consciously as a device to draw out the contradictory and diverse ways that the UK working class has evolved given the different influences on it – whether born of an optimism arising from, for example, the promises to be gained from new technology, to a bleaker outlook brought on by economic hardship. This does create some problems for the viewer, particularly given that the title draws our attention to history - without the order of any chronology, the people in the images can appear to be placed outside of history, and in no particular time. Time was not totally absent within the content. References to liminal space, such Kelly O’Brien conjuring up memories in Nana’s Bathroom, or as indicating a moment at the cusp of transition, with a
shift from Thatcherism to something yet unknown, as in Tom Wood’s 1990s Bus Stop series.
A greater focus on chronological sequence could however have revealed to us more about how the people in these images have helped shape their own moment, and potentially, the direction of subsequent events. And this might have made it a bit easier for the viewers to interpret the unfolding story of the evolution and experience of the working class.
In her version of taking control, Serena Brown’s ‘Clayponds’ (2018) is a jibe at the appropriation of working-class streetwear by predatory market forces –although, as we know, that cuts both ways with brand adoption by working class youth
A key aim of the exhibition was to give voices to the marginalised - focussing on groups of people Pitts thinks are absent from images prior to 1989different waves of immigrants; the daily life of the agricultural worker moving seamlessly between work and relaxation; the experience of working women; and the cool counter-cultural dancing youth. Where photographs reflect marginalisation, it is not clear to me whether this is as a problem to be overcome or revered in some way. The exhibition seems to do both, but the emphasis is on the latter.
Providing a sense of isolation are several more traditional documentary style images depicting people experiencing the new reality of capitalism, whether of people working in marginal hotel jobs or of those living within forgotten housing estates and amongst its detritus. The images of Chris Shaw’s hotel workers ‘at rest’ are some of the best in the show as his slumbering workers depict the grainy truth of the exhaustion of hard graft.
The exhibition provides images challenging the idea that ‘the future has been cancelled’ as a result of
the end of history (referencing the idea of thinker Mark Fisher who seems to have strongly influenced Pitts). The notion that the new market forces of neoliberalism, and related commodification of all aspects of life, were a victory for the West, are questioned through the work of a new generation of workingclass photographers and by the subjects they capture.
In her version of taking control, Serena Brown’s ‘Clayponds’ (2018) is a jibe at the appropriation of working-class streetwear by predatory market forces – although, as we know, that cuts both ways with brand adoption by working class youth.
Some images stand out just because they are very arresting – Hannah Starkey’s, ‘Untitled’ (2022) being one: an apparition of a pink haired young woman or girl walking into a Belfast Street scene with a Protestant paramilitary mural, almost from another time and made more surreal and ominous due to the dark clouds and gulls circling overhead. It has a mythical quality about it, bringing the present and past together through the juxtaposition.
And a couple of final observations on what these images may tell us about what has changed after the end of history. When contrasted with the images of the working class prior to 1989, there does seem to be a difference in how people present themselves to the outside world. Stepping outside of the house, out into the public, seemed more clearly delineated in older photos – as in the symbolic dressing up and the putting on of, however poor, suits and smart clothes. This warrants further exploration on what this might represent.
And culturally, there tended to be some things that the working class kept private. Surely, for our sanity, we can’t always be on public display. The contrast between the sleep of the father in Richard Billingham’s ‘Untitled’ (1993), in all his vulnerability, seems harshly exposing in comparison to the majesty of Chris Shaw’s ‘The Auditor Figures’ (1999). Yet both are two of the best shots in the exhibition.
After the End of History: British Working Class Photography 1989 – 2024 is at Bonington Gallery, Dryden Street, until Saturday 14 December. Entry is free.
words: Jo Herlihy
photos: Chris Shaw and Hannah Starkey
Brunch with a twist
Now then, who doesn’t love a good brunch? A hybrid between breakfast and lunch, the brunch craze started gaining popularity in the late 1990s and early 2000s as café culture expanded in the UK, causing a cultural phenomenon that was later fuelled by the rise of social media. In Nottingham, one spot stands out for its imaginative and deliciously presented brunch offerings. Meet Lilac Eatery, who has a full-time residency at The Specialty on Friar Lane.
Owned by siblings Gemma, Jamie and Dom Praditngam, Lilac was born from a love for food and cooking - a trait passed down to them by their dad who owns the legendary The Thai Kitchen takeaway in Long Eaton. You may recognise the names and faces of this talented bunch from their street food market days in Nottingham with their own Thai food business, Prad Thai.
While Prad Thai has since found a new home in London, Lilac has firmly established itself in Nottingham as a leader in brunch, serving their dishes across venues around the county.
We’re talking thick and fluffy slices of decadent Hong Kong-style French Toast drizzled with unique toppings like crème brûlée, their famous Turkish Eggs with chunky slices of Tough Mary’s sourdough, or a fried chicken milk bun dipped in a hot honey glaze. Outstanding.
There’s never been a prettier brunch to snap and it’s accompanied by a banging cup of brew at The Specialty, who are, no surprises here, known for their specialty coffee. Lilac is also known to pop up at The Garage Chilwell for their Sunday Market, where they take their creations and serve them street food-style to hungry market-browsers.
Move aside ‘Spoons fry-up; we have a new contender in town, and they take brunch very seriously. With plans for a brand-new location in London later this month, Lilac Eatery is making waves in the brunch scene. We caught up with Gemma, the creative force behind this innovative venture, to learn more about what makes their brunch so special.
So, brunch. Can you tell us a little bit about why you chose this concept for Lilac Eatery?
In early 2022 our friend Alex asked us if we wanted to take a kitchen residency at his cafe in Kimberley. That’s how it all started for us. Brunch was really the only thing that made sense there and there really weren’t enough places in Nottingham doing it at the time. Generally, it’s an underestimated market and also not very competitive in the UK. I think that’s going to change. The industry really doesn’t give brunch the respect it deserves. We thought, “People love brunch. Let’s give it some attention!” Up until then we had just been focused on our street food business, Prad Thai. I remember me, Dom and Jamie sitting in Dom’s room late one night and after about three hours it was Dom that came up with the name Lilac after the Jeff Buckley song.
How did you get into cooking and running Lilac, what’s your origin story? Cooking at home has always been a huge part of my life. Me and my brothers
grew up above my dad’s restaurant. My mum, who was a teacher, supported him with it day to day. We simply couldn’t escape the logistics. When we got older we would go down to the kitchen and help out. There was that side of cooking. And upstairs at home, cooking was also a big deal.
Preparing a meal could be a day-long task. I respect my dad for dedicating so much of his time cooking for us. I think it instilled a lot of good things. I love cooking for people. It’s what makes me happiest, I think. So I think that’s where that came from. In 2023 we got a chance to launch our first business Prad Thai at Pop Brixton in London so we made the hard decision to move things down there. Both Jamie and Dom moved with it to support things. I stayed up in Nottingham to look after Lilac. I suppose that gave the business some space to grow. Up until then we were very much treating it as a sideline project.
Not quite lunch dishes. Not simply a poached-eggs-on-toast breakfast. There was an inventiveness on the table that really intrigued us. Then things started to get fun
Your Hong Kong style French toast caused waves (rightfully so) in Nottingham when you first launched it. I don’t think I’ve seen anywhere else in Nottingham with this on their brunch menu. Can you tell us a little bit more about this dish?
We love bringing something to the table that our customers might not expect. There’s a Thai breakfast that we used to have as a treat as children which was essentially toast slathered in melted butter and dipped in caster sugar. Clearly, we couldn’t serve sugar toast to people over here but there was huge nostalgia connected to it for me and Hong Kong French Toast was doing the rounds at the cafes in Soho. It was similar enough! I think it’s a dish that sprang from the colonial presence in Hong Kong. It’s not French Toast in the traditional sense because it’s deep fried and there’s more emphasis on egg in the batter. There was also a trend appearing for it online so I knew it was the time to strike. You can find it at our stall at The Garage for their Sunday Market.
Where do you draw inspiration for your brunch menu? Are there specific cuisines, cultures, or experiences that influence you?
It started off by being charmed by how the brunch scene looked in Australia, places like Sydney and Perth. Brunch is a culture over there. Brunch cafes will be as ubiquitous as coffee shops over here. It’s cool. We always loved the idea of food as a social activity. There’s nothing nicer than enjoying a slow breakfast on
interview: Julia Head photos: Julia Head & Yolanda Rios
the weekend with friends and family. And the food these cafes were serving was also really interesting. Not quite lunch dishes. Not simply a poached-eggs-on-toast breakfast. There was an inventiveness on the table that really intrigued us. Then things started to get fun. We are half Thai so we started looking to our own heritage to see what dishes could be developed over here. ‘Hey, what do Thai people eat for breakfast - why can’t we serve that?’ That sort of thing. We’re finding our voice in that space.
What would you say is the most popular brunch dish on your menu?
After my previous answer, it’s quite funny to admit that our potato hash is hands down still the favourite dish for customers on our menus wherever we go. It’s probably the one thing on any of our menus that will stay. We make our hashes in house. It did take us a while to find the perfect potato for the job. It comes with streaky bacon, poached eggs and chives. The latest version of the dish is topped with cheese sauce and shaved cheese which we do at Specialty and The Garage. I don’t know why but it just works.
I agree, it really does just work. So, if you could only serve one dish for the rest of your life, what would it be and why? One dish for the rest of my life? Noodles. Which is technically a Thai breakfast food and probably my favourite food ever. That’s what I’m working on right now. I’m really hoping we put it on a menu soon.
What’s next for Lilac? Any upcoming projects or dishes you’re excited about?
It’s an exciting time for us. We have a few residencies going so well in Nottingham now, both branded and unbranded, and on top of that we have just got an opportunity to open our own spot in London in Kentish Town. We’re launching this month. My two brothers and I have run this business since early 2022. Last year we were joined by James (ex-The Berliner in Beeston) and things have now really picked up momentum. This will be our first place with Lilac on the front.
It’s a huge moment for us and also for all of our team. Me and James will continue to grow things in Nottingham while Jamie and Dom look after the project down there. We approach every venture as a learning opportunity. We’ve worked hard to make the kitchen residency model work for us in Nottingham and there’s no sign of that slowing down for us now. We’re still looking for more residencies. But it is a dream come true for us to open our own cafe. Let’s see how we go.
Find them at The Specialty 50 Friar Ln, Nottingham NG1 6DQ or at The Garage Chilwell 63 High Rd, Chilwell, Beeston, Nottingham NG9 4AJ.
A matter of taste
words & photos: Lucy Campion
Have you ever experienced a tasting menu? Food Co-editor Lucy Campion explains why you should treat yourself to a tasting menu (or ‘degustation menu’ as the French call it) for your next special occasion and why Woodborough Hall should be your destination of choice this autumn.
I’ve been a food blogger for over three years now so I’ve had the pleasure of dining at many different places in Nottinghamshire, but my visit to Woodborough Hall last month has to be the most memorable so far… Dinner by candlelight in the enchanting surroundings of a stunning, grade II* listed country house reminded me how much I enjoy tasting menus and why I always recommend them for birthday and anniversary celebrations.
Squid ink ravioli with hoisin duck, lobster tail, spring onion and cherry glaze - a flurry of flavours that, on paper, should clash but, when crafted by expert hands, the result was sensational
1. The courses are decided for you, giving you the chance to try dishes you wouldn’t typically choose. There’s something exciting about relinquishing all control when an experienced chef team is making the decisions for you. Yes, this does mean you’ll likely face ingredients you don’t usually love, but tasting menus have taught me that there are very few foods I dislike when combined with the right flavours.
Our meal at Woodborough Hall started with a scallop velouté. I’m normally quite selective when ordering seafood but the scallop was well-balanced with flavours of lemon and chive - a beautiful dish that I wouldn’t have tried outside of this experience.
2. Unique flavour combinations that shouldn’t work but do.
A successful tasting menu takes risks and always comes
served with a side of surprise. If something on the menu makes me do a double-take, I know it’ll be a highlight of the meal!
Our third course at Woodborough Hall was one of my favourites. Squid ink ravioli with hoisin duck, lobster tail, spring onion and cherry glaze - a flurry of flavours that, on paper, should clash but, when crafted by expert hands, the result was sensational.
Our side of surprise came in the form of herbal tea. I’d never think to order herbal tea in a restaurant but this fantastic blend of honey, lemon and ginger was delightfully sweet. Apparently the chef spent weeks perfecting this tea and the dedication was evident in every sip.
3. Smaller portions mean there’s always enough room for dessert!
The biggest objection I’ve heard to tasting menus is ‘the portions are too small!’ But while the portions may be small, the courses are plenty and carefully curated to create an ultimately satisfying meal. You don’t have to worry about being too full for dessert either because the menu is designed to make sure you have the appetite to properly enjoy your pudding.
At Woodborough Hall, ‘Nature’s Garden’ was a playful dessert bursting with flavour. White chocolate cream, dark chocolate crumb, matcha sponge and raspberry sorbet. This was followed by smoked cheese and crackers, presented in a flourish of smoke, which really captured the essence of autumn and bonfire night.
Woodborough Hall can be found at 1 Bank Hill, Woodborough, Nottingham NG14 6EE. Their new tasting menu is £75pp.
woodborough-hall.co.uk
Q @lilac.eatery
Wollaton Walled Garden, originally built in the second half of the 18th century, had fallen into a sad and overgrown state, its walls beginning to crumble. Thanks to the Friends of Wollaton Park volunteers they’re now being repaired, and flower and vegetable beds are singing with life once more. Having just become the first group recipients of a Nottingham Award, we had to go and check out all their hard work…
Gliding along on one of the new electric number 30 buses to today’s destination with a motley set of locals and students, we cross the road works on Maid Marian Way’s junction. The changes, intended to ease traffic and create more pedestrian friendly and green space, are causing consternation. I reflect that at least some of the changes occuring in our city are more agreeable - the volunteer-led transformation of Wollaton Walled Garden which I’m about to see is definitely one of them.
Entering the northerly entrance to Wollaton Park where Mr Man’s Cantonese Restaurant has stood since 1987, I’m greeted by stalls of fresh produce and a throng of volunteers. A few of the longest serving soon find me, and after a brief tour of the historic gardeners’ cottage which has become their makeshift museum and base, we wander around the incredible walled garden itself…
Helen Mitchem has been active in the Friends of Wollaton Park group that looks after this space since it began, and is now its Chair. She moved to Nottingham in 2013 and, seeking local connections and conservation activities, spotted an advert for the thenfledgling group in a local magazine. “I’m still here, and these guys are some of the best friends I've got in the area,” Helen enthuses. “You had your wedding on the park - that’s how deeply you’re in,” adds Kevin - who we’ll meet in a moment - sharing a laugh.
Andy Jackson has been volunteering here since 2017, but has long cared for the site. “When I was in my twenties the council moved (their Parks office) to Woodthorpe Grange, and I can remember writing a letter saying, ‘you must not close this place down’... I got married, had kids, and then all of a sudden, I'm 66, and I saw this opportunity in repairing the garden walls here. We were cleaning up old bricks at first, because apparently each brick would cost something like twenty quid to make again. Once we’d finished that, volunteers kept turning up and we thought, well, we just can't walk away”.
Andy talks me through the four acre site. “The right hand side (a large lawn) is used as an events area - there’s an archery club, and school camps in the summer. On our side we’re growing on two acres. We started with a veggie patch, and then the heritage garden, and now the sensory garden”.
Kevin Beswick, a previous Chair of the group, says that it was Wollaton resident Steve Battlemuch’s initiative, stemming from his campaign to become a councillor. Once elected, Cllr Battlemuch held a keenly-attended meeting and found a small amount of council money to get them started. Kevin explains that the group is now self-sustaining, and have put “over 41,000 hours” into the grounds. Their volunteers are not short of kit, and a well-stocked tea and biscuits station speaks to a solid operation. Three of the group’s own history books are on offer. I buy them all.
I’ve always liked gardening. My wife died, and this is where I came - it saved my life, really. This was heaven, I love it
“It's nice to see the beds and everything, but it’s the community of people that’s important”, Kevin says. “We have young people with learning needs come down from Portland College and they use it as an outdoor workspace. We have Duke of Edinburgh volunteers, there’s a young woman on an internship, we have businesses volunteering. It’s a big community here and we’re providing those opportunities”.
“There was a turning point,” Kevin continues. “Lodge one was completely overgrown, and we kept asking ‘can we cut it back?’. We were told no, it's too unsafe, but then a new manager took over, Rachel James, and she said yes. So one morning, seventeen of us turned up and cleared this space, and I think it opened their eyes to the power of volunteers, who can deliver improvements above and beyond what paid staff can do. We don't ever want to take over anybody's job, but we can provide a pressure group and also the council realise they can trust us.”
Kevin sees this as a solution to the ever-shrinking public purse. “When policing, child safety and old people's homes are part of their remit, there's no way public spaces like parks can be 100% council employees, so volunteers have a place. Friends groups can be anywhere, a little patch of ground, a little wood”. He encourages Wollaton generating income through commercial activities - like Splendour - to support paying staff to manage this and other vital parks around the city, rather than the cost falling on local families using play areas.
“Everyone sees the benefits of volunteering,” Helen adds. “For the good of the biodiversity, growing your own food, connectivity, reducing social isolation, all those things, and we come here because we're passionate about it and we want to. But I think the council are benefiting massively from our work and the positivity it brings. Even with perfect finances the council probably couldn’t afford to pay all these volunteers, and the things that have progressed here have happened through them.”
Helen’s horticultural ambitions for the garden are “to manage to grow a pineapple, as that was a prime example of what this Walled Garden produced back in the day. One was presented here to King Charles II, grown within these coal-fired, heated cavity walls and the greenhouses. Maybe we can present one to King Charles III in the future,” she mentions.
Bruce Henry is the last volunteer I speak with. He says that at the beginning, “it was terrible, everywhere was ivy, an awful mess... we dug all these beds,” he gestures, with a proud glint in his eye. “I’ve always liked gardening. My wife died, and this is where I came - it saved my life, really. This was heaven, I love it. I’ve met some nice people, the environment’s nice, and you can see all the work we’ve done.”
Our need for care, connection and community stands strong, like the walls around the park’s perimeter. What’s been achieved in this stunning Walled Garden is down to the Friends of Wollaton Park volunteers' passion and hard work, but councillors and council officers played a key role. They gave their trust, created a space for locals, and shared agency of this vast local asset. It’s an old thing, commoners commoning this once-common land.
Friends of Wollaton Park, in their own enterprising ways, have created a sustainable and growing effort to grow not just food here, but community itself. They don't seek out any accolades, but simply want to make Wollaton Park a “better place for all”, as their well puttogether website states. Award-winners don't come any worthier than that.
Learn more about the group’s work at friendsofwollatonpark.org.uk
Wonder Wall
words & photos: Adam Pickering
ARROW DOWN THE SUspECTS
words: Andrew Tucker
photos: Kaitlyn Mikayla and Andrew Tucker
After a lengthy career making his name in blockbusters such as The Hobbit and BBC’s Robin Hood, multi-award winning actor Richard Armitage has turned to the written word. He visited Bromley House to discuss his latest crime novel The Cut, and how writing and acting converge.
Bromley House Library, that leisure trove of a Georgian townhouse just off the Market Square, is on most days a spot of glacially cool repose - but today it’s getting hot and bothered. Lanyards swish around the spiral staircase, faces dart through the oolong-steam wearing smiles that say, We Must Be British and Not Too Excited about this. But we are failing.
The cause is Richard Armitage: The Hobbit’s Thorin Oakenshield, he of Spooks fame, and of course the unvanquishable Guy of Gisborne in the BBC’s Robin Hood - the man whose Byronic scowl brought living rooms across the nation to the cusp of mass cardiac failure. The Sheriff’s right-hand-man has now changed horses, in a mid-career move which few may have predicted: he is now a writer of crime fiction, and he’s coming here this afternoon.
Richard’s full of bright spirit upon arriving. The first thing he thinks, taking in impressions of the handsome two-hundred-year-old library, is that he’d like to film here “ - but don’t let a crew in - they’d trash the place!” How does this real Nottingham, I ask, compare to the fictional one? “I was really pissed off that we weren’t shooting in Sherwood Forest - I remember we used to come to Nottingham as kids and go to the Major Oak. So, like, why are we shooting this in Budapest? I still feel a slight pang of guilt.”
As an audience member discusses with Richard his sensitive depiction of dementia, you see less ‘persona’ and more personrevealed; he is a heartthrob still, but the heart is emphasised. His answers are animated with a sense of self-inspection, and a full pencil-case of writerly wit
Richard was raised in Leicester, a Midlander through and through, and although he knows a bread roll as a ‘bap’ rather than ‘cob’ - “That’s Leeds, from my dad” - we’re inclined to let him off.
Up the staircase, we find an audience whose fingers rap on restless legs, latesummer sunlight falling on a room that would put the ‘ire’ in fire brigade if it were any more full. Mixing with his readers, Richard has charisma that’s warm with shyness, like a theatre kid asked to perform an encore as themselves. Elly Griffiths is the interviewer - being herself the multi-award winning crime writer of Ruth Galloway renown, she’s come well-equipped with forensic questions.
The beginning of Armitage’s journey as an actor, we learn, was auspicious: “The doorway that opened for me was when our primary school teacher Mrs O’Leary read The Hobbit to us.” She would mimic Gollum’s voice, and at home Richard became consumed by doing the same thing: “I’d go home and open the book, try and copy what she was doing, and I think those are the early seeds of me becoming an actorit’s rooted in storytelling.”
Years later he would star in the three-part film of The Hobbit, one of two central heroes alongside Martin Freeman’s rabbit-eyed Bilbo - but not before he had made a bid to audition for The Lord of the Rings: “Darling,” his agent responded. “They’re already filming.”
He has come late to writing as well. What, Elly wonders, brought him there? “Not in a million years,” says Richard, would he have had the guts to approach a publisher
with a manuscript. But Audible approached him, and asked whether he would sign up to write and star in his own audio book. “Immediately, I said yes.” They asked who he’d like as a ghostwriter - “Absolutely not - I'm going to write every word. Then they got really scared!”
Thankfully the process of reading scripts aloud gave Armitage the inside track. The book was written to be heard, he says, “because I come from music, then musical theatre and Shakespeare” - forms of narrative, in his reckoning, which are designed to be absorbed, not dissected. Once a keen young cellist and flute-player, Richard listens for the melody as he writes.
We discuss his first novel Geneva, which tells the story of a respected scientist who begins to show signs of Alzheimer’s - while booked as the guest of honour at a tech conference, she’s drawn into a net of conniving and misgivings.
The Alpine setting felt right, says Armitage: “I get goosebumps whenever I get close to a mountain, summer or winter - I love the altitude, the isolation, the serenity… nobody can get to me here. And Switzerland was perfect because of the biotech, the medical development that’s happened there… and its secrecy, and the whole notion that legal euthanasia was going to be part of the crime.”
Geneva’s success prompted his new follow-up The Cut: as a rowdy film crew descends on the sleepy village of Barton Mallet, an architect grapples with the bewildering murder of one of his friends thirty years before. Barton Mallet is fed by autobiographical memory, with sections in the early 90s inspired by Richard’s adolescence.
What fastens our attention most, perhaps, is when Richard reflects on the psychology of acting: “I hate using the word false, but acting’s a construct.” In doing this line of work Richard immerses himself in new professions with a sense of real belief: “When I'm playing a surgeon, in my head I can actually perform defibrillation. I know I could resuscitate something.”
So, fresh-faced on the writing scene, is the role of the crime author for him another performance - a role to slip into, don for a while, and then hang back up on the rack? I don’t think so. As an audience member discusses with Richard his sensitive depiction of dementia, you see less ‘persona’ and more person-revealed; he is a heartthrob still, but the heart is emphasised. His answers are animated with a sense of self-inspection, and a full pencil-case of writerly wit.
What does it feel like now to hang out with writers, asks Elly? “It’s a whole new community of people that are weirder than the film community,” says Richard with a mischievous smile. “Actors are so aloof, and… well put together.”
The room laughs. Nottingham’s bookworms have come to be won over, and I’ve watched it happen - Richard Armitage, we are forced to accept, has joined the company of Agatha Christie and Harlan Coben. One imagines that Robin Hood will be having a strop in a hedgerow somewhere. His rival has split the arrow - for one day at least, Guy of Gisborne has come out on top.
Richard Armitage’s book Geneva is in shops now, and The Cut is available on Audible. The Bromley House autumn ‘East Meets West’ events programme continues until December.
Talking Therapy
As the nights roll in earlier and the weather gets chilly, it’s natural to not feel so breezy and bright. Over the next few months we’ll be dipping in with Nottingham Counselling Service to hear about their work and how we should normalise talking about our mental health.
One of the most fundamental aspects of being human is our ability to talk and listen to each other. Our ability to express our thoughts, ideas and feelings through language is as old as the hills. It’s kept us safe and supported our mental health throughout the centuries, without being formalised as doing so. “We’ve always needed to talk,” says Shoana Qureshi-Khan, Executive Director of Nottingham Counselling Services (NCS). “It used to be a neighbour or the person down the street that you knew was a great listener. Now we’re in 2024, we’re in a whole different place and it’s just not that easy.”
Counselling can help to fill the modern day gap for the age old need, by offering us a qualified professional with the warmth and approachability of the neighbour down the street. Years of research and developments in the field of counselling mean there’s much more knowledge about what helps an individual, empowering them to turn talking into action to improve their lives. “It's an accumulation of the new and the old coming together,” says Shoana, who holds an MSc in Psychology. “This is no different to advancements in medicine that have created antibiotics for diseases.”
Nestled close to the bustling Victoria Centre in its now modern premises, NCS is a charity that has a long history of holding the community at its heart, with its roots tracing back as far as 1875. Despite counselling, in some form, having existed for so long, Shoana knows there’s still stigma that prevents people from reaching out for help. Modern day life can give us the impression that we need to cope with our
stresses and worries on our own, or that we shouldn’t have them in the first place.
But it's an inevitability of life that whatever our background or income, we will be faced by mental health challenges at times. “Too many challenges at once are going to throw anybody. Challenges with no support systems are going to break people quicker and challenges that the mind just can't make sense of really need somebody else to help” explains Shoana. If you’ve never had counselling before and you’re unsure what to expect, Shoana describes it as a train journey: “Some bits are going to feel like hours. Some bits are going to go really quick and some bits are going to get noisy. But at the end of the train journey you should be happy to see that you've reached your next destination.”
We wouldn’t go through life expecting to have immaculate physical health, never getting a cold or tripping up. We can’t expect the same of our mental health. And when we do inevitably need some help, counselling can offer that safe space to talk. “You will be welcomed and you won’t be judged” reassures Shoana “If you’re unsure, just try exploring it a little more and get more of your questions answered.”
One-to-one therapy: £18-£58 per session. Visit nottinghamcounsellingcentre.org.uk to self-refer
It’s been just about two months since Nottingham Green Heart park was opened at the former site of Broadmarsh shopping centre. But how might this new green space be affecting our hearts and minds for the better? Elspeth White tells us, in her own words….
I sit in the park where the Broadmarsh shopping centre used to be. The sky is warm and there are couples sitting on the benches surrounding the heart of the ‘green heart’, the pond.
I eat my Tesco meal deal and listen to Fontaines DC, as you do on your work break. I start to overthink something or other, and this is when a woman says (to no one and everyone), ‘how did the pond get there?’. I muster a confused laugh. She asks if this is my first time sitting here and I say yes. We marvel at the grass, scattered with purple flowers. We part, and get on with our days, warmed a little.
A girl sits on a rock and draws in her journal. I return to my meal deal. Two white haired women sit in sunglasses, and four girls wearing school blazers are momentarily transfixed by the sight of green in our grey town centre. A father and his two children pause, staring into the water.
This is when I hear music across the pond, hypnotic, ethereal. A man in a colourful top taps precisely on a bronze object the shape of a UFO. It takes me a moment to realise his hand movements correspond with this music.
I use the excuse of binning my meal deal packaging to come closer. I ask him what he’s playing: a handpan, he says. Passers-by with suitcases watch him, others take videos. I confess I don’t have a pound to put in his case, and he says, with the charm of a ringmaster, ‘your smile is payment enough’. Despite my stained, damp work uniform, I feel somewhat at peace
I cannot fathom that we are standing where a Boots checkout once was. Hundreds of people every day, walking through the Broadmarsh without a second thought. Now it is a place where people can be still, or a place ‘just to chill’, as I hear a man on his bike say to his mate.
In a previous draft, I called this park a cemetery. The word is not entirely unjustified. The Broadmarsh is, even now, a work in progress, framed by derelict shops, a grey car park and a building site. This wall of scaffolding is a nostalgic sigh for all of us who frequented the Wilko pick n mix, or had a meal in the Wimpy’s diner. Long gone are the days my dad would drive me past the millions of bus stops around the back; Collin Street, Collin Street, Collin Street…
To me, the Broadmarsh could only be a site of what I had lost; people, places and the innocence of life before my late teens. Before Covid, before my first encounter with mortality. The truth is, before today, I had never visited the park.
Indeed, it has been open for less than a month. But even in my ninety-minute work break, I can feel my grief over a dead shopping centre being replaced with hope. The Broadmarsh is taking its ashes - slum, shopping centre – and rising as the space that Nottingham has always needed.
The proof? I have spoken to more locals in the span of this lunch break than I have in the last eighteen years of my life. And maybe that’s growing up, or maybe that is the collective excitement of a community that is witnessing its town grow up. We look up to the skeleton painted in green reading ‘Nottingham Broadmarsh’ and think ‘what next?’.
words: Elspeth White illustration: Zhara Millett
Happy Together
Alt-indie quartet Divorce are undoubtedly one of the buzziest Nottingham bands of the moment. With debut LP Drive To Goldenhammer in the can and slated for release next March, LeftLion caught up with genial drummer, Kasper Sandstrøm, backstage in the midst of their sold-out four night residency at Bodega, to find out more about their long history with the venue and discuss their forthcoming first album…
You have a long history with this venue - working and playing here. When did you first come to Bodega?
I remember being maybe nineteen, I was at a production at the Playhouse with my mum, and we sat behind all of the band Dog Is Dead. I’d met Rob (Milton) the singer once before, and they said ‘We’re going to Bodega, do you want to come?’ and I was like ‘Mum can I please go?’ (laughs). So, I went out with them and that was the start of it.
How did it progress from there?
So I started going Bodega loads, watching loads of gigs and then I started playing there with my first band, which became Do Nothing. I also wanted to move into town so I asked Bodega for a job, which was back in 2016, and I only left last year. So it was a good stint, seven and a half years working there.
What have been your highlights?
More recently Geese - saw them last year, that was amazing. A band called Wooze I saw supporting somebody, who were incredible. There’s too many to mention!
When was the first time you made the transition to the dressing room then?
Well, this one’s new! The old dressing room was just a toilet and a fridge basically, a little cloakroom. It wasn’t much to write home about! This one is beautiful. You can have a shower and chill.
And now you’ve just done four sold out nights here…
Yeah! It’s incredible. I mean, it feels like home. I know everyone behind the bar, the management team - it feels very relaxed, especially when you’re living there for four days!
It does seem to play a real integral part in the lives of Nottingham musicians. I know GIRLBAND!’s singer has worked here too…
We’ve all known Georgie for years. She started working here just as I left pretty much. We’ve actually never played with them on the same bill, but I’m sure that’ll change pretty soon - we’re big fans.
There seems to be a real buzz with Nottingham bands at the moment. Historically, one or two have gained traction nationally - but it feels like there’s a whole collection coming through now…
Yeah agreed, it’s always been like one at a time almost. I feel like after COVID we were bursting
with creativity and people really wanted to go out and play gigs. There’s so much - there’s Cucamaras, us, Wizards Can’t Be Lawyers - so many amazing bands on the scene. It feels like the healthiest it’s been in a long time.
After COVID we were bursting with creativity and people really wanted to go out and play gigs. There’s so much - there’s Cucamaras, us, Wizards Can’t Be Lawyers - so many amazing bands on the scene. It feels like the healthiest it’s been in a long time
It has been a busy year for you with the new album being recorded and support dates with Bombay Bicycle Club, The Vaccines and Everything Everything. Those three bands were you guys fifteen years ago - has it been interesting to see how they operate up close now?
Yeah. It’s been like a nice ‘this is what you could have’ type of thing when you play 2,000 capacity rooms. That’s not us yet and it won’t be for a while, we’ll see how it all works out. When you’re in a support slot you don’t have too much time to see what happens back of house - it’s soundcheck, dinner, play. It is interesting hanging out with people in the crew and seeing what they do. There’s so much to do in a small period of time, so it can be pretty stressful for them.
It’s been three years as a band now - are you guys officially full-time musicians?
We are yeah - for now! We got signed to Gravity Records (Capitol) last year which has enabled us to go full time with it. Adam (Peter-Smith, guitarist) still works as a joiner and I still DJ, but Felix (Mackenzie-Barrow, guitarist and singer) and Tiger (Cohen-Towell, bassist and singer) are pretty much full-time with this now. It’s the first time in my life I’ve been able to make a living from music, which is nuts. I’m not counting my chickens just yet, but it’s been great.
And the video for your recent single All My Freaks was shot at Wollaton Hall - how was that experience?
The director said what do you think about doing
upstairs there? And we were like if you can get it, absolutely! It was like 35 degrees that day, so it was quite intense, but fun to film in a place I've been going to since I was a kid.
So, all roads lead to March 7 now and the release of Drive To Goldenhammer
Yeah! It’s actually been done for ages. We recorded it in January with Catherine Marks in Real World Studios.
Yes, Peter Gabriel’s legendary place - how was that?
Yeah, we were hoping to meet him, but he was having some time off. It’s beautiful, really isolated, but not so isolated that there’s nothing going on. We were in the studio for twelve hours a day hashing it out.
Are you happy with how it has turned out?
Yeah. It’s the most amount of freedom we’ve ever had in the studio to play around and create. We had time to splurge all of our ideas and then take things away! Sometimes you have to know when it’s too much.
I understand Goldenhammer is this fantasy place where you can go to escape this hectic world - is that right?
Yeah, sort of. I feel like Tiger and Felix often write about travelling as we’re doing it all the time and you’re a bit placeless, you don’t really know where home is sometimes. So, you’re writing songs to make them feel like home, do you know what I mean? Get a sense of familiarity with it.
The album is obviously a huge milestone for 2025 - what other targets do you have in your sights? Splendour, Glastonbury?
Glastonbury will be class. I’ve been as a punter and I’ve also played it once when I was nineteen with another band, that was my first one. We played Splendour last time around, so I guess we’ll see, you never know - it’s local, so it’s an easy day for us! Our focus at the moment is just getting this album out and making it as good as possible.
Divorce will release Drive To Goldenhammer on 7 March 2025 through Gravity Records.
Q @divorceHQ
interview: Lawrence Poole photo: Nigel King
Bloodworm
Back of a Hand (Single)
Bloodworm’s debut single Back Of A Hand grips their listeners with a pensive gothic style that would make Robert Smith proud. Starting with a captivating drum hook shortly followed by the bass, a reverbed and doleful guitar riff then layers and lifts the song’s overall sound. What seals the deal is the moody vocals with a raspy chorus, allowing the band to drive an emotive and gritty edge that fits their lyrics well. Altogether, Back Of A Hand pays profound homage to the 80s gothic scene by showcasing influences from bands such as Bauhaus and Joy Division, but with a clear and modern production value bound to pique the interest of lovers of the genre. Like uncovering a hidden gem, Bloodworm entices those with an interest in the dark and mysterious to take a listen. Phillippa Walsh
The Days of Tomorrow Henry Road (Single)
As autumnal, darker days continue their inexorable approach, The Days of Tomorrow offer memories of warmer times, with underlying depth. Their latest offering, Henry Road, melds nostalgic rock with alt-folk sensibilities. There are warm guitars and plaintive vocals (inescapably Michael Stipe-esque), plus the inspired layering of Hammond organ. The song – which creates a fascinating narrative inspired by the Nottingham street where the band first rehearsed – is structured with long verses melding into their choruses, giving a broad and soaring feel to the story despite its sub-3-minute length. A rich and satisfying listen. Phil Taylor
Drew Thomas You, Me & Desire (Single)
You may have heard of Britpop, but now Notts singer-songwriter Drew Thomas is forging a path with his very own sub-genre of pop music – grit-pop. The recipe for grit-pop is pretty simple - take some super catchy alt-pop hooks, sprinkle in some big rock riffs, then finish it all off with a thrilling guitar solo and anthemic chorus. This formula is all laid out on his cathartic new single You, Me & Desire, which at its core sees Drew honestly share pubescent anxieties over his sexuality and lustful urges. It’s another brilliantly bold song from Drew, one made for singing loud at his live shows. Bring on the grit-pop revolution! Karl Blakesley
Cracked Hands
Mundane Hope (EP)
The Publics I Know The World Stopped, But Why Did You? (EP)
A band that has been lighting up festivals and the Notts music scene for the past few years, Mansfield-hailing, indie rock quintet The Publics have finally arrived with a bang on this, their debut EP. Emergency Broadcast Service opens the record on just that, a brief intro that begins with a piercing alarm and offers an ominous warning. It soon drops into the rumbling bass, pounding drums and whirlwind riffs of Red Flag Verified, which kicks the project properly into gear.
Gaslighter is then a soaring, fist-in-the-air anthem, boasting a huge singalong chorus and more thrilling guitar work.
D.B. Cooper then stomps along with shades of early Arctic Monkeys, before the title track thrills with a melancholic guitar breakdown midway through. EP Highlight Murphy’s Law then brings everything to a close, a track with lots of heart and more glistening guitars. Overall, this is a fantastic first outing from The Publics, one that showcases their talent and skilled musicianship, while also giving them a platform from which to rise in the future. Karl Blakesley
We’re big fans of spoken word, and Nottingham’s latest duo, Cracked Hands, brings a fresh take on the genre with their captivating blend of tumbling melodies and poetic reflections. Comprised of Milla Tebbs and Tom Hooley, the pair’s debut EP, Mundane Hope, delivers five tracks and eighteen minutes of atmospheric sonic beauty. The EP masterfully layers intricate sounds while maintaining a raw, minimalist feel, creating a rich, immersive soundscape that enhances the distinctiveness of each element. Cracked Hands are among the most original acts to emerge from Nottingham this past year, and Mundane Hope is an ideal autumnal soundtrack. Gemma Cockrell
If you’re from Nottingham and want to get added to our list of music writers, or get your tunes reviewed, hit us up at music@ leftlion.co.uk
Behind The Curtain
Kino Kilo Notts is a community cinema project that covers the entirety of Nottinghamshire, focusing specifically on Eastern European cinema. Screen Editor Autumn Parker spoke to two of the members Liam Skillen and Lila Yakimova about their work so far and their big ambitions to bring various communities together throughout the whole region.
So far, Kino Kolo have sought to unite communities through cinema: the act of communal watching allowing diasporas to see their own culture, but also to give Western audiences an idea of the cultures and customs of the people who live in the communities with them. Both routes demonstrate how powerful film can be to teach people about different countries they may have never visited before. On top of this, the group are keen to expand their events and introduce paired activities into the screenings such as cooking or crocheting, something that helps immerse people into the culture they are seeing on screen. They believe that these events can highlight the many overlapping aspects of various cultures, all brought together in Nottingham.
Kicking off their project was a screening of a Polish comedy titled The Cruise in Mansfield. A Polish classic that Liam tells me almost every family remembers watching at least once. The film highlights how these films connect to different groups on a variety of levels. At just over an hour and full of slapstick humour the entire audience understood and found it is easy to connect too; however, the spoken jokes even with English subtitles were so specifically Polish that the English audience were a bit unaware of the humour. Despite this, the film's playful energy and short run time was accessible to a wide range of people from different backgrounds.
Liam talks about how they got great feedback from the crowd, most people were expecting the stereotypical grim communist-era drama that Eastern European cinema has garnered an unfair, and untrue, reputation for. Breaking down these stereotypes of the oftenmonolithic definition of Eastern European cinema is key for Kino Kilo, as they aim to expand people’s knowledge of how diverse and varied these films can be. They have also found a large appeal for films that feel true to the country's own culture and are not Westernised films aimed at reaping awards at prestigious ceremonies.
Screening these films doesn’t always come easy though and they must also battle with getting licences for some of these films, with these often
being licensed by the countries themselves, creating a potentially long and expensive process to being able to screen the films they want to. Luckily Kino Kilo has started making a myriad of connections across the country and abroad, including a partnership they have with Klassiki: a streaming service showcases films from Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia. Connections like these makes the group hopeful they will be able to expand their events to include hosting other collectives or directors in Nottingham.
Of course, focusing on Eastern European cinema offers a huge plethora of films to select from; whether it’s Czech New Wave or surrealist fantasy films there is an incredible wealth of films to be shared with an audience who have potentially no experience with these styles of cinema
On the topic of slow, bleak cinema Lila talks about her home country Bulgaria’s style of cinema that reflects the countries tumultuous history of existing as a Soviet state in the 20th century, which included limited to access to their own culture, music and food. This has ultimately led to the countries cinematic output to mostly be deep and dark exploration of emotions, which comes from the need to use cinema to deep dive into their emotional pasts. It’s just another example of how intrinsic the idea of processing both individual and collective trauma is to both film making and viewing a film as an audience.
Their most recent event was a sold-out screening of a recent documentary titled HOME by Mela Milleard, which took place at Mammoth Cinema. HOME aims to explore the meanings of family, identity, emigration and many more, and really look at what defines our home. Lila discusses how this crosspollination of
ideas and concept of our own inner connection to our homeland fits right into Kino Kilo’s modus operandi. As the group is dedicated to expanding their events beyond the borders of the screen, they also organized a multi-lingual poetry reading session to take place after the film: featuring poems read in Hungarian, Ukrainian, and one a Bruce Springsteen poem read out in English.
Of course, focusing on Eastern European cinema offers a huge plethora of films to select from; whether it’s Czech New Wave or surrealist fantasy films there is an incredible wealth of beautiful films to be shared with an audience who have potentially no experience with these styles of cinema. But they are conscious of not just barraging audiences with niche films from their own personal interests, instead they exploring films that the various Eastern European communities want to see. Part of this is screening films that can appeal to the whole family, such as cartoons or stop motion animations aimed a younger audience –but still enjoyable for adults as well. This includes screening a collection of shorts that contain little to no dialogue, which they see as a way of getting around the language barriers that might put off younger audiences.
However, they are still open to exploring the spookier and more adult side of Eastern European cinema, which is well renowned for its surrealist fantasies. Their next planned event being a collection of Hungarian shorts which Liam describes as unnerving. One featured director is Luca Tóth whose specialty is exceptionally creepy and absurd animations, and Péter Litchter who uses found and archival footage to create an eerie atmosphere. Both are contemporary directors that the group are hosting which allows them to build connections internationally for future screenings and events. They also have a partnership with Tenx9 –another community project that sees nine people use ten minutes to tell a true story from their life – on the horizon, combining their audiences to create even more opportunities to connect to local communities.
You can keep an eye out for future Kino Kilo events over at their Instagram: @kino_kilo_notts
words: Autumn Parker
Living in full colour
Colour consultant and personal stylist Lisa Wood from Lisa Loves Style, has a career built on inspiring others to embrace the rainbow, and find empowerment and inner strength from the clothes they wear. Fashion Editor Addie Kenogbon caught up with Lisa at her West Bridgford studio to find out more about how a decades-old styling method is helping others feel more confident in the skin they’re in.
The practice of colour analysis has been taking the TikTok world by storm in recent years. You know the videos? A seated client draped in fabric swatches, before being told what ‘season’ they are? This practice, which pairs complementary colours with a person’s hair colour, eye colour and skin tone to see what shades suit them best, has roots which date right back to the 80s.
My personal wardrobe is a goth kid’s worst nightmare, featuring a technicolour explosion of colour, patterns and textures. I’ve always been fascinated by the power of colour, so when I was invited by Lisa to try out a colour analysis session, I was all in.
Boasting credentials which include training at London College of Style, Lisa launched Lisa Loves Style to help people with their confidence and style transformation. Her services include colour analysis, wardrobe edits, and personal shopping, while helping people find their inner style, so they can make better informed choices about what they wear each day.
“I work out where people feel stuck, where they feel like they're just wearing the same outfits on repeat. Or, when they just don't know how to wear colour, what colour suits them or how to dress for their body shape,” says Lisa.
Despite helping clients of all genders, Lisa says it’s often women who turn to her services more, stating that women generally wear 20% of their wardrobe 80% of the time.
“I'm on a real mission to change that.” Lisa explains, “For a lot of ladies, their body shape has changed significantly through having children, going through the menopause, or different life changes, and so it's really about getting back to finding their confidence again.”
But how does it all work? Ahead of the session, I was asked to fill out an online questionnaire, with questions including describing my style, my favourite outfit and preferred colours, to equip Lisa with a little more info before she meets me. Lisa believes that by understanding which colours work well with your features, it will enhance any outfit and in turn, make you feel more confident every time you step outside. And, even though she’s armed with claims that only
10% of people actually suit the colour black, Lisa does stress that it’s not about what colours you should wear, but rather her work is all about advising people on what colours might flatter them best, and making more considered choices about the clothes we wear.
“When people say, ‘Oh, no, I can't wear red’, there will be a tint that you can wear but it's just knowing which one,” Lisa says. “I always say to my clients, rules are there to be broken, and I'm giving you style tips and tools. It's not that you can't wear a colour, it's just that there are other more flattering colours for you.”
Once you know your few key colours, it’s a game changer. When you put your best colour on, that's where the magic happens
Lisa kicked off my session by asking me to describe my wardrobe in three words. I chose, ‘colourful’ ‘bold’ and ‘vibrant’ before moving on to the next stage which involved me choosing which style personality best described me, based on six different optionsromantic, chic, classic, natural, creative and dramatic.
I went with ‘creative’ and ‘dramatic’ before taking my seat for the draping to commence. Lisa always prefers to carry out her sessions in natural light so she can better see the effects the various shades have. Her technicolour arsenal of fabric drapes feature a multitude of hues, grouped into similar shades which she then drapes along each client’s shoulders, keeping the colours close to the chin and face.
“We're looking at your hair, your eyes, and your skin tone. We're looking to see that it has a really healthy glow, rather than if [a colour] makes you look tired or any lines or dark shadows appear,” explains Lisa. “You want to be in harmony with your whole skin tone rather than [a colour] bringing out any imperfections. You'll see, there'll be certain colours that make you shine, look radiant, and your eyes pop, but then there are others that will have the opposite effect as well.”
And the science goes further still, as once you’ve found what colours suit you best, Lisa says the next
step involves getting creative with the colour wheel to see which tones compliment your base tones well.
“If you want to put an outfit together or when you see something in a magazine, and you see a photo and you think, ‘Oh, gosh, she looks good,’ it’s often because it involves complementary colours which are often opposite in the colour wheel to each other,”
Lisa explains.
A believer in the psychological effects of colour too, Lisa states that colours hold the power to affect people’s mental state. It's a view that has gained traction in recent years too. You need only look at the #dopaminedressing hashtag on Instagram to see how others are using colour to enhance their moods and foster confidence and empowerment.
The result of my session? According to Lisa, my season is winter, and while I can’t say I’ll be changing my rainbow ways entirely, the session certainly got me thinking. I’ll most likely still be sporting a technicolour explosion of colours if you cross me on the street, but when next I reach for a new outfit, I’ll spare a thought for the impact those tones may have on my mind, mood and energy.
“I always say to people after they've had a colour analysis, please don't go out and buy a whole new wardrobe. My mission in life is to make women feel fabulous every single day,” says Lisa. “Once you know your few key colours, it’s a game changer. When you put your best colour on, that's where the magic happens. If you know what suits you, you can step outside and feel like yourself rather than feeling like the clothes are wearing you, or you're having to shrink behind something that's not you.”
For anybody who feels like they might have lost their way when it comes to their personal style, Lisa has some closing advice: “I would say colour is great, because it doesn't really matter what you wear, colour can really boost your mood.”
For more information about how colour could help transform your wardrobe, visit lisalovesstyle.com to read about her range of services. Q @lisa.loves.style
words: Addie Kenogbon photos: Sophie Gargett
Old Haunts
A Hard Act to Follow
Our city centre’s open spaces, parks and gardens, who put them there? Why have they not been built on? We heard about the 1845 Inclosure Act from June Perry, of the Friends of the Forest, which campaigns to protect Nottingham’s network of ancient green spaces, and organiser of the annual Inclosure Walk in the city.
You may not think it from walking through the city centre, but over 20% of Nottingham’s surface area is devoted to public parks and gardens. Places like the Arboretum, The Forest Recreation Ground, Robin Hood’s Chase, Victoria Park, and many more are all protected, free to visit areas of land, where residents and visitors can play, exercise, think and relax.
These green spaces were put there by the town council of Nottingham by the 1845 Inclosure Act, and we have enjoyed them ever since, although the memory of their origins have been largely forgotten. But what was the Inclosure Act, and how did it affect Nottingham?
Many think that Inclosure Acts were a stealing of land, or the use of land, from the poor peasants to the wealthy, but in most cases this was not true. Those who had ‘rights of common’ (putting your animals freely on the fields at prescribed times, or using the shared common pasture) differed from place to place, but the idea was very similar and well understood by those involved.
The land everywhere belonged to someone. That someone could be the local aristocrat, a charity such as a church or a school or, as was the case in Nottingham, many individuals. If not personally cultivated, it was let out, usually to farmers whose farm extended over multiple scattered plots. Although in Nottingham there were a few of these, the majority of the plots in 1845 were held by people growing grass to fuel their own or others’ horses and donkeys, or growing hay to see them through the winter. The much needed equivalents of the present car, bus and van were then all powered by horse or donkey and
words: CJ De Barra illustration: Natalie Owen
Welcome to Old Haunts our new monthly snippet where we delve into the hidden histories of some of Nottingham’s longlost venues, buildings and spaces in the city.
Lots of people will remember the Admiral Duncan pub or its alter ego @AD2. As the street formerly known as Coal Pit Lane was renamed Cranbrook Street in the mid-1930s, the original building was knocked down and a new pub built in its place. Coal Pit Lane was a very poor, working-class area once a main route into Nottingham for coal from local pits. The buildings were very cramped, damp and tightly packed. With most areas that were heavily residential at this time, there were a few pubs dotted around for locals. Like most of the houses, the pubs were pretty dark and damp.
On a warm day in June 1915, Admiral Duncan ran out of beer so the landlady Mrs Brooke sent a customer, Joseph Hague downstairs to get some for her. She was puzzled when he failed to return but decided to send William Williamson, who lived nearby on Lennox Street, downstairs to see where he was and grab some beer while he was there. He also failed to return. By now, she was presumably getting a bit spooked by the disappearing men so brought in some soldiers to help. Not as dramatic as it sounds, soldiers may have been drinking there or passing by as World War I had started in 1914.
The soldiers were unable to get into the cellar due to the overpowering gas and dampness. A fire brigade was called instead. The fire brigade used special helmets called Proto-fire helmets which had only been issued for the first time to Nottingham twelve months before. The helmets were created to protect miners allowing them to breathe easier underground. This was the first time that Nottingham firemen used breathing equipment. The men were safely brought back up to the surface with the landlady blaming the gas on a combination of ‘balm and damp.’
The Admiral Duncan is now Alleycat Tattoo Studio. Is there a Nottingham venue that you think we should do a historical deep dive into? Drop us an email at history@leftlion.co.uk and let us know where you think we should write about next!
these had to be fuelled and garaged by Nottingham’s fields and meadows.
We have in the Nottingham Archives 26 unusually detailed minute books for the commissioners’ meetings dealing with the act. These explain how Nottingham had been behaving like a rural village but in reality the area had boomed to an industrial town with different needs, the most obvious of which was housing. Surrounded by untouchable fields, the much increased population was squeezed into rooms and cellars which lacked water, ventilation, sewers and space. Evidence of these can still be seen on the west side of Mansfield Road, where many doors give access to alleys through to courts behind. The Act was created in order to free these fields for more building, and to ensure all future houses would have to be well built with their own yards and other essential features.
The Act required that a large amount of land should be kept to give the citizens the same access to fresh air and exercise which they might otherwise lose, and the town council chose the 130 acres as public walks and parks. While the commissioners worked diligently, later writers have blamed them for delays and mistakes, until a fresh look by Professor John Beckett in 1997 gave them, in ‘A Centenary History of Nottingham the credit they deserved.
‘Inclosure; 1845-65 of Nottingham’s Fields’ by June Perry, which shares the stories of Nottingham inhabitants, their uses of the land, and how the commissioners redistributed it, is available at Five Leaves Bookshop, along with the Nottingham Inclosure Walk Guide.
On the Hustle
Hockley Hustle hit Nottingham streets towards the end of October, with 400 artists playing fifty venues across Hockley, Sneinton and the Lace Market. This year, over 3000 people attended the arts and culture spectacular, which has raised over £220K for charity in its eighteen years. Along with a parade, street parties and activities for kids, the live performances were more diverse than ever, with music ranging from funk to folk, grime to grunge,and acoustic to alternative.
Standing in this place
The National Justice Museum has announced that £250,000 has been raised to begin the casting of the life-size statue ‘Standing in This Place’, which will be erected in the recently opened Green Heart public park next year. Designed by sculptor Rachel Carter, the piece will depict a female East Midlands mill worker and an enslaved African-American cotton field worker. The main idea of drawing this powerful parallel is to address the fact that less than 5% of British sculptures depict non-royal women.
Spontaneous sounds
TRUTH OR LEGEND?
October also saw two out-of-the-blue music events pop up in our city centre, with Pete Doherty of the Libertines playing an afternoon set at brand- new Sneinton Market recording studio and gig venue The Grove on 21 October. You might also have spotted an impromptu chip-shop rave on social media, which happened a few days later at Lace Market Fish Bar. The off-the-cuff party saw local grime and garage MC Window Kid and British DJ Nathan Dawe bring raving crowds spilling onto the streets. Did you solve last month’s riddle? The answer
Can you guess the answer to this Notts themed riddle?
My first is for leisure And drunken delights
The one with the rings And the lacking of light On my second you’ll rest Or visit a priest Or gather with friends To feast on a beast!
THE CASE OF Ned Ludd
Within our modern world of handy gadgets and technology, creative processes in production can be overlooked. All too often speed and standardisation are favoured over true value and fulfilment, leaving a lingering feeling that something, be it creativity, equity or happiness, is missing.
The Luddite movement marked a moment at which the British working classes became very aware of this fact. In the tumult of nineteenth century Britain, economic upheaval, technological advancement, and rapid city growth meant that leaders of the Notts textile industry sought to maximise production and reduce costs by introducing newer machinery with ‘wider frames’ that could be operated by unskilled, cheap labourers, and produce inferior quality products to satisfy increasing demand.
Feeling exploited and fearing for their livelihoods, a group of skilled Nottingham framework knitters took matters into their own hands and plotted to sabotage the machines which were threatening to put them out of the jobs they’d devoted years of their lives to.
The first attacks happened in March 1811, in Arnold, when 63 of the wide frames were destroyed by disgruntled hosiers. Over the following months this amorphous network of craftsmen and women saw to it that over a hundred frames were broken across Nottinghamshire, meeting in secret locations - their faces covered to avoid recognition - then dispersing into the night. Then in November 1811, six frames were smashed in Bulwell, and for the first time a name was attached to the threatening letters sent to factory owners. Ned Ludd had arrived and so began a nationwide conspiracy and movement of civil unrest.
The name of their illusive leader, rumoured to operate out of Sherwood Forest in homage to Nottingham’s champion of social justice Robin Hood, was itself a tongue in cheek taunt born out of an in-joke within the textile communities. The government however, didn’t catch this ironic intent, as attacks occurring throughout the Midlands and the North of England were attributed to this figure: alternately a King, Captain, and General all at once. Authorities were utterly convinced of the existence of General Ludd - a radical mastermind commanding illusive armies throughout the land. Various prominent working-class radicals were suspected, but no individual could be identified as the culprit. This use of an unseen but almost omnipresent leader gave the Luddites a sense of unity and ensured their captain would never be caught.
The need for the Luddite spirit is still highly relevant today as convenience and cost are held high above morality in industries such as food, clothing and cosmetics, while even the onset of AI brings to mind the need for individual, artistic integrity in the world of arts and culture. The protests of the Luddites should remind us that it is possible to live well with technology, but we must continue to question the way it shapes our lives and what can be lost through progress.
words: Sophie Gargett
best oF tHe montH
Nottingham Comedy Festival
When: Friday 1- Sunday 10 Nov
Where: Various venues
How much: Various prices
Now in its sixteen year, the Nottingham Comedy Festival is back to alleviate any seasonal gloom in November, with comedy talents from across the country scheduled for a visit to our city. Whatever humour tickles your funny bone, there will be something for you, from the absurd and surreal to the witty and insightful.
When: Saturday 16 Nov
Where: Theatre Royal
How much: From £35.50
From a career as one of England’s greatest cricketers to his new chapter as Sky Sports’ pundit and founder of ‘The Cat & Wickets Pub Company’, Stuart Broad brings his colourful personality from the pitch to the stage. Discussing highs and lows, Ashes and T20 World Cup glories, as well as the new challenges he faces beyond the boundary rope, this wicket night is sure to bowl cricket fans over.
Fireworks, Bonfire, and Bands
When: Saturday 9 Nov | 4pm
Where: Old Hall Farm, Newark
How much: £21.50 (concessions available)
Where have all the bonfires gone? They’ve gone to Newark, apparently. Enjoy a traditional night of fireworks and fun, with added musical fun. Kicking off with a chilled open mic before some of Notts’ best musical acts take the stage, including Ricky Jamaraz, Office Goth, Wilf Spiv & the Collective, Wizards Can’t Be Lawyers and Rights For Flies. All ages welcome, under 14s free. Wrap up warm!
When: Tuesday 19 Nov
Where: Rescue Rooms
How much: £20
Following the release of their fifth studio album Pull The Rope and numerous electrifying festival slots, the mighty Ibibio Sound Machine play Rescue Rooms this month. The cool charisma of Nigerian singer Eno Williams mixed their fusion of West-African funk, disco, modern post-punk and electro sounds ensures every Ibibio gig is an exciting, experimental and very danceable affair.
Disney on Ice
When: Thurs 14 - Sun 17 Nov
Where: Motorpoint Arena
How much: From £30
Relive your childhood dreams as Mickey Mouse and his Disney friends embark onRoad Trip Adventures, a wild ride through favourite Disney destinations with unexpected hijinks. See characters from Moana, Frozen, The Lion King, Toy Story 4, Aladdin, and your favourite Disney Princesses glide on the ice and create some magical new memories.
When: Thursday 14 Nov
Where: Metronome
How much: From £17.25
From ‘sparkling pop backdrops’ to ‘gothic harmonic unease’ is how Metronome have described the music of Alfie Templeman, who plays there this month following the release of his second album Radiosoul. His first record Mellow Moon was praised by the likes of The Guardian and NME so we’re excited to hear what’s next from this star who’s countless sold out headline shows have been captivating worldwide audiences.
UB40 Soul II Soul
When: Thursday 21 Nov
Where: Motorpoint Arena
How much: From £46
Hot off the heels of their 45 year celebration tour, the world’s biggest selling reggae band UB40 return to Nottingham. Led by the energising presence of vocalist Matt Doyle, enjoy listening to classic hits including Red Red Wine, Kingston Town and Food For Thought Joining them are two-time Grammy Award winners Soul II Soul, who began as a soundsystem before releasing tracks such as Back 2 Life, and Keep on Movin’, plus lots more.
Live Wrestling
When: Friday 29 Nov
Where: Old Cold Store
How much: £10
‘Think Little Britain meets Vic and Bob meets a smattering of Tommy Cooper and then lower your expectations and get on board’ is how Notts wrestling academy House of Pain have described this night. Hosted by cult favourite Angelos Epithemiou (Shooting Stars, Dave’s One Night Stand and Channel 4’s The Angelos Epithemiou Show) and with Castle Rock beer on tap, this sounds like a wild night of very serious sports.
