Andrew Whitehead

I can never walk past Blustons in Kentish Town High Street without having a peek into their commodious window displays. It is simply window shopping. At the moment, it can't be much else. The shop - a wonderful throwback to the inter-war years which I have blogged about before - is currently closed for its annual holidays. I haven't decided whether shutting down in mid-February for your hols is inspired or the opposite.

Walking past this weekend with my camera - which in technical and graphic calibre, is a good match for the photographer - I took a couple of shots which I rather like. Setting Blustons' very keenly priced 'classic ladies' clothing' against the reflections of the high street. See what you think.

I've lived strolling distance from Kentish Town High Street for longer than I care to remember, but still there are fresh delights to discover.

'The Wine Cellar' has a distinctly humdrum appearance - but inside there's a small cafe selling Portuguese pastries. It's also a delicatessen. And downstairs there's a sizeable wine cellar - all Portuguese.

It's a friendly family run business. I went there for a wine tasting just before Christmas - and went back to try the cafe just this morning. The pastries - some shown below - were wonderful: fresh, firm and beguilingly sweet.

I remember eating pastries just like these - still warm from the oven - at Belem, just outside Lisbon.

The Wine Cellar is just below Owl, near the junction with Prince of Wales Road. I am sure many of you have known all about it for years. So - why didn't you spread the word!??

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  I may be coming late to the party, but I have only just found out that the great Peggy Seeger once wrote a song about a big rent strike and bust-up here in Kentish Town.

I owe this 32-carat nugget  to the broadcaster and oral historian Alan Dein, who has spoken to veterans of the rent strike. And of course, there's a good story behind the song.

Back in the summer of 1960, a long standing grievance among tenants of the borough of St Pancras brewed up into an almighty row. It reached a climax in September when two tenants - yes, 'Cook and Rowe', Don Cook and Arthur Rowe - sought to challenge eviction orders by barricading themselves in their flats. They used bedsteads, barbed wire and a remarkable number of old pianos to keep police and bailiffs at bay.

_The key battle ground was at Kennistoun House on Leighton Road, where there is to this day a plaque 'in memory of Don Cook and the rent battles of 1959-1964'.

One evening in late September, hundreds of police descended on Kennistoun House. Yes, literally - breaking into one of the flats through the roof. A large crowd quickly assembled in support of the rent strikers.

The photo below - which Alan Dein sent me - shows Peter Richards (like Cook, a former soldier and a CP'er) addressing a meeting in support of the rent strike.

You can get a marvellous sense of the drama, and the level of political engagement, in a wonderful Pathe news reel of the rent strike available to view on line, Eviction Battle On! It features both Don Cook and Arthur Rowe.

The forced evictions and protests they triggered were big news - and clearly attracted the attention of Peggy Seeger, who wrote 'Hey Ho, Cook and Rowe' and recorded it with Ewan MacColl. If you click on the arrow below, you can here the full recording - posted here with Peggy Seeger's blessing - distinctly dated, but wonderfully so. And below there's a taste of the lyrics - you can find them in full, with much other background, here:

CLICK ON THE ARROW  BELOW TO HEAR  'Hey Ho, Cook and Rowe'

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HEY HO! COOK AND ROWE!
(or: The Landlord's Nine Questions)
Words and Music by Peggy Seeger

As true a story I'll relate
(With a) HEY HO! COOK AND ROWE!
How the landlord told Don Cook one night,
(With a) HEY HO! COOK AND ROWE!
You must answer questions nine
(With a) HEY HO! COOK AND ROWE!
To see if your flat is yours or mine
(With a) HEY HO! COOK AND ROWE!

CHORUS:
Hey, ho, tell them no
With a barb-wire fence and a piano,
Took a thousand cops to make them go,
Three cheers for Cook and Rowe!

What is higher than a tree? (With a, etc.)
And what is lower than a flea?
My rent is higher than a tree,
And the landlord's lower than a flea.
(CHORUS)

Normally, this site gets about 200 hits a day. I call that pretty respectable. Today, so far (and it's still afternoon), there have been 1,736 hits - and counting. All thanks to Giles Coren who, as @gilescoren, has 82,478 followers for his tweets. (As @john_pether I have precisely 128).

He took a liking to a piece on the blog - scroll down and take a glance at 'A Kentish Town resurrection' - and even more so to the kebab shop it's about. And the world, or a fair cross-section, followed his gaze.

A short six hours ago he tweeted:

gilescoren Giles Coren what's that very new, posh-ish, Victorian-looking kebab shop on Kentish Town Road called? Any idea of its address and phone number?

And then a few minutes later:

gilescoren Giles Coren right, it's called E.Mono and THIS is why it's brilliant: andrewwhitehead.net/1/post/2011/11… it will be my Xmas eve review and is going to be HUGE.

The review will be, as I understand it, in The Times. And as much about the sign board as the kebabs - though apparently they are pretty good too.

It's the best piece of High Street conservation I've seen in a long time.

I've blogged before about the wonderful shop signage which came to light during renovation on Kentish Town High Street recently. I feared and expected that the last trace of 'E. Mono - For Value' would quickly be obliterated.

I was wrong. The kebab shop which has now opened at 287 Kentish Town Road has not only kept the signage. It's adopted the name.

'E. Mono' lives again!

I put my head in the door this morning as I was taking these photographs. And the man gently prising a shish kebab into a piece of pitta confirmed that the name was taken from the old signage - there was no one by the name of Mono involved in the new business.

But they have certainly adopted the old name with enthusiasm. There's a pub style signboard with the name - it's on the engraved glass in the shop front, and in the tiling of the counter.

What an admirable piece of historical continuity amid the ephemeral businesses of a fairly anonymous high street. I for one will be buying a few 'freshly prepared kebab wraps' from the place simply to support this initiative.

It still begs the question: in what sort of business did E. Mono provide such value? My earlier blog prompted a response from Angela, who is keen to find out more because one of her forbears ran an adjoining shop. She's found the accompanying entry in a phone book from the late 1920s, which I post here with her permission.

Now, over to you. Commercial directories and other sources should provide an answer. My guess - given that among the other "Mono" entries in the phone book was a tailor and a costumier - is that this was either a tailoring business or a garment shop. But it is simply a guess. I am hoping that a reader of this blog will be able to tell us more.

I've walked past Blustons hundreds of times. It has the most striking shop front on Kentish Town High Street. By quite a way. Today, my curiosity took me inside.

Blustons has been here since the 1920s. It has huge glass displays - as you can see. They take up half the total floor space or more. Dated, conservative - but not at all tawdry or mildewed. The "ladies clothing" is bright, stylish (if not entirely in style), and to my lay eye appears excellent value.

Inside, there are wonderful sepia portraits of the founders (you can see them in Kim Cunningham's photo here, along with the current proprietor, apparently the grandson)  - and cuttings about 'the shop time forgot', and similar. Otherwise, it's fairly austere. Not much in the way of shop fittings. Just half-a-dozen or so racks. And a friendly welcome. The shop wasn't exactly doing a roaring trade for a Saturday lunchtime - but I wasn't the only customer.

Blustons backs on to the most hidden and atmospheric Kentish Town locality - the Crimean quarter. Alma, Inkerman, Raglan and Cathcart (the last two were British military commanders) Streets were built shortly after the Crimean war, and have survived largely in tact. Willes - of Willes Road nearby - was another Crimean general.

Amid these streets is a pub, 'The Crimea'. At least, it was a pub. The building's been turned into flats, but charmingly the signboard survives. A rather distinguished representation of the Crimean war.

This blog has been illustrated with photos from other sites. My thanks to the London Shop Fronts site, to photographer Kim Cunningham whose own website is well worth a visit, and Ewan Munro's photostream for the 'Crimea' pub sign.

'E. Mono, For Value'. This wonderfully evocative shop sign on Kentish Town High Street has just resurfaced for one last gasp of air. The site has recently been a cafe. Now it's being spruced up, and the renovation work has uncovered this old sign from  half-a-century or more ago.

It is marvellous that such mementoes of the past can be retrieved. And immensely sad that, in all likelihood, the last trace of this old high street business will soon disappear for ever.

A web search has revealed no information at all about this shop. 'Mono' is a very unusual surname. But what business did E. Mono conduct here? In what trade did he provide 'value'? And when did the shop close down?

If anyone has an old trade directory to hand - or perhaps a half-hour to spare in the local library - then do share what you discover.

UPDATE - 8th October 2011: I walked past this site today - the old sign is still there and spruced up. One of the developers told me that they plan to incorporate it in the new shop facade. Good one!