Past and future beautifully merge

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 02/11/2019 (1917 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

LONDON — I used to cry when i was a kid and my Dad took to me to the barber. I loved my hair long. I don’t have a lot left on the top of my head, but the last couple of years I’ve grown it out on my face. A trip the barber today is a much more enjoyable experience and I’d been brimming with anticipation over this particular appointment.

Carl Taylor appreciates a good beard. He just wishes he could grow one. He has to settle for living vicariously through those of us who can.

A Creative Lead Barber at the Murdock London location in Seven Dials, on this particular morning Carl’s client is a journalist from Canada who is doing a story on the quaint village located in the epicentre of London’s Covent Garden neighborhood.

Carl greets me with a warm smile as I enter the shop on a crisp and sunny Monday morning. The shop is as I would imagine — a decor in the room that oozes a old school style.

Murdock London has eight locations in the British capital and for a little over a decade has sold itself as masters of grooming for the modern, style conscious man — offering a contemporary take on the traditional barbershop experience. Their brand nods to the finest barbershops of Victorian London and the English way of doing things; meticulous attention to detail and inherent good manners.

After I take a seat in what is the most proper and luxurious barber chair ever, Carl asks about my beard.

I typically get it trimmed every two or three weeks, but it’s been about six weeks since my last tidying — deciding to let it grow out and get a little shaggy in advance of my visit to Murdock.

I tell him that I first started growing it while on a trip to Israel — he likes that. I tell him how I’ve maintained it. He sees a lot of beards and gives mine a definitive nod of approval. Then, he tells me what he’d like to do — thin out the sides a bit and tidy it up a bit underneath. He likes the length on the end of my chin. I had previously decided I’d just go with the whatever was suggested, so I give him the go-ahead to do his thing.

Carl tells me about growing up in South London and I tell him a little but about Winnipeg as he waves his clippers like an artist would stroke his paintbrush. He confesses how he had grown a beard for three months but then one day while trying on a suit at Top Man, he saw how the hair on his face was so thin a beam of light went right through it. ‘It had to go right then and there,’ he laughs. Now, he just helps the rest of us with ours.

When he’s done, Carl shows me what he’s done, gets my thumbs up, and then offers me a few tips for making sure my beard stays in tip top shape — beard shampoo and moisturizer being a big key.

Of course he helps me on with my coat, we shake hands and I head out feeling ready to conquer the day.

 

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The area of Seven Dials was once one of London’s most notorious slums.

MP Thomas Neale, who laid out the area in the early 1690s aimed to establish Seven Dials as the most fashionable address in London, following in the footsteps of the successful Covent Garden Piazza development earlier that century. Unfortunately, the area failed to establish itself as he hoped and deteriorated into a slum.

In the early 18th century, the area was home to alternative medicine, occultism and astrologers — attracted to the area by the sundial and the star street layout. The original sundial was removed in 1773 as it was thought to have become a meeting point for undesirables.

In the 19th century, the Victorian era defined a division of class types and even those who considered themselves respectable working men barely made enough in a week to pay their rent and provide for their families. The poor swarmed around Covent Garden taking what jobs they could find and the area sucked in people looking for casual work in the market. They were able to find cheap lodging houses in Seven Dials. With the poverty came crime and Seven Dials was said to be so dangerous at night that people often hired sedan chairs to avoid having to walk out in the open. Pickpockets were abundant, but the greatest night-time threats were the various gangs that made their home in the area.

In the book London in the Sixties by Donald Shaw, he says: “The walk through the Dials after dark was an act none but a lunatic would have attempted.”

Things are very different today: It’s a place where the past and the future beautifully merge.

In 1974, Seven Dials was declared a conservation area as its unique design and original streets made it one of the most richly historical areas of London. Today, over 25 percent of its buildings are listed.

A new sundial was erected in 1988 and Seven Dials has had a steady resurgence over the last few decades. Today, it is famed for its mixture of niche shops and restaurants — seven streets of independent boutiques, heritage brands, British and international labels, indulgent beauty and grooming salons alongside luxury hotels and award winning theatre shows.

Recent milestones in Seven Dials’ heritage include three blue plaques, which mark two great landmarks in its colourful history: one above 13 Monmouth Street where former Beatles manager Brian Epstein ran his successful management company; the second at the location of the animation, editing and recording studios of Monty Python; and the most recent at on the building where legendary London punk venue The ROXY Club was located. The ROXY Club was the only venue in London dedicated to promoting and supporting punk music from 1976-78 and was renowned for launching the musical careers of several inspiring punk bands including The Clash, The Heartbreakers, The Police, The Damned, Siouxsie & the Banshees, Generation X and the Buzzcocks.

Gautam Sinha is the founder and creative director of Nappa Dori, a brand of luggage, bags and leather accessories established in Delhi in 2010 that is reminiscent of glamorous travel from a bygone era.

The brand had expanded to nine locations in India, but Sinha wanted to open a store in London and embarked on an extensive search to find the ideal location. Over a cup of delicious chai tea, Sinha told me how Seven Dials was the ideal spot for his new venture.

“We wanted to be in a place where people were interested in homegrown brands,” he said. “Someone with a more acquired taste. That’s the type of clients we were looking for and Seven Dials is perfect. It’s such a unique place.”

 

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Seven Dials Market is the area’s latest dining destination. Opened in September, the ex-banana warehouse features talented entrepreneurs feeding Londoners something special, every day of the week.

Street food connoisseur KERB, which currently counts another five outdoor markets around the capital, has ventured indoors with a common area space that very much reminded me of the common area at The Forks.

A total of 25 food and drink vendors showcase their wares, with the space divided into two areas: Cucumber Lane focuses on London-based produce while Banana Warehouse hosts the street food traders and new restaurants.

Diners can tuck in at pink Italian terrazzo marble counters while sitting on orange leather stools and an electric pink elevator is a novel way to move between the market’s multiple floors.

Visitors can also take a seat at the world’s first cheese conveyer belt — Pick & Cheese.

My lunch was a daily special tagliatelle bolognese from Strozzapretti and a to-die for 7 Dials burger – seven cuts of meat including slow-cooked pigs head.

There is no shortage of unique dining options in Seven Dials: Delicious Indian food at Punjab, the oldest North Indian restaurant in the UK; Rosa’s Thai Cafe that sits in a converted three-story Georgian townhouse; and Flesh and Buns, a Japanese Izakaya restaurant specializing in DIY steamed hirata buns to name just a few.

The show stopper for me was lunner one late afternoon before attending the theatre at Tredwells. (You know lunner right? The meal consumed between lunchtime and dinnertime, consisting of food items from the respective meals.)

Located on the edge of Seven Dials on the bustling Upper St Martin’s lane, Tredwell’s dishes up contemporary British cooking.

Seated at a lovely window table where I could people watch on a now-drizzly London afternoon, I was served the most delicious three-course meal: chargrilled prawns in a corn chowder to start; a chargrilled hanger steak with a side of truffled mac and cheese for a main; and an in-house made salted caramel soft serve ice cream with honeycomb for dessert. The pre-theatre menu has a wide variety of choices and will set you back a reasonable — for London — 30 pounds.

 

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The final act to this particular amazing day in Seven Dials is to slightly exit the area to attend a play in London’s famous West End.

The Noel Coward theatre is a short stroll down St Martins Lane and on this night, I had the great pleasure of seeing Clive Owen give a magnificent performance in a stirring presentation of Tennessee Williams’s Night of the Iguana.

As I depart the theatre at just after 10 pm and saunter back to my hotel, I take a seat on the edge of the dials monument and appreciate both the great history of the area and the vibrance and energy of it today.

 

steve.lyons@freepress.mb.ca

Travel safe and sleep tight

HOW TO GET THERE

Both Air Canada and WestJet fly to London with connections through various Canadian cities — most commonly Calgary, Toronto and Montreal. WestJet also has direct flights to London in the summer months — it’s a great flight if you go at that time. Air Canada arrives at Heathrow and WestJet flies into Gatwick. Both airports have express trains into the city that I highly recommend.

GETTING AROUND

The London underground — referred to as the Tube — is excellent and easily gets you to all the major attractions. The water taxi on the Thames is also a great way to get from one end of the city to the other — and the view is significantly better. Get yourself an Oyster card, a quick and easy way to pay for travel on public transport in London. Buy your card before you leave home and save money with special offers.

WHERE TO STAY

The Radisson Blu Edwardian, Mercer Street hotel is a distinctive building in Seven Dials that fits in perfectly with its surroundings. The rooms are luxurious and the breakfast buffet is more than scrumptious. And in an ideal location for visiting the village.

Premier Inn London Waterloo is a terrific modern budget hotel, just a few minutes’ walk from the London Eye, that has clean, pleasant rooms with comfortable beds.