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Open Farm Sunday this weekend at Rowley Farm near Slough

If you’ve ever tasted the locally grown beef sold on occasions by Tony Luckhurst in Melbourne Avenue you’ll know it is absolutely delicious – it melts in the mouth. The beef will almost certainly have come from Rowley Farm near Slough, which is pretty local for West Ealing.

Rowley Farm lies three miles north of Slough and is home to three generations of the Whitby family. As well as the beef cattle, the farm grows various cereal crops and is now part of Natural England’s Higher Level Stewardship Scheme, so looking after the wildlife is a key part of the farm’s role.

This Sunday (12th June) is Open Farm Sunday when the farm is open to the public from 10am to 5pm. There are tractor and trailer rides along with children’s activities, a live band and hot food. You can watch the cows being milked at 2pm and meet the other animals – calves, chickens and a pony.

Contact details:  Black Park Road, Wexham, Slough SL3 6DR. Tel: John Whitby 07768 473787 or email john@rowleyfarm.co.uk.

Entrance is free.Parking is £2.50. No booking needed.

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Very enjoyable history of modern art talk last night at OPEN Ealing

I went to second in a series of history of modern art talks last night at OPEN Ealing. Admittedly, the  talks are given by an artist friend of mine Nick Pearson but he’s always been a good talker and I really enjoyed hearing about the radical impact of the Impressionists and Post Impressionists and how they were rubbished by the press at the time in much the same way as modern artists now.

I’d never realised the impact of Japan on 19th century art and how the influence was initially through some goods imported from the newly opened up Japan being wrapped up in copies of prints by Japanese artists. It’s odd how seemingly trivial things can end up having an enormous influence.  Japanese art was very different to Western art. It was more stylised and, for example, whilst Western art would have its main subject clearly visible and obvious, Japanese art might have its subject, such as Mount Fuji, almost tucked away discreetly in the distance.

I also enjoyed hearing that Constable’s painting The Haywain, which is now used on biscuit tins and goodness knows what else, was one of the most radical paintings of its time. It caused a sensation in Paris when exhibited in 1824 and was praised for its honest depiction of a contemporary rural scene. And it had a major influence on artists and contributed to the birth of Impressionism.  Strange how what was once a ground-breaking painting of a rural scene can a century or so later become almost a cliche of a romantic rural idyll.

The talks (12 in total) will take us up to the ‘Young British Artists’ of the late 20th century so there’s lots to go yet. They are every Thursday evening from 7-9pm at OPEN Ealing (113 Uxbridge Road) and cost £7.50 each. So you can always dip in and out if there’s something you particularly want to hear about.

David Highton

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The history of Northfields station

 

Northfield Avenue in 1903 with a cart going south towards the bridge over the railway line

In his second post on local history David Shailes gives a brief history of  Northfields station.

The stretch of line from Acton Town (then called Mill Hill Park) to Hounslow was opened in 1883 by the Hounslow and Metropolitan Railway. The motivation behind its opening was property speculation in the Spring Grove area of Isleworth and the line passed through open countryside. At the time what we know as Northfields was farm land, so no station was provided and the nearest being at South Ealing and Boston Road (Boston Manor).

The line was a sleepy steam-hauled branch line, which was electrified in June 1905 as part of the modernisation of the Metropolitan District Railway (MDR). By the time a station was provided in April 1908 housing development in Northfields had been underway for some time. In 1911 it was renamed Northfields & Little Ealing. The station was on the opposite side of the road to the current station and at platform level the canopies and fixtures were of a similar style to those that remain at Boston Manor today.

By now the MDR was part of the Underground Group (UG) and the District Line with its many branches was becoming severely taxed in terms of line capacity. So the UG resolved to extend the Piccadilly line from Hammersmith to Acton Town and for the Hounslow and South Harrow services to be transferred to the Piccadilly Line. This was funded by a cheap loan provided in 1929 by the Government for the purpose of alleviating unemployment.

Northfields was chosen as the site of a ‘Car Shed’ which required considerable earth moving. Work started in 1931 and the four tracks from Acton Town to Northfields along with the new Northfields Station, in the handsome ‘Adams, Holden & Pearson’ style on its current site, opened in December 1932. Piccadilly Line trains had reached Hounslow West in February 1932 and took over all services (sharing peak hours with the District) in March 1933. As part of further service changes in October 1964 the last District Line train ran to Hounslow West and the line became exclusively used by the Piccadilly services.

David Shailes

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West Ealing food blogger listed for blogging prize

Following on from the success of West Ealing garden designer Lesley Faux at the Chelsea Flower Show , it’s now congratulations now to West Ealing food blogger Katie Bryson (thanks to Ealing Today for spotting this story). Katie’s blog Feeding boys and a firefighter has been shortlisted for The Mum and Dad (MAD) blog awards.

Katie’s blog has been shortlisted in the Best Food Blog category. Visit www.the-mads.com for more information and how to vote.

David Highton

 

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Invite to launch of new art exhibition at OPEN Ealing on Friday

OPEN Ealing is launching its second contemporary art exhibition this Friday evening from 6.30-9pm. Please do come along. We ask you to bring an open mind and your imagination with you!

The exhibition is entitled Insert Title Here and we have  asked people to give us written descriptions of how they see particular works of art or images and put these on the gallery walls. What we are asking visitors to do is to use their imagination to interpret these descriptions in their own way and, with our help, produce your version of any one of the descriptions. So, for example, one description is ‘Something too beautiful to describe’. How would you interpret that? Others descriptions are more ‘traditional’, so there is something here for everyone. We will then collect these interpretations and use them as the basis for this exhibition and build up these images in the gallery over the exhibition’s three-week run.

OPEN Ealing is at 113 Uxbridge Road (opposite the fire station) and its number is 020 8579 5558.

David Highton

 

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Why do people shop in West Ealing? A recent survey gives some answers

‘Why do people shop in West Ealing?’ is the title of a survey late last year of 400 shoppers carried out by Brunel University on behalf of Ealing Council.  The answer – buying food is the main reason people come to shop in West Ealing, but there’s a good deal more valuable information in the results of this survey than  this one answer.

The final report is 20 pages long but here are some of the key findings from this survey:

What’s good about shopping in West Ealing:

1. Buying food was the main reason for people shopping in West Ealing.

2. Buying specific non-food items came second

3. Eating and socialising ranked third as a reason to come to West Ealing

Overall, West Ealing is liked for its varied, multi-cultural location that is good for food shopping, pubs, eating and socialising.

What needs to be improved about shopping in West
Ealing:
1. Better shop fronts

2. Improved cleanliness

3. Better safety and security

Interestingly, in an entry last December in his shopping blog (www.soultsretailview.co.uk/2010/12),  expert retail analyst Graham Soult sees independent shops as West Ealing’s brightest hope. He writes:

‘Arguably, it’s West Ealing’s independent shops that give it the
brightest hope for the future. Walking through, despite the visible problems,
the area has a cosmopolitan and colourful feel, with ethnic food shops
displaying their wares in the street. The West Ealing weekly farmers’ market
in  Leeland Road – which seemed to be well advertised when I visited – also adds to the area’s reputation as a mecca for foodies, and is apparently its trump card in attracting shoppers from other parts of London.’

WEN has been arguing for some years that West Ealing is a great place for food shopping and that we need to build on this strength as a central part of any plan to regenerate the high street. We’d love to hear your views about our shops.  Use our forum to tell us where locally you like to buy your food, why and what you’d recommend others to try out.

David Highton

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West Ealing garden designer helps win gold medal at Chelsea Flower Show

I have to declare a personal interest in this as my wife Elizabeth also had a small role in this story. West Ealing garden designer Lesley Faux of Designed Gardens played a key role in Korean designer Jihae Hwang’s Hae-woo-so (Emptying one’s mind) garden which not only won a gold medal but also was voted best garden in the Artisan garden category at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show.

Lesley has spent the past few months busily sourcing a wide range of unusual plants for this garden and then, with a little help and moral support from my wife, spent a good deal of last week laying out and planting this unusual garden which has as its central feature a Korean toilet. The RHS website describes the garden as follows:

‘Hae-woo-so is the Korean word for the traditional Korean
toilet. The inspiration behind the garden is that for centuries the Korean
people believed that going to the toilet was a cathartic experience and
considered it to be highly spiritual.

The wild flowers and vintage look of the toilet building are key
elements of this predominantly green-toned garden. The pathway to the toilet
from the garden’s entrance is also a significant feature; the process of
emptying one’s mind takes place on the walk through the centre of the peaceful
garden, enjoying the beauty of nature.’

Congratulations to Lesley. Oh, and somehow or other we’ve ended up with about 12 tea plants so watch out for West Ealing grown tea at some future date!

David Highton

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Is drug dealing a problem in West Ealing? Tell us what you think.

The post on the Ealing Today website about blatant drug dealing on the streets of West Ealing has set us thinking again about how to tackle this problem. I’m told the CCTV cameras along the Uxbridge Road have simply pushed the drug dealing onto the side streets.

We’re interested to know what people  think so that we can take this up again with our local Safer Neighbourhood police teams.  Please leave a comment to let us know your thoughts and experiences.

 

David Highton

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Origins of some West Ealing street names

Local historian David Shailes writes that when the streets of Ealing were originally laid out the landowners and property developer got to choose the names, so the reasons for their choices are generally not recorded and are lost in the mist of time. Researching street names is interesting for lots of reasons as some have names of local historical interest, others have no local connections and some are linked to events in history.

The length of this article (published in our May newsletter) means that we can only scratch the surface of the 200 odd roads that have a W13 post code.

A set of my personal favourites are the Australian named roads: Adelaide Road, Brisbane Road, Sydney Road and Melbourne Avenue and these were all on land developed by the Steel family and it is known that Charles Steel whose market garden at one stage made him the largest rate payer in Ealing, went to Australia to see how they did things down under. So this may be the reason they have such names.

Loveday Road takes it name from William Lockyer Loveday, who owned land in Ealing, but lived in Devon, which he left in 1860 to start a new life in the State of Illinos in the USA. His son eventually became the owner of what was called the Loveday Estates and these were sold in 1896 for £60,000, a considerable sum of money. The St Kilda and Marder Estates, have also given their names to two roads.

Horticulture gave us Leeland Road andTerrace, as these stand on part of the land that once was part of Charles Lee & son’s Ealing nursery, they had other nurseries in Hammersmith (The Olympia Exhibition hall stands on the site), Feltham, Isleworth and Hounslow. They used the site to grow fruit trees, roses and shrubs.

As a child I lived in Green Avenue and never gave the street name a second thought as there are no other streets named after colours nearby. It appears that the name relates to a H.C. Green who was the very first mayor of the Borough of Ealing in 1901/2. Next to this road is Cranmer Avenue that runs up to St Paul’s Church and on the opposite side is Ridley Avenue, which take their names from two Protestant Martyrs burnt at the stake by Mary Tudor (Queen 1553 to 1558).

The 1777 parish map reveals that North Field Lane (now Northfield Avenue) and Mattock Lane have been with us for over 200 years. My mother who lived in Ealing right up until her death in 1983 always referred to going shopping as up the “lane” meaning Northfield Avenue. Drayton Green existed as a small community on this map, which gave its names to several nearby roads.

Green Man Lane took its name from an old coaching inn on the Uxbridge Road, the second world war damaged pub being rebuilt in the 1950’s was demolished in 1981 and replaced by the block which Iceland is now in. The inn existed on the 1777 map and was an important stabling facility for over 100 horses on the London to Oxford road and on further west to Fishguard  (No A40 in those days!).

(to be continued)

David Shailes

There are more articles about West Ealing’s history in our bi-monthly newsletters. You will get these automatically emailed to you if you become a member of WEN. It’s free to join and details of how to join are on our website. Or visit our website and you’ll find links to the last few newsletters on our home page – www.westealingneighbours.org.uk