The developer of the land previously used for car parking (see picture) is making what seems to be a pig-headed attempt to remove important conditions placed on the planning permission finally granted on appeal in March this year. Despite the planning inspector making it clear that, in order to preserve the character of the conservation area, conditions are needed in respect of external materials such as roof slates, rainwater goods, render finishes and window frames. A further planning application BH2023/01843 has been submitted in the hope that cheap and no doubt nasty materials can be used to maximise the developer’s profit. The Council’s Heritage Team has inevitably recommended refusal.
Red Pillar Box Blues
The MP for Pavilion has been in correspondence with Royal Mail over its decommissioning of the pillar box (see picture) outside the T@the Dials café in Dyke Road. During the Covid pandemic this was designated a “priority post box” but has been decommissioned for more than a year. According to Royal Mail, the café owners claim ownership of the land on which the pillar box is situated and will not allow the box to be removed (and perhaps re-positioned) during the working day. This would seem to be an unreasonable stance; the café has, after all, been allowed to use the pavement, which it clearly does not own, to place its tables, chairs, and planters. The loss of what was probably the most convenient pillar box for many West Hill residents is further depressing news about a postal service which fails to deliver (and now fails to collect).
Reasons to be cheerful
Homes in Clifton Street and Compton Avenue have been restored and are now enhancing the character of the West Hill conservation area.
The pictures below of 2, Clifton Street show the front elevations before and after the works were carried out. The disfiguring of the original façade probably occurred in the latter part of the last century. The balcony in particular is now an attractive feature.
At no 18 Compton Avenue the flint and brick front wall has been repaired, and new cast iron railings set in particularly good stone coping. The balcony has been reinstated, the steps refurbished and the garden replanted.
Artist Dotty found himself interviewing me after hearing about my mission to run up and down every street in Brighton and accidentally join the London to Brighton marathon for the British Heart Foundation. But after I stopped prattling on about myself for 10 days and whinging that BBC comedy had relocated to Manchester, normal interviewing procedures resumed play with Artist Dotty.
Creased coffee stained journo pad on table, with naff pencil and dried up pen, I asked: So Artist Dotty what have you being doing recently? “Listening to you banging on” came the reply. Artist Dotty seemed disgruntled and proceeded, in a confessional way, to spew out his recent new direction at embracing AI digital art.
AD2023 was on the one hand singing the praises on new AI art and its fantastic capabilities and on the other hand looking facially perplexed, as if his face was saying, “Have I sold out as an art purist to the power of technology?”
He proceeded to tell me that pitching art concepts is now far easier, but was a touch upset when he discussed a digital piece that was generated on the strength of a prompt description. The description read as follows:
“An architect-style Dotty art gallery, with a space age Dotty band, jamming music”. Within seconds the piece auto generated, through the multiplex dottyverse algorithm and produced a fantastic piece of digital art.
Dotty explained how he racked his brain to try to multiprocess the digital art in order to put his own artistic stamp on the composition. Then he came to a resigned conclusion, that the piece held its own as a visually great piece of art and narrative.
Dotty began breaking up his wooden coffee stirrer and dropped each piece in his drink, as if to demonstrate an act of defiance and disdain at a robot creating a robot band and kicking the artist out of his arty processes. AD2023 was also concerned about the future of media and journalism; any number of fake scenarios could go out with photorealistic AI dark web wizardry. “Is there not a board of ethics by now?”
The other side of the AD2023 coin is that his responses for his new strand of art, is causing quite a stir.
The other day AD2023, while musing in Powis Square, it recreated the Royal Pavillion as a piece of digital art, with colourful Dotty designs on the side. This caused a class war debate on the Facebook page, Keep Brighton Weird, proving if nothing else, that there’s still life in the old prankster.
The last time I cooked for Lee Marvin, we ate snake. I was sceptical. He was adamant. As ever he was right, the reptile was excellent. But then it would have to be, if it were to be cooked for one of the greatest men of the 20th century. Actor, lover, fighter. Man of action. Man of few words.
Every man alive, without exception, secretly wishes he were Lee Marvin.
The day I cooked for him, we were riding the sierra that ran through his ranch. He was an incomparable caballero. He could do anything on a horse. He taught me to ride and whilst I can handle myself, I will never come close to his horsemanship.
We had started at dawn, after a breakfast of beans and coffee and stopped every so often, dropping from our horses, fully clothed, into the cool, clear water that pooled in the bends of the creeks we passed. It helped wash away the sweat of the long riding and nights of heavy drinking under stars that were engaged in celestial shootouts.
The sun was getting low in the sky and I watched as he leaned down out of his saddle, fully extended his arm and picked up a stone the size of a wolf’s testicle. He hoisted himself back up and twisted round and threw the stone straight at me.
Luckily, he wasn’t actually aiming at me. He was aiming at a snake in a tree we were passing. A diamondback, he told me later.
Nasty snake, bad bite – was how he put it.
He hit the snake fully on the head and killed it outright.
He drew to a halt and dismounted, walked over and toed the inert, defunct mother of all sin. As soon as the boot made contact with the snake, it sprang back into action. Not to back life, just action. It was writhing and convulsing but he simply pinned the snake to the ground just behind its head with his boot. He slowly withdrew a knife from within his clothes, crouched down and cut the snake’s head off.
He lifted his boot but it still jumped and writhed. It reminded me of the way chickens run around when decapitated, seemingly trying to escape the end that they had already met. He picked it up, put it into a sack.
‘Sorry kid, you’re cooking,’ he said, handing me the sack.
An hour later, we made camp next to the creek and I began to get ready for the night – a night with Lee Marvin was never predictable and was often quite hard work. Particularly the next day.
I waded into the water and removed the snake from its sack. I was fairly appalled to see that it was still moving. Not so vigorously, but writhing nonetheless. I took out my knife and made a small cut in its skin, enough to be able to peel it back. I bit down on the fleshy, bony stump where the head used to be and pulled the skin off its body. Still the creature writhed, but slowly now, like a dancer using his arms to pretend to be a snake.
I washed the skin before turning it back, right side out. When I had finished I hung it to dry from the limb of a tree that was overhanging the river. I still have the snakeskin. I keep it on the dashboard of my car. I then washed the snake in the cold water. Finally it was inert, a good couple of hours after its death.
I walked back up to the fire wondering how I was going to grill it, when I saw him coming towards me with the branch of a tree, cutting away its limbs. What now? I thought and took a step back. But all he did was to take the snake from me and lay the two things alongside each other, near the fire.
‘Wait,’ he said, and disappeared into the woods.
So I waited. It started a couple of minutes after he reappeared carrying a bundle of leafy oak cuttings. “It” was the unaided union of the snake and stick. Right there on the ground by the fire, the snake began to move once again. It twisted its rattle around the end of the stick and curled and rolled until it was completely corkscrewed around the stick’s length.
‘Shit,’ I said.
‘Yep,’ he said, and threw the cuttings on to the fire.
He sat with his arm out straight, holding the weird snakestick in the smoke just above the heat, whilst he went into a monologue at full volume about a night’s drinking with Bob Mitchum and some French sex workers, only he didn’t call them that, in a town he claimed had been liberated by the two them at the end of the war.
He talked for half an hour without pausing, without even seeming to draw breath, all the while feeding the smoke and holding the snakestick in it. He finished up by saying ‘Okay, now you,’ and he handed it to me.
I poked about in the embers until I had them nice and white with a red glow beneath. I put two rocks about a foot apart in the fire and laid the snake across them, turning it every minute or so. Juices dripped on to the embers and hissed.
Its flesh, a pinkish white to begin with, had now turned a beautiful, golden brown. It smelled good.
I pulled the stick out of the long coil and cut it into two halves and we ate.
Snake is just one long spine and ribs so it can be tricky to eat if it’s thin. But this was a diamondback and about four foot long and weighing five pounds or so. We could pull off whole hunks with our teeth. It was young so its flesh was reasonably tender for a creature that is all muscle.
I sat chewing, thinking about its flavour. It tasted like mackerel. And we were about 400 miles from the sea.
Mr Marvin liked it. He didn’t say as much. In fact he didn’t say anything. I could just tell he was enjoying it. Every now and then he would shake a few drops of Tabasco onto his next mouthful and chew it slowly.
He wiped his mouth with his sleeve as the last mouthful went down. ‘Right, I’m ready.’
The sun had gone down.
And the drinking began.
You can find Matthew Marke’s killings every Tuesday at matthewmarke.substack.com
We love The Lanes with all its nooks and crannies and jewelery shops and maybe the odd tourist, but it’s easy to get Lost In The Lanes. And that’s a terrible line about a very nice place. Food editor Gilly Smith found out more
LOST in the Lanes has been a bit of a tranquil refuge in the middle of tourist Brighton, a place for a coffee and a sit down away from the buzz since it opened in 2017. But who knew that its owners were all about local produce, that it had sustainability at its core?
Since August, its launch of LOST Nights has been showcasing an evening menu, plucked from Brighton’s natural pantry, with meat from the South Downs, fish from the day boats, dairy from our neighbours at Downsview and wines from Wiston, Stopham and Hallgarten.
Owner Natalie Demetriou and chef Sophie Taverner are keeping it simple and slow, evolving it gently to keep its values at its heart. One day, all restaurants will be like this. I asked chef, Sophie Taverner why local sourcing is so important to her.
“The reasoning behind keeping a short and changing menu in the evenings at LOST is that it really allows us to work closely with local suppliers and make the most of produce when it is at its peak.
“Sourcing locally isn’t just an ethical choice but also means getting the best produce at the peak of its flavour. Part of the ethos we have built is grounded in excellent relationships with suppliers who will tell us what the best catch is coming in off the fishing boats, or they’ll send us a message when new crops are being harvested. It means being able to put food on a plate that has been harvested that same day which then allows us to create menus that really showcase those ingredients”.
Tell me about your favourite local product right now and what you love to make with it.
“Right now we are coming to the end of the season for the most wonderful Culver corn from Culver Farm in Sussex. It is exactly what corn should be, so sweet and fresh with a perfect crisp to it. We have been serving it as fritters with a chilli vinaigrette, keeping it simple to allow the flavour of the corn to really shine through. It is also the most amazing time of year for fruit and we have strawberries, raspberries, redgages and damsons dotted around the menu and plans for preserving so we can also enjoy these later in the year. Part of really working with the seasons is thinking ahead to what we can make into jams or ferments so that in those months where less is growing, we have stores of things that can add some interest to our menus”.
How do you let your customers know how much care you put into sourcing well?
“We keep telling our story and reflecting our ethos in the menus we are creating as well as constantly highlighting our suppliers and the work they are doing. Shrub, who are our produce supplier for LOST Nights, work with small organic farms to get their produce to restaurants like LOST and that means we know exactly where our produce is coming from and who is growing it. That kind of transparency we hope will translate in what we are doing and is something that customers increasingly value.
What’s the stand out dessert on the menu right now?
“Like the rest of our menu, our desserts change regularly to reflect the seasons and what´s coming from the farms. This week’s standout favourite was fresh Sussex poached quince, baked cream and almonds. The quince right now is perfect and sits so well to balance out the tart sweetness of the lemon. It was so good we might keep it on for another week”.
At 6am on a bright sunny morning in late May this year, I joined a gathering of excited Brightonians in the line to try out the water at the new Sea Lanes for the first time. I left an hour later slightly astonished. Looking around like Alice in Wonderland at the setting I had to pinch myself.
When we first moved ‘down from London’ seven years ago, I insisted that I had to be able to see the sea from the house. I thought that I would buy a wet suit and a dry robe and immediately morph into a near-fish-person at one with the ocean I’d made my neighbour. I would be one of Brighton’s swimmers. That didn’t happen. Instead as a freelancer trying to work, commute, settle our family in, sort out our damp and crumbling house, the years passed… I never did get that dry robe (Ed: quite right too)
Bubbling along since we arrived has been this talk of a beach pool down at Black Rock – a regeneration project around the old Peter Pan Park on Madeira Drive. It wasn’t an area of Brighton we often went to. For us, it was a case of turning right at the sea, walking to Hove Lawns or further along, with our dog and our kids and friends.
Planning issues seemed to dog the project. Every so often there’d be word that there were plans. There would be the odd mention in the paper. Then… nothing. Would it ever happen? Nay-sayers galore doubted it. And then in 2021 after vast negotiations with the council and local heritage and resident groups, the plan got its permission. It turns out that surely and steadily the main players with the vision for the pool were working away to make this dream come true.
Immense challenges to the building process itself were an ongoing battle none of us knew about.
While we all were grumbling because well you know, it’ll never happen, it’s pie in the sky, good things like this never come off – the project team dealt quietly with the delicate removal of huge concrete slabs, ever so gently so as not to de-stablise the terraces, issues with materials for the carbon-neutral structures (pandemic legacy too) and terrible weather conditions – all huge hurdles to the build. The changing rooms are made of materials that come from unrecyclable plastics like toys, make up, flip flops, bottle tops… and they have tried to ensure the place is future proofed too – when hydrogen power arrives, the Sea Lanes can switch, everything is in place. And it’s a triumph.
The National Open Water Centre – aka, The Sea Lanes – conceived as “a stepping stone into the sea” has for the past three months never failed to deliver pure joy. The water sparkles and welcomes you in from 6am to 9.30pm during the week, a little earlier closing time on weekends. . And when it’s stormy, the water whips up little choppy waves to remind you where you are and make you work a little harder.
When you stand in those changing rooms the stickers telling you about the fact that they’ve used stuff generally headed for land-fill to make the doors and benches is somehow incredibly reassuring. Big smiles are exchanged, little chats about the water temperature (it’s been matching the sea all summer and will be between 15 and 19 degrees in the winter) and where someone got their wet suit… “What will you wear in the Winter?” “Do you have a spare hat I can borrow?” “Have you seen my new heads-up-display goggles?” “The wind’s up today, it’s a real work out in there!” “The water’s crisp this morning!” “This place makes me happy”.
I think we recognise each other now by our tattoos or our hats – these became mandatory (hats not tattoos but I’m considering a fish one since you ask) in August and after a few furrowed brows I think really no-one cares. It’s kind of nice. I put on my swimming hat and I feel even more in character as the Brighton swimmer of my dreams.
-Hat-Guy said “Hello” this morning. “Not seen you for a while, I always know you by your tattoos! Everything OK?” “Yes”, I said, “just been in Cornwall for the weekend”. And off we swim.
There are lockers and showers beach side that are free for sea swimmers to use and there’s a smooth pathway to the sea to walk down without suffering Brighton’s pebble agony. You can always buy some water shoes at the lovely Paddle People shop and a coffee from Fika afterwards. Pop up to Photomatic for a picture to take home or investigate the myriad gym, yoga, sports massage, fitness outfits that have set up shop inside the 27 carbon neutral units. There’s even a little ice-cream parlour. It’s the home of swim-adventurers “Swim Trek” who offer an ‘endless pool’ approach to swim technique training, where you swim, resistance style, on the spot while an instructor shows you to adjust your technique and breathing til you able in the big pool.
I did those very same lessons when I realised that in order to be that swimmer I’d always hoped to be I HAD to learn to crawl because… The other thing about the pool is you quickly realise 50 meters is BIG. Now I can swim a daily kilometer freestyle easiy. It’s really ALL about the breathing. Isn’t everything?
What had been imagined as a bright and colourfully decorated complex initially has been realised – post public consultations – with a more muted colour-palette to better compliment its setting against the terraces of Madeira Drive. A good decision, I think, when you stand and look at it. And that’s often what I do. I stand on Madeira drive and marvel at this lively, vibrant, positive, hope-filled place. The colour is brought to the place by the busy-ness of the businesses, the happy people waiting for coffee, breakfast, lunches or a beer in the evening sunshine. Dogs, stand up paddleboards, runners, walkers, kids, kites, bikes and yes, brightly colour swimming robes. Possibly also dogs-in-swim-robes.
“Yellow Wave” started it with their lovely beach volleyball set up and fab café but Sea Lanes pool and it’s village are the cherry on the cake. It’s a world class undertaking, you feel like Brighton is really showing off. Loving its beach, loving its seaside setting, loving its people actually and delivering aspiration that’s achievable. Grumblers say it’s just another members club – it really isn’t though! You can swim as a non-member but it just makes sense to join – like I did at my local pool. It’s just a few pounds more and a million miles away in terms of spiritually delivering just what I need. They even run a monthly beach-clean with a free coffee at the end of it. People are starting to gather here and we all need this as a community of human beings, places to gather that make us feeling hopeful.
The water ALWAYS lifts my spirits – get into the blue to shake off the blues I always say to myself – it connects me to not only myself, my ability in the water, my sense of strength and presence but to the other smiling people I share the pool with. And that is more important now than ever it was.
There’s now a reason to turn left at the pier.
I think we recognise each other now by our tattoos or our hats – these became mandatory (hats not tattoos but I’m considering a fish one since you ask) in August and after a few furrowed brows I think really no-one cares. It’s kind of nice. I put on my swimming hat and I feel even more in character as the Brighton swimmer of my dreams.
Yellow-Hat-Guy said “Hello” this morning. “Not seen you for a while, I always know you by your tattoos! Everything OK?” “Yes”, I said, “just been in Cornwall for the weekend”. And off we swim.
There are lockers and showers beach side that are free for sea swimmers to use and there’s a smooth pathway to the sea to walk down without suffering Brighton’s pebble agony. You can always buy some water shoes at the lovely Paddle People shop and a coffee from Fika afterwards. Pop up to Photomatic for a picture to take home or investigate the myriad gym, yoga, sports massage, fitness outfits that have set up shop inside the 27 carbon neutral units. There’s even a little ice-cream parlour. It’s the home of swim-adventurers “Swim Trek” who offer an ‘endless pool’ approach to swim technique training, where you swim, resistance style, on the spot while an instructor shows you to adjust your technique and breathing til you able in the big pool.
I did those very same lessons when I realised that in order to be that swimmer I’d always hoped to be I HAD to learn to crawl because… The other thing about the pool is you quickly realise 50 meters is BIG. Now I can swim a daily kilometer freestyle easiy. It’s really ALL about the breathing. Isn’t everything?
What had been imagined as a bright and colourfully decorated complex initially has been realised – post public consultations – with a more muted colour-palette to better compliment its setting against the terraces of Madeira Drive. A good decision, I think, when you stand and look at it. And that’s often what I do. I stand on Madeira drive and marvel at this lively, vibrant, positive, hope-filled place. The colour is brought to the place by the busy-ness of the businesses, the happy people waiting for coffee, breakfast, lunches or a beer in the evening sunshine. Dogs, stand up paddleboards, runners, walkers, kids, kites, bikes and yes, brightly colour swimming robes. Possibly also dogs-in-swim-robes.
“Yellow Wave” started it with their lovely beach volleyball set up and fab café but Sea Lanes pool and it’s village are the cherry on the cake. It’s a world class undertaking, you feel like Brighton is really showing off. Loving its beach, loving its seaside setting, loving its people actually and delivering aspiration that’s achievable. Grumblers say it’s just another members club – it really isn’t though! You can swim as a non-member but it just makes sense to join – like I did at my local pool. It’s just a few pounds more and a million miles away in terms of spiritually delivering just what I need. They even run a monthly beach-clean with a free coffee at the end of it. People are starting to gather here and we all need this as a community of human beings, places to gather that make us feeling hopeful.
The water ALWAYS lifts my spirits – get into the blue to shake off the blues I always say to myself – it connects me to not only myself, my ability in the water, my sense of strength and presence but to the other smiling people I share the pool with. And that is more important now than ever it was.
The Whistler 