Tag Archives: West Hill

Brighton, Brighton Life, Lido, Outdoor swimming, Sea Lanes, Swimming

Brighton’s new Sea Lanes

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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. 

There’s now a reason to turn left at the pier.

By Ceri Barnes Thompson

Sea Lanes Brighton, 

300 Madeira Dr, Brighton BN2 1BX 01273 044163

http://www.sealanesbrighton.co.uk

Membership is from £50 per month

Brighton, Brighton Life, Brighton pubs, Food & Drink, The Duke of Wellington

The grand old Duke of Welly

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It’s been up a bit and it’s been down a bit, but it’s not been out, and now a fresh breath of air is flowing through the Duke of Wellington 

“Well, my ex-husband died in April, not this year, last year. Six months later, I collapsed beyond the bar, had a heart attack, which scared my children. I’ve got son and a daughter who are grown up. They lost their dad, and six months later, I thought they were losing me. So this is my compromise. 

I’m sitting in the Welly and Cheryl West, the new-ish landlord – landlady? landperson?? – is telling me her story. It’s a bit of a story. 

“I’ve been running pubs for over 20 years, pubs and nightclubs. Pulled my first pint when I was 17 which is, I was working it out this morning, is… a long time ago.” 

A long time and a lot of bars ago. We go into Cheryl’s story, a story that takes us from Islington in London to Northampton to Chingford to Luton to London again, taking on pubs, clubs and a Caribbean restaurant. “Then after 12 years, I decided I wanted to get out of London, so I joined a pub management company as a holder…”

What’s a holder?

“You go around, holding pubs, covering pubs until a full-time manager moves in.” Fair to say, Cheryl knows hospitality. And since April, she’s been holding The Welly. 

“I didn’t really know Brighton much but I’d only heard good things. I’d seen this place and it was a smaller place, which I needed after the heart attack, and it’s by the coast which I love and… ”. A lot of boxes ticked. “Yes, there were a lot of signs pointing in this direction. Also, there’s no food involved. Doing food in a pub is really hard work and since Covid, it’s much harder. Since Covid, everything is much harder”.

Did it matter, I wondered, that there were so many good pubs within a stone’s throw?      

“No, not really. We all support each other and we’ve all got different strengths, we’re all known for different things. And we’ve always been known as a sports pub and we’ve got the pool table which is very popular and the pool team’s doing very well, but we all get on very well. I talk to Hatt from The Eddy a lot and when I first came here, Mark (Reed, from The Eddy) was one of the first people to come in and say “Hello”. If one of us is short of something, gas for example, we’ll just pop into our neighbours and borrow it”. 

Talking of neighbours… not everyone has been so happy. “I’m struggling with music here to be honest. I love live music. But since I’ve been here, I’ve put on three events on a DJ night. I had to do karaoke nights, the last one being Saturday. Every time we’ve put on music events, there have been complaints.” 

I’ve never really understood why anyone would move next to a pub and then complain about the noise. But then maybe some people just like complaining. 

I grew up around music, reggae mainly, that’s my genre. Old school reggae.”

Old school reggae? We’re going to get on just fine. Who are we talking? John Holt?  

“John Holt, yes. Carol Thompson’s a friend. Janet Kay’s a friend, too”. 

Janet Kay? Oh, get Janet Kay down. We can all come and sing along to “Silly Games”. That would get the upset neighbours properly, a gaggle of happy punters trying  to reach those high notes. Cheryl’s not so sure. “I don’t understand it. The music stops really early…” 

So a few grumpy neighbours aside… “It’s going really well. I thought coming down here would be like semi-retirement, and it was supposed to be my compromise with my children. My son wants me to retire. But I’m not ready yet”.

Sam Harrington-Lowe

Sam Harrington -Lowe – Oct/Nov 2023

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The season of mists and all that jazz firmly divides opinion, I have found…

There are those that welcome its gentle cooling, its falling leaves, its lazy sun. The snuggly appeal of fires and warmer clothes. Halloween parties, hot chocolate, and the rich colourful tapestry of nature. You know these people. They’re on social media a lot.

And then there are people like me. I’m not awfully keen, shall we say? It feels like death looming. I hate woollen clothes. They make me itch. The days are shorter, the bleakness is around the corner. Everyone talks about stupid bloody Hygge until my eyes glaze over with IKEA fatigue. Even hot chocolate makes me feel gaggy.

I can’t be the only one? There must be other people out there for whom autumn feels like the beginning of the end? Here are some of my (least) favourite things about the season.

Is it a turd or a leaf? Ah, the seasonal guessing game. For a dog owner like me this is a double-edged sword. Not only might I tread in a turd, thinking it to be a leaf, which is never a good thing. But I also find myself searching blindly – in leaves – in the general area that Alice has visited, desperately trying to find… well, you know. Add wind and rain to this search or squelch, and I’m pretty much ready to murder someone.

I also hate the darkness. By all that is holy I hate the short days. Not so long ago I was waking at 4-something to see the warm pink of dawn. I slid from my bed bathed in the happy glow. 

Now I’m up at 6am or thereabouts, full of hate, and it’s as dark as midnight. It might as well BE bloody midnight. And then more darkness at the other end of the day, coming increasingly closer. BRING ME THE LIGHT, dammit. Not the SAD light though. That’s just weird. I’d rather be depressed.

Hearty behaviour. Oo look, another thing that could drive me to murder. People being hearty and cheerful. Getting all togged up in stupid hot clothing and doing bonfires and ghastly marshmallows. Capering around having a nice time, dressing up in fancy dress like toddlers. Or getting excited about a soup they made. Actually I do that, to be fair, I love soup. The rest of this heartiness though? Stop it. You’re not five.

And as for the ’Russian Roulette’ pedestrian. I see you, standing there at the kerb at the end of a long day, ready to die in front of my car as you dash out to cross the road in mad traffic, far from the safety of pedestrian crossings, traffic lights or Belisha beacons. Or rather I DON’T see you, because you’re an idiot dressed head to toe in dark clothing in the pouring rain. Darwin Awards at its very best. Do you have any idea how invisible you are? No? Idiot. 

As far as I’m concerned, autumn also heralds Christmas on the horizon, which I’m also not terribly keen on either (more heartiness. And charades! Argh). 

As soon as the first leaves start to fall, it feels like a countdown to the darkness, and a long stretch to springtime. I live for the winter solstice and the turning point as the days get longer again. I pray for snowdrops, and daffodils. And right now they seem a long way off. 

Best I go and have a nice hot bowl of soup to warm up. Bah.

Sam is founder and Editor-in-Chief of Silver Magazine – for the mature maverick

http://www.silvermagazine.co.uk

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Editorial – Oct/Nov 2023

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Life used to be so much simpler than it is today. For example, the first job I ever had was in a shop called Stamford Hill Stationers and it was called Stamford Hill Stationers because it was a shop selling stationery in a place called Stamford Hill. It was a curious shop, not very big and full of… just magic. 

It was a while ago, long before all this new fangled tech stuff we surround ourselves with now had even been dreamt about, and I loved stationery – which sounds an odd thing to say, but it’s true. Basildon Bond note pads with a sheet of carbon paper at the back. Blue note pads. Parker fountain pens that had little pipettes inside that sucked up the ink from the little pots of ink. But we sold all sorts of stuff. There was much excitement one week when we took delivery of the then new Bic disposable lighters. Terrible to admit, but I tea-leafed a handful and swapped them with Russell Roberts, who was working at Lord John where there was this pair of trousers… Kids, huh. 

Anyway, I was thinking about Stamford Hill Stationers because, well, in the back there was a “staff room” where you could put your coat and if you were a bit more grown up, make a cup of tea or something.(Why you’d do anything like that when there’s a Wimpey bar round the corner…). In the staff room there was a poster that said “The customer is always right”. And then underneath that, it said “Even when the customer is wrong, the customer is always right”. Life used to be so much simpler than it is today. 

Nice look” said the bloke at the entrance to Dick’s Bar at the Amex. “I always like to see what you’re wearing”. Since you asked,  – double breasted brown corduroy suit, black beret, tan and white co-respondents. I like suits. I like wearing suits. I like wearing nice suits. I could never get my head round “casual” clothes or “streetwear” or whatever. Why would you wear a tracksuit if you’re nowhere near a track? No one is going to call you “Dapper” if you’re wearing a hoodie from Gap. No. You wear a suit. A good, well cut suit. 

There aren’t many downsides to wearing good clothes, but you do need to look after them. You’re not going to put double breasted brown corduroy suit in the washing machine, are you? You’ve to go to the dry cleaners. And so it was that in the summer I took a fine cream linen whistle to my local dry cleaner – I live very close to Powis Square. Handed it in. Had a chat and, yes, Thursday for pick up is fine. 

I went in Thursday for pick up and… It was odd. The jacket was still a cream colour but the trousers had been completely discoloured. They were now white. What had been a very nice cream linen suit was now… not a suit at all. I pointed it out to the very nice woman working there who was sympathetic and gave me the email of the owner and… 

I’m guessing she never worked at Stamford Hill Stationers. She refused to talk, she would just email, and she proceeded to give me a lecture on the processes of dry cleaning (which, as a friend said, was ironic; if she knew so much about dry cleaning how come she ruined the suit?). It wasn’t a great conversation. After a series of emails, I contacted the Citizens Advice Bureau (nice people and sympathetic but ultimately couldn’t do anything) and she ended up threatening legal action if I wrote about it. Customer service aside, threatening a journalist is a bit silly, but… hey ho. 

I tried to explain that I’ll no longer take anything to her shop, not because they made a mistake with my suit – they’ve been really good until now and, look, it’s not the end of the world. We all make mistakes, we all do things that don’t turn out how we want and besides, now I’ve got an excuse to buy a new suit – but because she was so lacking in grace and courtesy. I just don’t want people like that in my world. If you make a mistake you say “That’s really terrible. I’m really sorry”. And that’s it. Maybe they could offer a free something. It shouldn’t be a drama. 

Maybe if you went to Stamford Hill Stationers now there’d be a sign in the back room “The customer is a bit of a nuisance and if they ever complain, threaten them with legal action”. Maybe. But I doubt it. Life used to be so much simpler.  

Brighton Dome, Brighton Life, Dexys, Events, Features, Kevin Rowland, Music

Review: Dexys at The Dome

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We’d just finished another year at Manchester Polytechnic and summer was staring at us. Before heading to our respective homes, a few of us went up to Newcastle for the weekend to visit a friend. We saw a sign “BBC Radio One Roadshow with Dexys Midnight Runners”. What to do? We were very cool, I mean very cool, and a Radio One Roadshow? Seriously not cool. It was probably introduced by Richard Skinner or, I don’t know, Peter Powell or something. And it was in a tent. I know. A Radio One gig in a tent. You’d think we were going to see Nik Kershaw or maybe Howard Jones. But it was Dexys and we loved Dexys. So we went. And it was extraordinary. It was so extraordinary it was released as a CD in 1995. The shock of the power of the horn section, the passion and emotion of the songs, the everything of Kevin Rowland. Back then, pop music was about synths, about artifice, about dressing up as a pirate or a Pierott clown. Dexys were about horns, about soul, about passion.  

That was June 1982 and Kevin’s outfits have changed a few times since then, but the fashion for passion has never wavered. Time’s passed but they – he – are still extraordinary. And last night at The Dome was just as extraordinary as ever.

A homecoming gig – Kevin lives down here, don’t you know – this was as much a celebration as anything – celebrating the history of the band and the audience, celebrating the songs, celebrating survival. The night was split in two halves: the first given over to the new album, “The Feminine Divine”, the second a run through of the old. Playing your new album which probably no one’s heard for the first hour of a gig, it’s asking a lot and is at the same time fantastically ambitious and arrogant. So far, so Dexys.

“The Feminine Divine” is as ever a step away from the expected which is, I guess, the expected. A treatise on Kevin’s relationship with women and how it’s changed, played live it’s stripped back, theatrical (between each song there was a ‘dramatic scene’ between band members Rowland, Jim Patterson, Sean Read and Michael Timothy), less horn more synth. Dressed in a dark blue pantalon suit, white beret and striped t-shirt (you know these things are important), Rowland held the stage, his voice at 70 still really strong and still carrying that familiar plaintive soulful plea.

While the new songs held up, the place really came alive during the second half when the lights came up, the horns came out to play and, standing on the balcony, he started up

“I won’t need to think of nice things to say,
I don’t want to want this way anymore,
Shh now and hear comes silence,
from this comes strength I promise”

which led, naturally, to

“You’ve always been searching for something…” from 1982’s “Plan B”. And on it went. “Geno”, “Jackie Wilson Said” (complete with backdrop of Jocky Wilson), “Until I Believe In My Soul” through to the much loved but rarely played “Tell Me When My Light Turns Green”. As the lights came up, there wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

photo: Sandra Vijandi