Hidden from sight: the specially commissioned mural, just over a year since it was unveiled, now easily missed, overgrown among weeds in Queen’s Gardens
Over the past week, Croydon Mayor Jason Perry and some of his chums from the local business community have been celebrating the ‘success’ (their word, not ours) of the year as the Borough of Culture.
We sent ELSIE GOWERS off to see if she could track down one of the worst examples of ill-conceived, art-less hubris
The Music Heritage Trail was unveiled in June 2023, as a permanent focal point of Croydon’s year as London’s Borough of Culture. It had cost £350,000 paid for from in various grants – including £225,000 from the Mayor of London, the largest single grant paid out for Croydon’s Borough of Culture.
For all that money, there’s not very much to show for it now. In fact, it’s really difficult to find any trail of the trail at all.
A year ago, when the trail and its smartphone app were new, Inside Croydon roadtested them with another teenager, who at first walked past “Croydon Symphony”, the expensively commissioned (it alone cost about £10,000) art mural that is supposed to mark the trail’s starting point. They could only recognise one of the musicians featured in the mural.
But at least they could see the mural. When I was there, it was pretty much completely overgrown by weeds and thistles, another sign of the neglect of Queen’s Gardens, once the ornamental pride of Croydon, a public open space right outside the Town Hall.
Roughly worked: the HMT plaque outside Croydon College looks like it was dumped in a puddle of wet cement
Just as Inside Croydon found 12 months ago, there was nothing anywhere nearby to signpost Croydon Symphony or highlight that this was the start of Croydon’s Heritage Music Trail. Unless such a sign, too, was also covered by the overgrown shrubbery.
It is all just confusing for those who might be looking for the Heritage Music Trail but are not sure what to look for.
I resorted to using the app on my phone. The app alone cost an initial £38,895, yet in the first few months after its launch had received just 458 downloads.
The app was not without faults. The location tracking feature is not precise, which would not have been an issue had there been more information available about the trail and what I was actually looking for. It was little in locating signs of the trail – the brass plaques laid into the pavement, mostly around the town centre.
The app did provide some insightful information on Croydon’s musical history, including key figures and events, linked to each plaque location.
The first plaque is outside the Fairfield Halls, where I learned that many highly influential artists had played there, including Elton John and The Beatles.
Brass polish: the plaque outside Boozepark appears to have been installed with a little more care
But even with the help of the app, the plaques were not easy to find as they do not stand out from the pavement very well and there’s no other signage to indicate where they are.
The plaques can easily be mistaken for drain covers. Does anyone notice them if they are not actively looking for them?
None of the people around me seemed to pay any attention to the plaques as they hurried by, even in the busier areas, like outside Boxpark.
In fact, for the duration of my walk along the Heritage Music Trail, I did not notice anyone else who appeared to be following it, nor did I see anyone stop to read the plaques. It’s as if the Heritage Music Trail, neglected and overgrown in Queen’s Gardens, is bypassed by many elsewhere in the town centre, even people who have an interest in music, simply because they are unaware of its existence.
Read more: The cost of Croydon’s Music Heritage Trail: £750 per download!
Read more: £250 per day fees paid to lead on borough’s Heritage Trail
Read more: It’s hard to find signs of the borough’s musical heritage trail
Read more: GLA has few checks on how £1.3m Culture grant is being spent
- Elsie Gowers is an A-level pupil undertaking work experience at Inside Croydon
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ROTTEN BOROUGH AWARDS: In January 2024, Croydon was named among the country’s rottenest boroughs for a SEVENTH successive year in the annual round-up of civic cock-ups in Private Eye magazine
It’s a bit much to expect anything resembling culture from a Mayor who makes his living by flogging plastic decking, flooring, cladding and fencing. It was his party, Croydon Conservatives, who got rid of the Warehouse Theatre.
And what has the Cabinet Member for Communities and Culture, Councillor Andy Stranack, done to earn his extra dosh for his responsibilities for “London Borough of Culture 2023, Culture, Leisure and Libraries, Voluntary and Community Sector partnerships and funding, Music, Arts and Sport and Equalities”? Bugger all, it seems.
The meeting of the Scrutiny & Overview Committee on 6th December, 2022 agreed that it would ask Perry and Stranack to provide an all-Member Briefing in advance of the Borough of Culture launch event to update Councillors on the programme, explain how to encourage community involvement and detail the support available for individual artists wanting to participate. It also recommended to them that the evaluation of the success of the Borough of Culture be tested by a group made up of Members and Officers.
Perry’s always telling us how he loves to listen. It looks like he stuck his fingers in his ears with these two requests, like so many others
The author Paul Talling does an excellent “Lost Music Venues of Croydon” walk. It starts at Fairfield Halls and winds it’s way all over Croydon to Broad Green and the site of the old Cartoon Club, taking in the old sites of The Greyhound, Underground, Red Deer, Star Hotel etc as well as large theatres long since gone. I never knew that Croydon had such a rich musical history. It was a fascinating afternoon and I’d highly recommend it, if you can get a ticket because they literally sell out as soon as they come on sale. Paul does walking tours in London & the South East. As well as the lost music venues walk he also does the “Lost Canals Of Croydon”, which is a full day and is equally engrossing.
Looks like another walking tour will be soon be possible. After fourteen years of steep decline and perpetual ineptitude someone will be able to do a tour of all the wasted millions by Croydon Council in the name of economic regeneration. Starting of from the site of CCURV and taking in all of Fisher’s Follies, Newman’s Delusions and now Perry’s Plops.