A current favourite is 80s London Squatters, as the name suggests including loads of photos of London punks and squatters and their hangouts around that time. There's some good South London stuff on there, like this:
The photo above is of Brixton Lido in Brockwell Park. Considering how busy that place is now in the summer, people may be surprised to know that Lambeth Council closed it down in the early 1990s. For a while it was squatted, I believe from Summer 1993. People lived in the changing rooms and offices around the pool, and they hosted various events including cabaret nights, Brixton Poets Society, cabaret nights, a couple of rave-parties, an end-of-tour party for The Levellers and an Exploding Cinema film night in August '93 that attracted more than 2000 people.
I went there a couple of times in this period, and the pool was empty. But as this photo by Fleur Daniel shows, they did manage to refill the pool at some point. Who knows, perhaps they helped save the pool from being sold off, since the events they held there created a buzz and momentum that others were able to build on when plans were being floated (pardon the pun) to reopen it as a Lido.
Another piece of South London history I found there was this flyer for a 1989 All London Squatters meeting at 362 Old Kent Road. This was a formerly empty shop squatted and used as a base for SNOW (Squatters Network of Walworth) from 1985 until late 1989 - by which time SNOW had been superseded by SHIP (Southwark Homeless Information Project). The latter moved in 1990 to 612 Old Kent Road, this time as rent paying tenants. This was a period in which huge numbers of homes were left empty across London by councils and other landlords - a vacuum that was filled by (mainly) young people taking over empties and turning them into homes. In Southwark alone there were 1600 squatted properties in early 1988.
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4 comments:
OMG, a blast from the past. I used to work for SNOW and pass flyers for them to various squats. Mine at 22 Royston House, in Peckham sayed open for 5 years. I was there from 1986 to 1989. What a time. WHen there were metal doors, we used to give a 20 pound deposit to SNOW who had the key from some council person who was making money off the squatters. Great to read about it. Thank you.
From June 1986 until late 1990 there was a whole group of us NZers living in Peckham in council flats on the likes of the Friary Estate.
...banged up on remand in 81/2ish,two new dudes turned up.big bob and dave b.they showed us their bail forms with the adress'dalston bus garage'!they were the protection arm of the peace convoy.the ones who put that railway sleeper on the front of k9,and got people tooled up with crossbows and the like.not so peaceful i suppose,but if you're in for bashing the filth,you don't rush for moral high ground.not that i regret one bit of it.opened my first squat in esssex in'78.had some dealings with snow when we were on the amos est in rotherithe in 82.closed up my last place(the cricketers pub,oval)in 2011.check out alasdair convery 'the cricketers'on youtube to see one of londons best ever skate/squats...and don't forget pubs are still fair game...keep doing things your own way...
I recall they filled the pool with tap water or the water that came out the normal pipes anyways (& and a hose) and it caused the housing block on the opposite side of the road to have no water as they used it all to fill the pool 🤪 The parties are fun!
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