Started January 2010 [by Jack Thurgar]

This is a scrapbook dedicated to the study of London's weeds and the wild places where they grow. Wildcornerz also looks at the languages, cultures and mythologies that develop in these cracks.


What is a Wildcorner?

A Wildcorner is a term referring to a piece of land that has been left to grow wild in a man made landscape. To be a true Wildcorner, the land has to be restricted from public access. Many are hidden from public view altogether. A common type of wildcorner is referred to by govements and local authorities as a 'brownfield site'.

Wildcorners and corridors* are dotted all over the capital and vary in content, depending on their location and history. In this blog we focus particularly on the Wildcorners of south east London.

* Wildcorridors are networks of pathways that run through the city and facilitate the propagation and growth of weeds. Many are restricted from public access such as railway embankments and urban rivers. In the suburbs, footpaths such as the Green Chain connect public green areas by a network of alleyways and passages that skirt between houses and private land. It could be argued that these are also wild corridors.



Urban and Suburban Weeds

By the term 'weeds' we are of course referring to the cities wild plants and flowers. But their are also two other weeds that grow in the city.

'Graf' like its botanical relation, has many families and strains. Both of these weeds can often be found together, sharing many qualities including their adaptive nature and unregulated status. Both in many cases, originally entered and populated the city using the railway network.

Another 'weed' that historically flourishes in London is invisible and uses the tops of tower blocks to propagate. Pirate radio like its weed relatives, grows away from the public eye and is constantly adapting to exploit these same gaps across the cities FM radio spectrum, fighting and flourishing in-between the commercial stations.

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Tuesday, 31 July 2012

The God of Weeds appears in SE12

My friend has told me before of a wildcorner near to his flat in Lee, SE12. While on the way to visiting him last friday, i remembered and took the long way around, to pass it.
The corner is hidden away behind a row of shops and is not over looked from any side. The corrugated iron fence was too high to look over and the trees and scrub to thick to peer through. 
I walked around the side of the corner and along a narrow alleyway. It was there I found a wire fence and then, a few yards along, a small hole made in it at the bottom.


 The rusted ends of the wires, suggest the hole was made some years ago.
I climbed through and pulled myself up and into the small clearing. My heart skipped when my eyes caught the white antlers of the lone beast, sticking out above the tall nettles at the far end of the corner.
The Lewisham Natureman's spirit dwells in the most forgotten of places.





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