wildcornerz: August 2013

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.

Wednesday, 14 August 2013

Queens Road Wildcorner visit and sighting

Here are the photos from the visit to the large wildcorner on Queens Road Peckham where the Wooddene Estate once stood.

A few weeks ago, I was passing the corner on the top deck of the 171. As we were pulling away, I looked back over the site and my eye caught a small flash of white which in that same moment disappeared from view.

It was a whole week later before I could return on foot to take a closer look. After a while wandering the perimeters of the high steel fence, I saw through the tangled weeds and piles of rubble what had caught my eye the previous week..

He was there, right at the back of the corner, walking amongst bushes of Buddleia and Rosebay-Willow Herb, appearing across a large TEAR dub.

The Wild Walker aka The Lewisham Natureman, familiar of the weeds and spirit of South London's wild places. He has wandered beyond the boroughs borders into neighbouring Southwark the 'black borough'.