Lucinda Douglas-Menzies At Butler’s Wharf

Quaker St 1967 by Philip Marriage Click here to book for The Gentle Author’s Tour of Spitalfields Contributing Photographer Lucinda Douglas-Menzies sent me these photographs of Butler’s Wharf from 1980 that she discovered recently. “One weekend on an overcast day in 1980 I walked around Butler’s Wharf in Bermondsey. Bulldozers had already begun demolition and the place was utterly deserted. Warehouse cranes, forlornly still, stood to attention by the water’s edge, discarded pallets leant against the derelict leaking buildings on Shad Thames where piles of rubbish spewed outside closed doors. Deserted except for occasional signs of life: two men pushing a load on a barrow, abandoned road sweepers’ brooms and carts, a pair of guard dogs gazing down from high on a parapet, and one elderly resident, standing on her gleaming doorstep looking out resignedly, one hand on the frill of her apron, the other holding onto the brick wall as if to reassure herself it was still there.” – Lucinda…