Viva Brighton October 2015 Issue #32

Safe and local cosmetic surgery
Nuffield Health Brighton Hospital provides cosmetic
surgery and non-surgical treatments including:
• Breast enhancement
• Breast uplift and breast reduction
• Eye-lid surgery
• Facelift
• Liposuction
• Varicose vein treatment
We are offering a series of complimentary 15 minute one-to-one advice sessions
for you to get expert personal advice from a Consultant surgeon specialising
in cosmetic surgery. These sessions give you the opportunity to get all your
questions answered and find out more about treatment.
To book your one-to-one advice session, call
01273 961 526
nuffieldhealth.com/hospitals/brighton
Nuffield Health Brighton Hospital, Warren Road,
Woodingdean, Brighton BN2 6DX

vivabrighton
Issue 32. Oct 2015
editorial
...................................................................................
The clocks go back on the last Sunday of October, which this year falls
as early as the 25th. And so we move back to our winter mode, aka
Greenwich Mean Time. This means more light in the morning (for a
bit) and, of course, darkness falling before most of us leave work. We
will, in effect, all have more night to deal with. For this reason, we have
dedicated this issue to ‘The Night’ and all it represents.
We asked some of our regular contributors to provide material reflecting night-time: cartoonist
Joe Decie illustrated his anxiety-fuelled insomnia; photographer Adam Bronkhorst stayed
up late photographing charismatic taxi drivers; Steve Ramsey wrote about the aftermath
of the most dramatic night in Brighton’s history, October 12th 1984, when an IRA bomb
exploded in the Grand Hotel, at 2.54am, and the town became the centre of the world’s attention.
If you only read one piece in this magazine, read that one.
Brighton comes alive at night, or at least it shows a completely different side of its character.
Stuff happens: some of it bad (the obscurity night affords leads to more delinquency and
crime); some of it good (paaaaaaaarty). After the clocks go back, if you’re a certain type, the
brightly-lit streets will seem all the more appealing; if you’re another, the sofa even more
comfortable. Whatever the case, we wish you, in a very general sense, good night.
Enjoy the issue…
The Team
.....................
EDITOR: Alex Leith alex@vivabrighton.com
DEPUTY EDITOR: Steve Ramsey steveramsey@vivabrighton.com
ART DIRECTOR: Katie Moorman katie@vivabrighton.com
PHOTOGRAPHER AT LARGE: Adam Bronkhorst
EDITORIAL ASSISTANT: Rebecca Cunningham
ADVERTISING: Anya Zervudachi anya@vivabrighton.com, Nick Metcalf nickmetcalf@vivabrighton.com,
PUBLISHERS: Nick Williams nick@vivabrighton.com, Lizzie Lower lizzie@vivamagazines.com
CONTRIBUTORS: Amy Holtz, Andrew Darling, Ben Bailey, Chloë King, Di Coke, Holly Fitzgerald, Jay Collins,
Jim Stephenson, JJ Waller, Joda, Joe Decie, John Helmer, Lizzie Enfield, Martin Skelton and Yoram Allon
Viva is based at Brighton Junction, 1A Isetta Square, BN1 4GQ
For advertising enquiries call 07596 337 828
Other enquiries call 01273 810259
Every care has been taken to ensure the accuracy of our content. We cannot be held responsible for any omissions, errors or alterations.

contents
...............................
Bits and bobs.
6-21. Our cover artist Chris Moore,
Brighton Street Pastors, Joe Decie’s
latest toon, secrets of the Pavilion, and
a good deal besides.
36
Photography.
23-27. Simon Roberts focuses on
Britain’s piers, including two of our
own, natch.
Columns.
28-31. Our columnists are not a happy
lot: Amy Holtz is cop-phobic, Lizzie
Enfield’s worried about her kids, and
John Helmer’s suffering from a case of
Gaudí-fuelled vertigo.
History.
32-35. The police investigate the
Grand Hotel bombing, 1984-5.
53
My Brighton.
36-37. It’s Brighton Fashion Week
in October, so we interview its
founding director, Lizzy Bishop,
wonderfully photographed by Adam
Bronkhorst (see above).
In Town this Month.
39-55. Britpoppers My Life Story,
middle-aged dirtbags Wheatus, Ed
Byrne and No Such Thing as a Fish
in the Comedy Festival, Copperdollar’s
take on Mexican Day of the
Dead, foodie-in-chief Jay Rayner,
and Marc Koska, TEDx hero.
....4 ....

contents
...............................
Art, film, literature and design.
57-67. Bit of a hold-all that section
title, but they’re all creative forms.
Yoram Allon’s cinema round-up, carview
painter Kate Sherman, Big Apple
photographer Mark Nelson, Mooncup
designer Su Hardy, City Reads author
Matt Haig, furniture makers Baines
and Fricker and Brazilian shoe gurus
Mo:vel.
81
The Way we Work.
69-75. Adam Bronkhorst meets some
night-time Brighton taxi drivers, and
asks them: what was your best-ever
fare?
64
Food and drink.
76-87. We sample pizza Napolitana at
Fatto a Mano, Indian fish and chips at
Temple Bar, octopus at MARKET, halloumi
at the Better Half and check out
the Flint Barns and more at Rathfinny.
75
97
Family, health and sport.
89-95. JoJo and Billie’s Tour de France,
the PT to the PTs, Brighton and Hove
Albion’s Dedicated Football Officer,
and Ollie Pepper, of cycling clothes
designers Morvelo.
Inside Left.
98. The proposed Chain Pier extension,
1883.
....5 ....

this month’s cover artist
..........................................
....6 ....

this month’s cover artist
..........................................
This month’s cover is the work
of Chris (Sick) Moore, a graphic
designer and part-time DJ whose
B-Movie-style posters you’ll likely
have seen plastered around town
promoting his Stay Sick nights at
Sticky Mike’s. “I’m inspired by Jim
Flora, a graphic designer from the
50s,” Chris explains. “His use of
colours and crazy images are where
a lot of my cartoons like this cover
come from.” The character he’s
created for this design is based on
the Bride of Frankenstein, who has
pulled up a deckchair for a spot of
Addams Family-inspired ‘moonbathing’. Fortunately
she’s remembered her bottle of Moon Lotion so she
won’t end up with moonburn like Uncle Fester.
Originally the figure was going to be accompanied
by Frankenstein himself, and the famous Bandstand
would be making an appearance. “I sketched it out
on A4, but when I made it smaller it felt a bit too
crowded,” he says, “so I thought I’d simplify it.” After
the quick sketching stage, Chris looks online for
inspiration and visual references to form the final
look. Once he’s decided on the composition, he’ll
hand sketch the design and re-work it in Illustrator
to finish it off.
The hand-drawn Viva masthead looks to have been
sliced and stitched together, much
like this month’s cover girl. Chris
has drawn this one from scratch,
but he sometimes uses the ‘Frankenstein
approach’ to create fonts
for posters and sleeve artwork. “I
use lots of fonts from old movie
posters to get that sort of vintage
vibe,” he explains, “and depending
on the length of the title
you’ll probably get a handful of
characters. But then there are ways
you can change it slightly; you can
change a ‘v’ into a ‘y’ very easily.”
Even without a landmark in
sight, this scene couldn’t be set anywhere but here.
“I wanted it to be Brighton-centric so obviously my
automatic thought was the beach, but particularly
the railings.” The familiar turquoise of the seafront
steelwork inspired the colour palette for the design.
“If you don’t live in Brighton you might think of the
Pier or the Pavilion first, but I’ve always loved the
colour of the railings, that really says Brighton to me,
in a more subtle way.” We couldn’t agree more. And
if you find yourself admiring those railings next time
you walk past, be sure to steer clear of the zombie
claw emerging from the pebbles.
Interview by Rebecca Cunningham
chrissick.co.uk
....7 ....

its and bobs
...............................
on the buses
#6 prince kropotkin (No 49)
Prince Kropotkin’s prison break involved a message hidden in a
watch, a delivery of firewood, and various accomplices – one to distract
the soldier at the gate, another to play the violin as a coast-isclear
signal, and others to hire all nearby cabs to stop the getaway
vehicle being pursued. It worked: he outran a bayonet-wielding
sentry, got to the cab, and was taken into hiding.
Kropotkin had shunned his aristocratic military background and,
under a pseudonym, secretly got involved in revolutionary agitation. Caught in 1874, he was held without
trial for two years, until his escape. He snuck out of Russia and spent the next four decades in exile, mostly
in the UK.
In Britain, he worked as a science journalist, writing about anarchism and society on the side. His best
known book, Mutual Aid, blended the two, using examples from human and animal societies to argue that
co-operation was a better survival strategy than competition.
A mild-mannered anarchist, Kropotkin ‘became a fashionable figure in London, lauded by the late-Victorian
artistic and intellectual avant garde,’ in the Guardian’s words.
He moved to Kemptown around 1911, for health reasons. Jerome K Jerome wrote in his memoirs: ‘Prince
Kropotkin himself was a kindly, dapper little gentleman of aristocratic appearance, but his compatriots,
who came to visit him, there was no mistaking. The sight of them, as they passed by, struck terror to the
stoutest hearts of Kemp Town.’
After the February Revolution, Kropotkin left Brighton for Russia, where he died in 1921.
Illustration by Joda, jonydaga.weebly.com
spread the word
This month’s picture was sent in by readers
Gill and Howard Cox, who took our
July issue with them over the Pond in the
summer. Normally contributors show off
the mag’s front cover, but this time Gill
and Howard’s daughters Georgie and
Emily have opened it out so cover artist
Naomi Sloman’s picture of Yosemite
Park is revealed; and they are standing in
front of the same mountains as Naomi
has illustrated (if you use a bit of imagination,
at least). Keep them coming!
hello@vivamagazines.com
....8 ....

186 WESTERN ROAD, BRIGHTON, BN1 2BA
COTSWOLDOUTDOOR.COM

its and bobs
...............................
jj waller’s brighton
The latest picture from JJ is five years old, but still relevant today: it’s from the
2010 launch of the Brighton Street Pastors, churchgoers who wander the streets
of central Brighton on Friday nights, between 9pm and 2am, in order to try and
pre-empt trouble from revellers by ‘tone setting’: creating a positive feeling that
will optimise the mood of drinkers who might otherwise kick off.
....11....

TOUR THE
WINE ESTATE
EAT OR STAY AT
THE FLINT BARNS
E XPLORE TH E
RATHFINNY TRAIL
HOST YOUR
SPECIAL EVENT
Rathfinny Wine Estate, Alfriston, East Sussex BN26 5TU / www.rathfinnyestate.com

Joe decie
...............................
....13....

its and bobs
...............................
pechakucha Night
We’re excited about Volume 22 of PechaKucha Brighton at 6pm on Sunday 22nd
November – the third one curated by Zara Wood (aka Woody) and Viva. Teaming up
with Silo - where the event will take place - the price of a ticket also includes three
bite-sized offerings created in tune with the zero-waste ethos of the North Laine
restaurant. For the uninitiated, PechaKucha is an evening of quick-fire talks, delivered
over an automated slideshow, allowing talkers 20 seconds per slide to verbally
illustrate what the audience is seeing on the screen. It is ideal for creative people
showcasing their work, or those who are passionate about a subject describing that
passion. For this event the theme is ‘good grub’, and we are inviting eight speakers to
show and tell a presentation about food. We are busy getting together a great line-up, and at this early
stage can confirm five speakers: Dougie McMaster, founder of Silo; Sarah Hyndman, innovative type
expert and author of the book ‘Type Tasting’; Josie Jeffrey, from Foodshed; Christina Angus, Co-Founder
of Street Diner and Kate Jenkins, an artist who uses crochet, wool and sequins to make food-inspired
art. Tickets, including the food, cost £15. The last two events have been sell-outs: if you want to ensure a
place, you can buy your ticket at pechakucha.org/cities/brighton
....14....

its and bobs
...............................
Pub: the pond
Pat Murphy, the leaseholder
of The Pond, in Gloucester
Road, remembers the pub
from when he was a lad, living
in Over Street. “I used to
deliver milk there, in shorts,”
he remembers. “There was a
bottle and jug [off licence], a
lounge, and a public bar. Everyone
smoking their heads off.
The landlord used to play the
piano. He’s still alive now.”
Once he’d graduated into long
trousers, Pat went on to run a
number of bars, from the Zap
to the Richmond, and in 1989
he bought the lease for the
Pond, which had had a chequered
history since his boyhood
days. “It was an antique
shop for a bit,” he says. “Then
it was the place the casino
used to train their croupiers.
Finally, in the 70s, it became
the Lanchbury Club.” This establishment
went through several
incarnations, starting as an
upmarket restaurant-bar, then
becoming an afternoon drinking
bar (in the days when the
pubs shut between 2.30pm and
6pm), finally becoming a latenight
club, which closed down
in 1987, remaining empty for
many months, until a group of
squatters moved in. “I got the
lease in 1989,” Pat remembers,
“but I had to get a licence first.
They used to go round and inspect the places the day before the
hearing, so we washed it down with several litres of bleach. This lady
magistrate walked in the place, opened up her handbag and stuck a
great big handkerchief on her nose, and walked straight out again.
‘That doesn’t bode well,’ said my mate.” He got his licence second
time of asking, and gave the pub back its original name, though he’s
unsure why it was originally so titled, back in 1872, when it was
opened by Cannon Brewery. “It would have been fields around here
when it was built,” he says. “There must have been a pond around.”
The place is now a good old community boozer again, with the added
attraction of a Thai restaurant upstairs, which has been there for
15 years. The food comes highly recommended: you can also buy
it to take away, or eat it in the pub. If you pay a visit, don’t forget
to look up at the ceiling, where you’ll see scores of chamber pots,
which originally hung in the Green Dragon in Sydney Street, and
came Pat’s way after literally falling off the back of a lorry. Which is
another story… AL
Painting by Jay Collins
....15....

its and bobs
...............................
di coke’s competition corner
This month we’re giving one lucky reader the chance to win a pair of tickets to see the spectacular ‘Holiday
on Ice: PASSION’ at the Brighton Centre on Friday 8th January, including a two-course meal at the Skyline
restaurant with a glass of house wine.
The October challenge is on the theme of food and drink. We’d like you to imagine your dream dinner date
- who would you invite and why? Be creative, and brief (25 words max): they could be real
or imaginary, dead or alive! Tell us about your chosen one on Twitter, Instagram
or Facebook with the #VivaBrightonComp
hashtag - or alternatively, e-mail your entry
to competitions@vivamagazines.com. The
most entertaining entry will feature in our
December issue and win the meal and show
tickets. Entries must be received before 31st
October and full terms and conditions can be
found at vivabrighton.com/competitions.
Holiday on Ice: PASSION runs from
5th-10th January. Tickets £15 for
children, £22 for adults.
brightoncentre.co.uk
0844 8471538
competition winner
In the August issue we set the
challenge to take a photo on
the theme of ‘Brighton at
night’. Lance Bellers won a
night’s stay at the Ibis Hotel
plus VIP tickets to see Pulp
Fiction at Brighton’s Big
Screen with this lovely shot
of beach huts at dusk.
Di Coke is very probably the
UK’s foremost ‘comper’, having
won over £250,000-worth
of prizes. For winning inspiration
and creative competitions,
check out her blog at
superlucky.me
....16....

Murder Mystery Nights
Saturday 24 October & Wednesday
30 December, 6pm & 8.30pm, £20
Join 368 Theatre Company for an
immersive theatre experience at
Preston Manor.
Cabinet of Curiosities
Friday 30 October, 6-10pm, £13
Prepare for Halloween with a spooky
night at Brighton’s most haunted house:
ghost tales, magic lanterns and noir
films to scare.
For more information visit
brightonmuseums.org.uk
To book call 03000 290902
Fright
Night
at the
Manor
Dare you visit Preston
Manor after dark?

its and bobs
...............................
Secrets of the pavilion:
The Illuminated Palace
There is a long tradition
of illuminating the Royal
Pavilion estate on special
occasions. In November
2013 the digital artwork
studio SDNA lit the
exterior of the Pavilion
in rainbow colours for
one evening, marking the
opening of an exhibition
on Turner. Since Turner was fascinated with light
and colour they used images of Regency colour
wheels and artwork created by Brighton students.
From Turner’s times we have the earliest references
on light installations in the Pavilion grounds. On 17
August 1795 the Sussex Weekly Advertiser reported
that 1,400 spectators watched ‘truly magnificent’
fireworks and illuminations in Promenade Grove (a
pleasure garden on the site of the Pavilion Gardens
Café) in honour of the Prince of Wales’ birthday.
A similar upcoming spectacle was advertised in
the same issue: ‘On Wednesday next, the 19th of
August, the gardens will be decorated, and brilliantly
illuminated with coloured lamps, in various devices.’
Throughout the Georgian period papers frequently
mention illuminations in the windows of private
houses, particularly near the Pavilion. It is possible
that these were lanterns, made from coloured or
painted glass or waxed paper.
In the early age of electricity the Pavilion was
frequently clad in lightbulb chains. A nice example
can be found in the 1903 edition of John George
Bishop’s guidebook The Brighton Pavilion and its
Royal and Municipal Associations. The occasion was
the coronation of Edward VII in 1902: ‘Never has
the Pavilion presented such a scene of enchantment
as it did during this memorable Coronation year.
For many days Brighton
had had the tantalising
vision of the Pavilion,
embroidered with rows
upon rows and festoons
upon festoons of coloured
lamps, though unlit, gave
a singularly picturesque
touch to the Royal edifice.
And when at last came
the time for lighting up, then the exterior of the
structure was a spectacle of splendour such as left
enduring memories for all privileged to see it.’
A black and white photograph accompanies this
description, but the lights were clearly painted on to
the photograph, as was common. The lights appear
white in the picture, but Bishop gushes about the
jewel-like colours: ‘The intricate work of lines of
blue, of white, of ruby, of emerald, set with devices,
like glowing jewels, of initials, crowns and stars,
made a spectacle of appealing charm.’ The Pavilion
gates, too, were illuminated, and the lawns were encircled
with light (probably gas light) and decorated
with Japanese lanterns, while neighbouring estates
and buildings responded by adding their own decorations.
The new library, for example, created ‘an
elaborate design in turquoise, emerald, and amber,
representing a Chinese pagoda, with flanking walls
and gateway.’
From just a few years later we have a number of
hand-tinted photographs showing early flood-lighting
of the Pavilion. One cannot help but think that
in the early 20th century the Pavilion was probably
frequently upstaged by the lavishly lit new Palace
Pier, at least at night.
Alexandra Loske, Art Historian and Curator, Royal
Pavilion Estate
Photo © Alexandra Loske
....19....

£10 EYE TEST AND 10% DISCOUNT
VALID UNTIL 31ST OCTOBER 2015
The Open Market, 1-2 Marshalls Row, Brighton, BN1 4JU
01273 911191 info@thespeckywren.co.uk www.thespeckywren.co.uk

its and bobs
...............................
magazine of thE month: cherry bombe
Coming out of a brilliant concert
at the Dome recently, most
people were very quiet, me
included. Then I noticed that
everyone was talking about the
lighting, me included. That
wasn’t because the lighting was
better than the music; it was because
it was just so hard to put
into words anything that made
sense of what we had just listened
to.
I’ve always thought the same is
true about food. The difficulty
of trying to describe taste, aromas
and textures is so tricky it’s not surprising that
most restaurant reviews – even the best of them -
bang on about their journey to the restaurant, its
location and the friends they were with more than
the food itself.
Which doesn’t stop food journalism from continuing
to grow. This is true in the mainstream but it
is also true of indie magazines as well. In the short
time since the shop has been open The Gourmand,
Lucky Peach and Cherry Bombe
have been joined by Tapas, Cleaver,
ffzine and more. We stock
them all.
I’m highlighting Cherry Bombe
this month because it has a sense
of fun, it covers the whole spectrum
of food and food related
stuff and, as it comes from New
York, it looks through a different
lens than most UK magazines.
In the latest lively and bright issue,
there are 30 different items
in its 144 pages. You can start
picking from a girl and her goats,
taming migraine, thanking moms, rising chefs, frozen
juices, luxury ice cream, sushi, culinary awakenings
and more, more, more. Oh and there are
recipes, too.
Cherry Bombe will take you ages to read, will look
good in your kitchen and make you better at appreciating
food. Not bad for a twice-yearly mag, in
my view.
Martin Skelton, MagazineBrighton, Trafalgar Street
toilet graffito #9
Where IS the coat hook?
This is a question which our toilet
correspondent asks herself in too many
public toilets. In Brighton and beyond.
So, we join this month’s anonymous
scrawler in her lament, and make this
public service plea to all the publicans
out there: A coat hook please (to ease
our wees).
But in which pub did(n’t) she find it?
Last month’s answer: The Sussex Arms
....21....

“
Proudly understated, no fuss just the perfect bespoke kitchen
with each and every millimetre in use. It was a delight to work with
Alistair and his team and I’d have no hesitation recommending Alistair
Fleming to my family and all my friends. The whole experience was
effortless and enjoyable. We love our kitchen!”
KATE, FLETCHING
For inspiration and advice, drop in to our new Lewes showroom
or contact our team on 01273 471269. www.alistairflemingdesign.co.uk
KITCHENS I OTHER ROOMS

photography
..........................................
Simon Roberts
Pier Review
In this month’s regular photography
feature Jim Stephenson from Miniclick
(miniclick.co.uk) catches up with
photographer Simon Roberts, who
has set out to create a comprehensive
study of Britain’s remaining pleasure
piers in his project Pierdom.
What drew you to the piers,
Simon? Like many people in
Britain my childhood is infused
with memories of trips to the
seaside. My grandparents retired
to the south coast of England so
we often visited piers along the stretch of coastline
between Bognor and Eastbourne. I wanted to
capture a sense of faded romance, nostalgia for the
quirkiness and fun that these piers represent. Once
I started researching the project I was interested to
find that it was the Victorian photographer Francis
Frith, along with his team of employed photographers,
who had created the last comprehensive
study of the pleasure pier. I felt it was high time
for a reboot! Although my visual style is quite
different, I applied a methodical approach to the
project in much the same way as Bernd and Hilla
Becher, who looked to capture vanishing forms of
vernacular architecture, with the goal of preserving
their details before they disappear completely.
Did you see many tangible differences or similarities
in the various piers? Some of the piers
are spectacular creations whilst others are more
modest, built from concrete or steel. Eugenius
Birch was one of the most famous pier builders,
known for his eccentric designs that echoed
Eastern architecture, including Brighton’s West
Pier. So whilst the work is a taxonomy of Victorian
decorations and construction methods, seen together,
the photographs in the
exhibition provide a comprehensive
picture of these variations,
and of the many modern
additions and entertainments
that have transformed some
of the piers in recent years. By
framing the piers within their
wider geographical context,
between steely greys and
blues of the British sand and
sky, I also wanted to provoke
consideration of our changing
relationship with our coastline.
The photos in Pierdom, as with all your work,
have a lot of depth - lots to look at. How much
planning goes into this in advance and how
much of it is down to patience?
The large negative from the field camera I use
provides an enormous amount of detail in the final
print, thereby offering the viewer an opportunity
to discover small narratives and details in each
photograph. In making the work, I often referred
to Google Streetview or satellite images to find
the best vantage points to photograph each pier,
sometimes ringing on the doorbells of apartments
on the promenades to persuade often bemused
occupants to allow me onto their balconies! I also
embraced whatever the weather was in each location
on the day I arrived to photograph – come
sun, rain or hail storm – to help give a sense of
time and reflect the very elements that the piers
have had to endure in their long and sometimes
fragile relationship with the sea.
Pierdom will be exhibited at Brighton Museum &
Art Gallery from 3rd Oct to 24th.
simoncroberts.com
....23....

photography
...............................
Clevedon Pier
....24....

photography
...............................
Brighton Pier
Brighton West Pier
....25....

photography
...............................
Eastbourne Pier Worthing Pier
....26....

photography
...............................
Cleethorpes Pier
....27....

column
...........................................
Amy Holtz
The truth is, I’m a Minnesotan
There are few things in life
that truly scare me - aside from
the usual plague/shark attack
scenarios. Once while gardening,
I put my hand behind a shrub
and was just scooping out what I
thought was a pile of dead leaves
when out rolled a hedgehog,
Sonic-style. I clambered onto
a bin and squatted there until
someone could prove that he’d
left the county. I’ve since developed
something of a post-traumatic phobia of
irrational proportions.
I think I believe in ghosts, too, at least at night.
Guns - definitely. Not every American sleeps with
them, I can assure you. That’s probably why cops
kindle a familiar, blood-freezing trepidation in me.
It started when I was 17, out past my curfew and
15 miles from home in the dense dark of Highway
12, the potato smell from Bushmills Ethanol
seeping through the windows. After midnight, the
only light that illuminates the Atwater, pop. 1,126
and 30mph hour signs are your headlights and a
panoply of stars.
The coppers in this dwindling, mile-long town are
infamous. They hide between the towering F-150s
at the Ford dealership and wait for you to blunder
through, grow impatient crawling past the beaten
up Victorian houses and shuttered roadside cafes
and put your foot down - a few hundred feet shy
of the 55mph sign.
But being young and very stupid, the sirens
shrilled and the red lights flashed and my whole
life grew very still. And short, I feared, when my
parents found out.
Thing is, troopers feed on fear. It’s
their favourite snack - better than
krullers or pinwheels. And they
let it grow, while you sit, sweating,
and your friend starts sobbing, the
blood slopping in your ears blocking
out everything but ‘speeding’
‘sin’ and ‘hell’ as you suck back
snotty tears, trying to man up.
I’ll never forget his face, that guy,
even though he’s probably seen
hundreds like mine. Expressionless, but riven with
stern disappointment.
I was pulled over on my bike near Preston Park
about this time last year. The cop was tall and
imposing, and I stopped because I had that feeling
again - where your heart makes a repeated run
towards your ribs.
He wanted to let me know that I’d be fined in a
few days for my lack of day-glo and lights.
But, I pointed out, sensibly, the clocks haven’t
changed yet, so I don’t need them today.
Yes, but next week you will, he replied firmly - my
exit cue. But a man rumbled past us on his mobility
scooter and I couldn’t help myself.
He doesn’t have any lights, I said, leaning over my
handlebars. Are you going to stop him?
He glanced up the road, then back at me. It was
that look again. So I wore my lights and all the
yellow I could find the very next day.
Anyhow, turns out I wasn’t speeding in Atwater.
One of my tail lights was out. It didn’t matter
though - another post-traumatic phobia had
already set in.
....28....

column
...........................................
John Helmer
High anxiety
Illustration by Joda, jonydaga.weebly.com
‘Welcome to the sky,’ says the concierge as I
stumble, sweating and blinking, into the 25thfloor
lounge. The room is fiery with afternoon
sunlight and has a view from its floor-to-ceiling
windows that turns my stomach. I suffer from an
irrational fear of heights, so of course we have
booked into a skyscraper hotel for our three-day
city break in Barcelona.
Kate, who is good at these things, has found us
this great deal where we get free cava and tapas
all day (it seemed a fair trade-off) and a concierge
called Federico to help us book restaurants,
tickets to visitor attractions, etc. Federico
is invaluable, since Kate doesn’t speak much
Spanish and my own command of the language
is limited to putting an ‘o’ on the end of an
English word and smiling engagingly. He gets us
ticketed up for La Sagrada Familia:
‘...and will you be taking the tower tour?’
‘I think not.’
Our room a few floors down has the
same floor-to-ceiling windows. After
watching me edge round the bed with
fluttering eyelids a couple of times,
Kate suggests we keep the curtains
drawn.
Why do I let this happen? Less than
5% of people share my phobia, but
somehow I can’t accept that everyone
else doesn’t secretly feel the same way
and is just toughing it out. It doesn’t
help that all the major tourist attractions
involve dizzying heights. I mean,
just look at Europe’s top three: Guinness
Storehouse (my knuckles were white
around that top-floor pint), The Eiffel Tower
(the rest of the family walked up, I drank vin
rouge au rez-de-chaussée) – and Gaudí’s Barcelona
Brainfuck Basílica, La Sagrada Familia,
which we’re visiting now.
‘No wonder their economy’s in the toilet,’ I
say, as we stand amid a huge crowd of Chinese
people gazing up at its absurd lollipop towers;
‘every one of them is over here bunking off work
and poking me in the back with a selfie stick.’
Inside the nave we collapse into a couple of
chairs, bathed in garish amber light from the
stained glass, gazing upwards into the astonishing
vault.
‘This is nuts.’
‘This is completely nuts.’
Kate and I don’t go into churches much nowadays
except for tourism and funerals. There is
an intimacy here, perhaps, in the fact that we are
sharing a mutual sensory disablement – for once,
I’m not the only one with head-spins – but this is
not the place to hear a still, small voice. It’s an art
assault. Gaudí was an architect of shock and awe:
like an equally pious, but infinitely more talented
Donald Rumsfeld.
We venture on past the high altar, over which
a statue of the risen Christ appears to be paragliding,
and catch sight of little balconies at floor
level that give onto a huge subterranean crypt.
The balconies are fully glassed in. There is no
danger – but I hang back, with a clamour in my
limbic system that doesn’t let up for as long as
Kate is at the rail. Finally, she turns and, noticing
my expression, says, ‘What?’
‘Let’s go get a cava.’
....29....

Float in our luxury cabin with unique LED galactic
ceiling for a superior floatation experience...
BENEFITS OF FLOATING CAN INCLUDE
4
4
4
“I no longer need pain killers for my back”
“I feel so much happier and relaxed”
“I sleep much more soundly after my float sessions”
Brighton’s ONLY Floatation Centre
© 2015 Cocoon Healthcare
Ocoon
A Healing Arts Centre
3be safe
3be smart
3be strong
ARTS / YOGA / BALLET / PILATES / ACTING CLASSES
MASSAGE SESSIONS DAILY • HYPNOTHERAPY & COUNSELLING
ALLERGY/FOOD INTOLERANCE TESTING • SOUND HEALING + MORE!
OPEN 7 DAYS
01273 686882
www.cocoonhealthcare.co.uk
20-22 GLOUCESTER PLACE, BRIGHTON BN1 4AA
DESIGNER MAKERS
OF CONTEMPORARY AND
TRADITIONAL CRAFTS
The Sussex Guild
Shop and Gallery
The North Wing
Southover Grange
DESIGNER MAKERS
OF CONTEMPORARY AND
TRADITIONAL CRAFTS
Ceramics
Enamelling
Furniture
Jewellery
Metalwork
Lighting
Pewterwork
Printmaking
Quilt making
Silversmithing
Textiles
Woodturning
Woodwork
Contemporary
EVENTS 2012
CRAFT SHOW
at Hurstpierpoint
CONTEMPORARY
CRAFT 7 & 8 SHOWS November 2015
THROUGHOUT 10.00am - 5.00pm SUSSEX
www.thesussexguild.co.uk
Hurstpierpoint College, Chalkers Lane,
Hurstpierpoint, West Sussex BN6 9JS

column
.............................
Lizzie Enfield
Notes from North Village
It’s so late that it’s practically tomorrow, when I remember
I’ve forgotten the children. It’s not such
a terrible crime. They are either old enough to be
forgotten about or lurking in safe places, with people
who will not have forgotten about them. I’m not
quite as lax as a couple of friends who are always forgetting
their children and leaving them in the car or
in shops. Seriously, if they were single parents they’d
have no children anymore but, because there are two
of them and at least one of them tends to remember
that they have offspring, there’s a kind of built-in
protection system. “Where’s the baby?”
“I don’t know. Where is she?”
“You took her to the bookshop with you.”
“So I did. I must have left her there. I’ll go back and
have a look!”
I’m not that bad. I’m not like my own father, who
so often seems to have totally forgotten that I exist.
“Who is this?” he queries when I phone, and appears
to be none the wiser, when I explain that it’s his middle
daughter. No, I’ve just forgotten that I promised
to make contact with my children at some point during
the day and now the day is almost done.
This isn’t really a problem, especially as far as the
youngest is concerned. He’s all for hands-off parenting
with an almost invisible ‘p’, as opposed to Parenting
(cap ‘P’), which is how it’s generally done in
the North Village.
I worried out loud during the summer holidays that
I hadn’t really given him much time or attention, to
which he replied, “You give me freedom” and disappeared
off somewhere - no idea where.
When I do make an effort, it doesn’t go down well.
“You’re such a pushy parent,” he complains on a
Monday morning.
“It’s not pushy telling you to go to school. It’s the
law and I have to enforce it. I just don’t want to go
to prison.”
“Oh. Ok then.”
This line of reasoning works, at the moment. No
doubt having a jailbird mother will take on its own
appeal in a couple of years time. But, for now, it’s not
the authorities that are the issue; it’s my own guilt for
having forgotten about them.
I’m swanning about at the far end of the kingdom
(that’ll be Scotland until the next referendum) and
they are either looking after selves or being looked
after by others. The only parenting I was required to
do all day was to send a text and I’ve failed to do that.
I wonder if it’s too late and decide it’s not.
“Hope all ok?” I say, or something equally brief.
“Yeah fine,” replies child 1.
“Yup,” comes in from child 2.
I look at my watch. It’s two minutes to midnight. I
wonder if child 3 has already been tucked up in bed
by a more Parenty parent and complained that his
useless mother has not been in touch at all.
Then he replies.
“You’re so over-protective…”
Illustration by Joda, jonydaga.weebly.com
....31....

BRIGHTON IN history
..........................................
Manhunt
The Grand bombing police investigation
The man from Scotland Yard knew straight
away what it was he’d found. It looked a bit like
an ice-cream cone, but it was actually part of a
timing device, from the bomb which had gone
off two weeks earlier. It had been in the U-bend
of a debris-filled toilet on the third floor of the
Grand Hotel. It was a breakthrough.
Metropolitan Police experts, affectionately
nicknamed ‘the flour sifters’, had spent those two
weeks searching through hundreds of tons of
rubble and debris. They were so meticulous that
they even found a conference delegate’s missing
contact lens.
They were looking for tiny pieces of the bomb’s
circuitry and timing device. It was ambitious and
time-consuming work, ‘a dirty and often dangerous
job’, in the Argus’ words. But someone had
tried to kill the Prime Minister, and they needed
to find out who.
***
There were hundreds, maybe thousands, of
false leads. Like the bearded man seen acting
suspiciously inside the hotel, who turned out to
be a TV repair man. Or the man with a bag, who
a witness claimed ‘was very peculiar and said he
hated the Tories’. Or the Irish people spotted,
before the explosion, ‘jeering at the Tories’ at
another hotel. Or the young man who worked in
the Grand’s kitchens for a couple of weeks under
a false name. Or the ‘short, stocky man’ seen running
from the scene after the explosion.
At one point, there were more than 200 officers
working on the investigation. They traced
hundreds of people who had stayed at the Grand.
They interviewed, and did background checks
on, guests, staff, and building contractors who’d
been refurbishing the place. They went to ‘secret
prison locations’ to interview three convicted
IRA terrorists, who were uncooperative, according
to the Argus. And they pursued every lead,
however trivial it seemed.
At Brighton Police Station, in John Street, ‘noone
ambles along [the] corridors these days,’ the
Argus reported. ‘Everything is urgent. Messages
flash from room to room. Phones ring continuously.’
However, “exciting is probably not the right
word,” says Graham Hill, who was a senior
figure in the investigation. A surprising sense of
normality developed, once they’d got over the
scale of the crime. They were “working monster
hours” and the operation dragged on, but the
overall mood remained upbeat. “I think, looking
back on those sorts of inquiries, there’s always
that optimistic determination; that you’re going
to catch the person that’s done it.
“With almost every inquiry that I’ve been
involved in, officers, even after long periods of
time, still have that motivation. You might feel
one day, ‘I don’t know if this is going anywhere’,
and the next day something happens and you’re
all on that enthusiastic roll again.”
It was, the Argus noted at the time, ‘the most
secret investigation ever mounted in the county’.
Even Sussex PCs, if they weren’t involved, were
told very little. “It was very much on a need-toknow
basis,” former policeman Albert Mariner
says. “I don’t feel that I knew a great deal of what
was going on, and didn’t need to know.
“It seems like a huge event in English history, but
....32....

I think, unless you were in the actual hub of the
investigation, then your day-to-day work tended
to shift focus [back to normal policing] and you
moved on.”
“It was so far away from those of us who were on
the ground and charged with normal day-to-day
policing that it could almost have happened in
Paris or Bangkok or Amsterdam,” says Simon
Parr, who was then a junior Sussex PC. “Just
there were parts of the building we couldn’t use.”
Most of one floor of the John Street station
was taken up by officers working on the case,
co-ordinating operations and dealing with all the
information that was coming in. Investigationrelated
security concerns meant that some PCs
spent whole shifts guarding the building. Parr
calls this “the most boring duty I have ever had
in 32 years in the police... You spent seven hours
standing on the street around a police station.
Terrible… everybody hated it.”
Presumably due to concern about car bombs,
parking was suspended outside the station. One
motorist was told: ‘If you leave your car here,
you’ll get it full of bullet holes’.
***
An Army explosives expert was able to work out
where the bomb had been: behind a panel in the
bathroom of room 629. And, from analysis of
what ‘the flour sifters’ had found, as well as other
intelligence, investigators figured out exactly
when the bomb must have been planted. It was
on September 17th, in the evening.
Evidently this was before hotels started taking
guests’ credit-card details as a security precaution.
But people staying at the Grand did at least
have to sign a registration card. Most of the
reception area was still intact, and, by the end of
November, the relevant card had been found in a
box. It was signed by ‘Roy Walsh’ of ‘27 Braxfield
Road, London, SE4’. This was a real address, but
wasn’t the home of ‘Roy Walsh’, whoever he was.
Interviews with potential witnesses provided
“practically no information” about the mystery
man, Hill says. “I don’t recall anybody that was
able to tell us what he looked like, or what he was
carrying or what he was wearing.”
But, at a Met forensic lab in London, they
had an electron microscope which, the Times
....33....

All talk
and no
vote?
You need
to make sure that
you’re on the
updated electoral
register, or you
might not be able to
vote in future.
Register online
now at
www.gov.uk/
register-to-vote
Electoral Services, Brighton & Hove City Council
Visit us at www.brighton-hove.gov.uk/vote
Email electors@brighton-hove.gov.uk
or call 01273 291999

eported, ‘can be used to recover fingerprints from
surfaces on which they are normally obscure’. This
process apparently revealed prints belonging to
Patrick Joseph Magee, who was the subject of an
outstanding arrest warrant over a postal-bombing
campaign in 1979. But where was he?
***
“The press were hounding us for briefings,” Hill
says, and senior politicians showed “a very high
level of interest” in what was going on. “It wasn’t
pressure that we were feeling in the team; we just
got on and did it.” But, of course, Sussex’s Chief
Constable Roger Birch was under pressure.
He was in a difficult position. Though they’d
discovered the real identity of ‘Roy Walsh’ by
January 1985, Birch couldn’t make this information
public. “The feeling was that Magee wasn’t in
this country, and therefore, the whole issue of trying
to find him had to be handled very carefully,”
Hill says. “Had he become aware that he’d become
the main target, he had connections in other parts
of the world, as far as I understand it, so he could
have disappeared.”
Keeping this secret was so important that normal
PCs – even some of the people involved in the
investigation – weren’t told about Magee. “There
may well have been less than 100 people in the
country who knew they were looking for him,”
Parr says. “I’m just picking a number, but it would
have been kept very, very close in the investigations
team, surveillance and intelligence units.”
Yet, somehow, a Daily Mail reporter found out. The
paper planned a front-page story naming Magee,
and contacted Sussex CID chief Jack Reece about it.
‘Jack was horrified’, the journalist later wrote. Reece
had heard, from undercover sources, that IRA
operatives including Magee would soon be coming
back to Britain for another bombing campaign. The
story would have been enough to spook Magee.
The Mail pulled it. Magee came back.
On June 22nd, 1985 – eight months after the
bombing, and at least five months after the manhunt
began – he was spotted at Carlisle station by
undercover operatives.
“I can remember a story about the surveillance
officer quickly going to his partner, grabbing her,
and faking a great big passionate kiss so he could
look over her shoulder without being spotted,”
says Simon Parr. “Surveillance officers will do all
sorts of things to look normal.”
Magee was followed back to a hideout in Glasgow.
A team of armed detectives surrounded the place.
When they knocked on the door, Magee answered.
He and his fellow IRA operatives were caught with
incriminating evidence about plans to bomb various
resorts in South East England.
“Although you’re allowed, I think, a degree of selfsatisfaction,”
Hill says, “that very quickly turns to:
‘Right, now we’ve got the man, we’ve got to prove
it, and get a conviction in court.’”
Interviewed by police, Magee ‘never once replied
or spoke to them,’ the Argus reported. He pleaded
not guilty, but didn’t give evidence at the trial. He
was convicted. Steve Ramsey
With thanks to Simon Parr (who’s now Chief
Constable of Cambridgeshire), Graham Hill (now
working at Victim Support), Albert Mariner (now
running Acorns Camping, based near Angmering),
and Kieran Hughes, author of Terror Attack
Brighton.
Photo courtesy of Peter Chrisp
....35....

Photo by Adam Bronkhorst
....36....

interview
..........................................
mybrighton: Lizzy Bishop
Brighton Fashion Week director
Are you local? I grew up in the countryside
near Banbury, Oxfordshire. I moved to
Brighton when I was 21. I was studying at
Southampton at the time and after visiting for
a weekend I fell in love with it. So I transferred
to Brighton University.
What did you like about the place? It
attracts very individual, unique characters.
And although it’s small, it never gets stagnant
because there are always new faces, new people,
new energy. It’s full of familiar places – like The
Dorset [where we’re doing the interview] but
plenty of new places starting up as well.
And you’ve been here ever since? Yes I have,
I have travelled and lived abroad over the years
but have always come back to Brighton as a
base. I originally planned to move to London
after my degree to work in the music industry,
but life threw a spanner in the works, in the
form of a diagnosis of Hodgkin’s Disease. I
made a complete recovery, but it made me
completely reassess what was important to me.
It was a blessing in disguise, really.
How did the Brighton Fashion Week come
about? In 2004 I started off a catwalk show,
called Brighton Frocks. Originally it was part
of Brighton Fringe and acted as a platform for
Brighton designers. Over the years this has
grown into what it is now - an international
concern. Over the years we’ve featured over
600 designers from over 30 different countries.
What’s new this year? I’ve become friends
with Siobhan Wilson from FAIR, the Fair
Trade and ethical fashion shop on Queens
Road. I’ve got huge respect for her – she’s one
of the most genial and inspiring people I have
met. Siobhan is Sustainability Consultant to
Brighton Fashion Week and is helping us with
our aim of advocating environmental sustainability
in the fashion industry.
Where do you shop in Brighton? There
are so many places: I got an amazing jacket in
Snooper’s Paradise recently. All About Aud and
Hope and Harlequin are great places too. I love
getting my hands on second-hand and vintage
gear. I recently bought a Chanel handbag at
Brighton Racecourse car-boot sale for 20p, and
found £20 inside. The trouble with Brighton
charity shops is that there are so many quirky
people around doing the same thing that it
makes it difficult to find a good bargain. I often
go further afield: Lewes charity shops are great!
Can you recommend us a good pub or restaurant?
I like Silo at the moment, the wastefree
place. And the Real Junk Food Project. For
a good roast I love the Yeoman, or the Lion and
Lobster.
When did you last swim in the sea? About
three weeks ago. I used to swim from pier to
pier, but not anymore. I also used to do military
training for exercise but three tears in my rotator
cuff put an end to that. Now I’m getting
into Hatha yoga.
Where would you live if not in Brighton?
I love India. Or I’d like to live in the Basque
Country, because of the green mountains. Or
Granada, for its duende. Mind you, Brighton’s
got duende in spades: you’re never far from an
inspiring moment. Interview by Alex Leith
Brighton Fashion Week, Oct 15th-17th
....37....

local musicians
..........................................
My Life Story
Power-pop chuggists
My Life Story earned their place in the 90s Britpop scene
with a string of top 40 singles and some sassy orchestral
pop. We spoke to main man Jake Shillingford about the
band’s comeback tour, kicking off in Brighton this month.
Tell us about the new material you’ve written.
It’s got a new wave, power-pop chug. So it fits sonically
alongside some of the tracks on our last album,
but it’s mainly the lyrics that are a genuine continuation
from My Life Story of old. The new single is
called 24 Hour Deflowerer so you can surmise there’s
a lot of wordplay going on.
Has your soundtrack work affected how you
write pop songs? Writing for film and TV briefs
gives you a huge amount of discipline. It got me
thinking about the three-minute pop song format
and how much arrangement has changed in the
streaming era. Many top-40 songs are now frontloaded
with choruses to prevent the listener from
clicking on. I wanted to return to old-school songwriting:
we’re recording 24 Hour Deflowerer this
week and it’s coming in at exactly three minutes.
This isn’t the first time you’ve reformed. Is
there unfinished business? I always find that
question odd. Painters, actors, authors and film
directors all disappear and reappear at will, often
without questions being asked of their motive. It’s
just what I do. I write songs, and as I’ve matured I
have got better, and now I want to play them to a
few people. That’s all.
What are your thoughts on Britpop 20 years
later? Great songs, some great people, pointless
rivalry, amazing ideas, a capital city that was genuinely
buzzing, naivety. When the drug dealers started
hanging outside all the recording studios it was over.
As a lecturer at BIMM you must see bands
coming through who have been inspired by
90s music. Are your students ever fans? Ha, yes.
I’ve had a couple of students bring albums into my
lectures for me to sign. Never sure if it’s for them
or their parents! I don’t think revivals are weird,
they’re part of the circle of life and music does
much to bring back memories, good and bad. There
were so many characters and so much genuine popstar
behaviour in the 90s, so it doesn’t surprise me
that people want to see that return.
What did you do then that you wouldn’t do
now? Drive around in a blue transit with wooden
benches screwed in over the wheel arches with an
11-piece mini orchestra in the back, half of which
were trying to get off with each other.
What’s the new line-up like? We’re going for a
hard, tight, new wave, rock ‘n’ roll line up. The big
orchestral version of My Life Story has been indefinitely
rested, but some of the original members
will be joining me on the tour, depending where
we are in the country. I’ve found that the new arrangements
that we’ve come up with let the songs
breathe but also hit you square in the face.
Interview by Ben Bailey
My Life Story play the Hope & Ruin on Friday 30th
October, 8pm, £12
....39....

Gigs In Brighton...
BorN ruFFiaNs
Thursday 8th October
Patterns
WHeaTus
Monday 12th October
Komedia
rae morris
Tuesday 13th October
Concorde 2
ProToje
Tuesday 13th October
Komedia
Diy Neu Tour
Tuesday 13th October
The Haunt
Clay & kassassiN sTreeT
Wednesday 14th October
Green Door Store
Les Ballets
Trockadero de
Monte Carlo 2015
Tue 3 & Wed 4 Nov, 7.30pm
Tickets from £12.50
Dma’s
Thursday 15th October
Green Door Store
youNg guNs
Saturday 17th October
Concorde 2
FiNk
Monday 19th October
Bexhill De La Warr
HoNNe
Tuesday 20th October
Patterns
HooToN TeNNis CluB
Tuesday 27th October
Green Door Store
sPeCTor
Tuesday 27th October
Patterns
CoasTs
Friday 30th October
Concorde 2
THe milk
Friday 30th October
Sticky Mike’s Frog Bar
brightondome.org
brightdome
‘The funniest
night you'll
ever have
at the ballet’
Sunday Times
01273 709709
brightondome
Bully
Monday 2nd November
Bleach
LoutPromotions.co.uk
There is a £2 per order charge.
Additional postage charges (50p
standard or £1.50 recorded
delivery) apply

local musicians
..........................................
Ben Bailey rounds up the Brighton music scene
BAD POND
Sat 10, Green Door Store, 1.30pm, £8
Starting with the
mellow electronic
jazz of Calico, this
post rock all-dayer
gets heavier as it
goes, taking in the
‘turbo prog’ of
Cleft, the ‘chaos
core’ of Let’s Talk
Daggers and the ‘diva doom’ of Written In Waters
(only one of those genres we made up). The top slot
goes to Guildford’s Palm Readers, who launched
their last album with five gigs in one day, but the
more interesting headliner might well be Brighton’s
Delta Sleep who go for insanely tight experiments
in choppy-stoppy guitars and endless drum rolls.
There’s also a record fair and a math rock quiz – as
if there wasn’t already ample opportunity for chinstroking.
DOG IN THE SNOW
Wed 14, Hope & Ruin, 8pm, Free
With a moniker inspired by a Kafka novel and a
new EP named after the unsettling effects of robots
with a human likeness, there seems to be something
more going on in Helen Ganya Brown’s sparse
electronic music than meets the eye. The video for
last year’s Factory saw her wandering around the
weird apocalyptic landscape of Dungeness power
station; the latest single from Uncanny Valley has her
living out parallel lives in a future/present personality
split. Dense as it sounds, the duo’s songs are
stripped back and spacious, allowing the vocals to
shine. A run of South Coast shows concludes with
this free EP launch party.
THE SECRET FESTIVAL
Sat 24 & Sun 25, Secret Location,
12.30pm, £10/6.50
The organisers of this mystery music weekender
played the secrecy card so well they managed to get
7,000 people attending on Facebook before they’d
even announced the line-up. Promising a fresh blast
of new music alongside stuff like body art and zine
stalls, the event seemed to entice Brighton gig goers
so much they signed up regardless of the blanks.
From what we’ve seen so far the bands are mostly
from Brighton and Leeds, with garage surf duo
Thundernauts and indie rockers Pürple the notable
local inclusions. You can’t argue with two days of
live music for a tenner, even if you don’t know what
you’re paying for.
OCTOPUSES
Thu 29, Green Door Store, 7.30pm, £9
Combining the
slacker ethos of 90s
guitar bands with
a lo-fi synthpop
sound and a great
knack for tunes,
Octopuses also
somehow manage
to mix knowingly childlike rhymes and some rather
tasteful trumpet parts with a series of mini rap interludes
to make music that’s at once catchy, upbeat
and fun. Equally oddly, this album launch party sees
the Brighton band releasing their debut on Lick
Music, a local yoghurt company moonlighting as a
record label. The ticket price includes a copy of the
new album, Yes Please, as well as some great support
from Prince Vaseline, Seadog and the hyperactive
comedy rave of MC Fashion.
....41....

Resident Music
Dome Box Office
Union Records
Music’s Not Dead
(Bexhill)
Pebbles
(Eastbourne shows)
The Vinyl Frontier
(Eastbourne)
Venue if applicable
seetickets.com
ticketweb.co.uk
Age restrictions may apply.
Tue 6 Oct
Wed 7 Oct
Sun 9 – Sun 24 Oct
Shobana Jeyasingh
Dance
Racheal Ofori:
Portrait
Brighton Comedy
Festival
Friday 9 October — The Haunt
Two Gallants
+ support
Tuesday 13 October — The Green Door Store
Rival Consoles
+ support
Monday 26 October — Komedia
Ron Sexsmith
+ support
Wednesday 4 November
— Otherplace at the Basement
C Duncan + support
Monday 9 November — Komedia
Julia Holter
+ support
Tuesday 10 November — Komedia
An evening with
Alela Diane &
Ryan Francesconi
TTuesday 17 November — Komedia
Mercury Rev
+ Nicole Atkins
+ Wolf Solent (DJ)
Wednesday 18 November — Komedia
The Mountain Goats
+ The Weather
Station
Thursday 26 November — Komedia
Built to Spill
+ Disco Doom
Saturday 28 November — St. George’s Church
Stornoway
Unplucked
+ support
Friday 11 December — The Hope & Ruin
Curated by Dog In The Snow
Bernard + Edith
+ support
Thursday 18 February — Concorde 2
Ezra Furman
+ support
Tue 27 Oct
Akram Khan
Company:
Chotto Desh
meltingvinyl.co.uk
Tue 27 Oct
Wed 28 Oct
Asian Dub
Foundation live
score THX 1138
Godspeed You!
Black Emperor
Fri 30 Oct
Sun 1 Nov
SPECTRUM:
GAPS
Joanna Newsom
01273 709709
brightondome.org
Don’t forget to pick up Viva Lewes too
or read it online at vivamagazines.com

music
.........................................
Wheatus
Middle-aged dirtbags
“It was an interesting time; very nerve wracking,
very topsy-turvy, lots of insecurity, and excitement
at the same time,” says Wheatus frontman Brendan
B Brown. “We were a bit wide eyed.”
The band’s year, really, was 2001. They had a major-label
contract, a top-ten album, and a hit single
so successful that it would obviously overshadow
anything they subsequently did. They were big.
But Brown, unsure why his band was “being
lumped in with ‘pop punk’ and stuff”, had been
feeling “a little bit misunderstood”. Then there was
an incident in Australia where “we were going to
play a TV show, and one of the Sony people said:
‘Hey, can we get you into some clean white shirts?’
They wanted us to clean up. And I said, you know,
the name of the song is Dirtbag…
“I felt a lot misunderstood that day. From then on,
I was kind of feeling like, well, maybe they didn’t
know who they were inviting to this party, perhaps
it isn’t for us. That began the whole ‘maybe we’re
not supposed to be on a label’ thing.
“There wasn’t a second step for us to take at
Columbia Records, so we got out of it. That meant
that people didn’t hear from us for a few years,
because we had to get out of our deal. I was also
being sued by an ex manager; we eventually won
the case… The point is, we had to lie low after that
because we didn’t have the ability to make another
record yet, legally. And as soon as we did, we got
it together and kind of reformed things, around
2003-04, I guess.”
Since then, the band has been independent, releasing
stuff through their website. According to their
own PR material, ‘they scrape recording & touring
budgets together by selling last year’s gear on
eBay.’ But that doesn’t bother Brown.
Photo by Jane Greenwood
“Most artists from our time period, who released
albums in the year 2000, are doing much, much
worse. Some don’t exist at all. Most musical
endeavours end in catastrophe. And we never got
along with the major label system, so it’s fortunate
that we don’t have to.
“That comes at the cost of being sort of just an
indie band. But I feel a lot better about selling
stuff on eBay every year than I do about having
solipsistic, horrible conversations with record label
executives who have eaten the wrong yoghurt
that morning, so they’re not going to give you the
fucking video that you need. No matter what the
reward, I don’t want that in my life.”
And actually, Teenage Dirtbag has been useful to
them in this respect. “It’s fantastic, we use it now as
an ambassador, as our calling card… all the things
we don’t have that you typically need infrastructure
for in the music industry, Teenage Dirtbag provides.
So, you know, we’re quite happy with the way
things turned out.” Steve Ramsey
Wheatus – 15th Anniversary Tour, Mon 12 Oct,
Komedia, 7pm, £15
....43....

9–24 OCTOBER
brightoncomedyfestival.com
OR 01273 709 709

ighton comedy festival
.........................................
Ed Byrne
“I won’t take my foot off the gas”
There seems to be a nice story-arc in Ed Byrne’s
career. There’s the early hype, as a young-andpromising
Perrier-nominated act. Then the slump,
in which he struggles to write new material, stars
in Carphone Warehouse ads and unsuccessful
sitcoms, and does a too-long tour around largebut-part-empty
venues, somewhat distracted by
frequent rows with his girlfriend between gigs.
Then the recovery and continued rise, beginning
around 2006 with an acclaimed new stand-up set
and a regular guest spot on Mock the Week.
But a key part of the story – his misery during the
slump – is missing. He’d gone into comedy with no
particular sense of urgency, and no greater ambitions
than to “make a living out of it, out of making
people laugh”. Always very much a “go with the
flow” type person, he only really realised he’d had
a difficult spell once it was over. And anyway, he
says, “things weren’t going that badly.
“At the time I thought that things were okay. I
just thought ‘the next thing will come along’.
And it’s only after, I guess, some distance was put
between me and then, that I look back and go ‘oh
shit, things did really take a dive around that time,
didn’t they?’”
Byrne admits to having “taken my foot off the gas”
around 2000. He’d been doing an Edinburgh show
every year, but “kind of burnt out and then didn’t
do it at all… I sort of ran out of things to talk
about as well.
“At the time, maybe there should have been a
bit more introspection and worry and stress, and
perhaps I’d have done something about it a bit
quicker. Maybe having the cushion of a lucrative
advertising contract made me less likely to do so.”
But doing a play at Edinburgh in 2003 made him
“want to get back on the horse a bit more.” He
Photo by Roslyn Gaunt
brought a new show to the festival the following
year, which he now calls “alright, but only alright. I
did a better one in 2006 and a better one in 2008.”
Also, in 2006, he gave the best-man’s speech at
Dara Ó Briain’s wedding, telling a story “about
the time he brought the police to my house by accident,
by trying to flag down a police car, thinking
it was a taxi, outside my front door.” A producer
from Mock the Week heard it and invited Byrne to
come on the show and tell the story, which led to a
regular guest spot.
“I was quite pleased,” he says of his re-emergence.
“And determined to maintain it a bit better this
time, and make wiser choices as regards TV.
Although you could say that this time around my
success is purely on merit, it’s not based on that
fresh-new-comedian smell anymore. So I feel like
this is a more sustainable period. And I won’t take
my foot off the gas this time.” Steve Ramsey
Ed Byrne appears at the Brighton Comedy Festival,
Dome Corn Exchange, Fri 16 Oct, 7.30pm. Also at
The Old Market, Tue Nov 24, 8pm
....45....

The Treas n Show
Jeremy Corbyn is ...
The
Corbynator
Give me
your votes
“Savagely funny-fantastically silly” THE GUARDIAN
(1 min walk from
The Clock Tower)
Fri 9th & Sat 10th October
Fri 13 & Sat 14 November
11 Dyke Road, Brighton
Box office 01273 725230
www.rialtotheatre.co.uk

ighton comedy festival
.........................................
No Such Thing as a Fish
Four nerds in a room
“We’re useless at pub quizzes,” says Dan Schreiber,
one of four QI elves who’ve become known in their
own right for the spin-off podcast No Such Thing as
a Fish. “We don’t have the basic knowledge. When
you’re reading something, you almost gloss over
the stuff that’s general knowledge, and take in the
stuff that’s quite obscure and never really comes up.
There’s never really the question ‘how many vaginas
does a kangaroo have?’ in a pub quiz.”
“Like ‘what country are kangaroos native to?’”
adds fellow elf Anna Ptaszynski. “We don’t even
know the answer, but we can tell you how many
vaginas they have.”
Anna says it is “really fun to have your job being
reading about things that you’d never usually come
across”. Dan says: “I was looking into the history of
socks the other day.”
“That was the third time we’ve mentioned socks
in the podcast,” Anna adds. “I think we were all
researching the history of socks for the third time,
and finding that we already knew most of the weird
stuff about socks, and had to dig even deeper.”
“And suddenly we found so much more,” Dan says.
“There’s always more.”
The podcast came about when they were thinking
about possible formats for a new show, and realised
that “the times we laugh most are when we just
randomly say ‘did you know this?’ and start talking,
and throwing in more and more facts, trying to
out-fact each other,” Dan says. “We then just sat in
front of a laptop and pressed record.”
That’s all the show is: four nerds in a room, talking
about interesting stuff they’ve found out, making
each other laugh. It’s brilliant. It’s also intellectually
intimidating – how do they know all this stuff? But,
reassuringly, they’re always forewarned about the four
‘headline facts’ for each episode. They then research
around those facts, finding related bits of trivia, which
they keep secret from each other until the tape’s on.
That’s why it sounds so spontaneous.
“It’s not meant to be a show where we’re trying to
swing around our intellect, going ‘look how much we
know without googling,’” Dan says. “We google and
research the hell out of these shows.” They need to.
“Any subject we talk about, there’ll be a listener
who’s an expert in it,” Anna says. “If we say something
wrong, way more often than not we’ll get an
email or a tweet: ‘You said that wrong, you idiot.’”
Dan says: “I was once told that, when transporting
sparkling water overseas, they take the bubbles out,
so it doesn’t go flat on the boat, and when they get
to the other side they put the exact same bubbles
that they took out back into the bottle. I said that
as an outright fact on the show, and we’ve been
receiving emails about my stupidity ever since.”
Anna adds: “From wannabe bubble allocators, who
just haven’t been able to find work.” Steve Ramsey
Brighton Dome Corn Exchange, Sun 18 Oct, 5pm.
Part of Brighton Comedy Festival
....47....

MUTATIONS
MULTI-VENUE
FESTIVAL
AN INTIMATE 1000 CAPACITY EVENT IN BRIGHTON, UK
LIGHTNING BOLT
METZ
JOHN TALABOT (DJ)
TOURIST / NEKO CASE
OM / CHELSEA WOLFE
28TH - 29TH
NOVEMBER
WILLIS EARL BEAL
OUGHT / JANE WEAVER
NATALIE PRASS / BRNS / KAGOULE / VISION FORTUNE
BLAENAVON / ALL TVVINS / LOWLY / PLASTIC MERMAIDS
CHASTITY / MOUNT BANK / ABI WADE / SEA BASTARD
BLACKLISTERS / FOREIGN SKIN / NATURE CHANNEL
PLUS MANY MORE TO BE ADDED

halloween
...........................
Copperdollar
Dead men do dance
“As you enter into the space you’re taken into
another world... a dead carnival,” says Kt Simpson,
Producer and Artistic Director of immersive theatre
company Copperdollar. Their show Back of Beyond
is inspired by Mexican Day of the Dead and pagan
feast of the dead Samhain, and will be taking over
The Old Market this Halloween weekend. “I did a
lot of research into the traditions of these festivals,
welcoming the dead, and I had this idea of trying to
change people’s feelings about death and how we
connect with people who have passed. The show is
a celebration of life, with a strong party element to
it. It’s very interactive and there are lots of things
going on to get involved with: there will be a coffin
that you can lie in and have your makeup done;
people going around offering you to write letters to
the dead, or to other people at the show; dances to
join in with, and more.”
Kt has been performing for over 30 years, after running
away from dance school to join the circus. “I
wanted to do something which would reach more
people; the dance world to me was always very ‘high
art’.” She spent three months training on one of the
first Circus Skills courses ever taught in England,
where she met like-minded performers and went on
to form a two-person clown act called ‘Bodgit and
Scarper’. The group expanded and new performers
joined, until the act included “fire engines and boys
on motorbikes doing motorbike tricks,” but eventually
Kt became “too hungry and too poor” to carry
on, so she went back to working duos and solos on
other shows.
“40 was looming and I was still performing as an
aerialist. With one child and another on the way,
I decided I needed to ground myself.” Literally.
So she went to study Dance and Visual Art at the
University of Brighton, where the idea of immersive
theatre was sparked. “I became quite obsessed
with the relationship between the show and the
audience. In street theatre, you’re always close to
the crowd, and in the circus too, you’re connected
with your audience. In one of my shows I created a
harness that connected all the actors together, and
behind the actors I put a mirror so that the audience
saw this reflection of themselves in the show.”
Performing is only one side of the Copperdollar
theatre company; Kt also runs a rehearsal space
for performers to hire. Housed in a disused garage
in Kemptown, Copperdollar Studios has a vast
warehouse-style space upstairs, with a smaller rehearsal
room downstairs. “What you really need as
a performer is space to devise, and rehearse, which
is really hard to find in Brighton,” Kt explains.
“Someone can come here, have the space for a
couple of days or a couple of weeks and be able to
work undisturbed.” Rebecca Cunningham
To find out more about hiring Copperdollar Studios,
or for more info on the Copperdollar Theatre
Company, visit copperdollar.co.uk. ‘Back of Beyond’
tickets at theoldmarket.com
....49....

THE YOUNG
CHEKHOV SEASON
ANNA CHANCELLOR
THE
SEAGULL
by ANTON CHEKHOV
in a new version by DAVID HARE
directed by JONATHAN KENT
Photo Anna Chancellor Samuel West Olivia Vinall Adrian Lukis Peter Egan Joshua James by RICHARD HUBERT SMITH & SHAUN WEBB
£
TICKETS
FROM
cast NEBLI BASANI LUCY BRIERS
PIP CARTER ANNA CHANCELLOR MARK DONALD
PETER EGAN JOSHUA JAMES ADRIAN LUKIS
DES McALEER SARAH TWOMEY OLIVIA VINALL
SAMUEL WEST JADE WILLIAMS
28 September - 14 November cft.org.uk 01243 781312

ighton early music festival
................................................
The musical Borgia
Music-loving princess Leonora D’Este
There is, officially, no surviving
music by Leonora d’Este,
Lucrezia Borgia’s daughter.
It’s known that she was
talented; other 16th century
musicians said so. It’s also
known that she had various
keyboard instruments, and
back then “if you played a
keyboard instrument, to play
beyond a certain level, you
almost de facto composed,”
says the musicologist Laurie Stras. But as a
woman, a nun, and a princess of that era, any
music Leonora did publish would almost certainly
have been issued anonymously.
Leonora grew up in a convent, as her mother
had died and there were no suitable family
members to look after her. “Growing up, she
had arguments with her father because she
was the only princess, and a princess’ value to
a ruling family was as collateral - she could be
married off to form alliances,” says Stras. “She
didn’t want to marry; she wanted to stay in the
convent. That meant she could carry on studying,
and playing music.”
Leonora’s convent, Corpus Domini, had a good
musical tradition. There were ‘servant nuns’
and ‘choir nuns’, and the latter “probably spent
more time singing than they did any other
activity, even sleeping,” Stras says. “There must
have been extraordinary music going on in this
convent, but they kept it very private.”
Stras, though, is a “musicological bloodhound”
of 20 years’ experience, with a particular
interest in 16th-century Italian music. Flicking
through a catalogue of publications by the
Venetian Girolamo Scotto, she
spotted a title, something about
a ‘Bride of God’, and wondered
if it was by a nun.
She got a reproduction from a
library in Germany. The book
contained various choral works,
with no composers’ names
given. “I started to transcribe
the music, and virtually the
whole book was just screaming
‘nuns’ music’ at me.
“There are lots of very strong signs that they
were written by a nun who lived at the same
time as Lucrezia Borgia’s daughter, in the same
kind of convent, and with the same kind of access
to the same kind of music.
The evidence is “kind of esoteric stuff”, involving
the timing of feast days, knowledge of the
private music of the d’Este chapel, and requests
for the Virgin Mary to intercede on behalf of
‘the devoted feminine sex’. Stras sounds pretty
convinced that the works were composed by
someone from Corpus Domini, with Leonora
being the strongest candidate.
“My frustration is that I haven’t yet been allowed
into the convent to see the archives. The
nuns are very polite, but they won’t let me in,
I haven’t yet gained their confidence… They
do have an archive, and I know they have her
papers. I don’t know if they have the absolute
proof there, but I’m not going to know unless I
get in and have a look for myself.”
Steve Ramsey
St Barts, Sat 24th Oct, 7.30pm. Lucrezia Borgia’s
Daughter is part of Brighton Early Music Festival.
bremf.org.uk
....51....

food writing
...........................
Jay Rayner
Bad food makes good copy
Jay Rayner isn’t a hatchet man. He doesn’t seek out
restaurants to slate. “I specifically try and find the
good things, and I travel hopefully all the time,” he
says. “I don’t want to sit through a bad meal any
more than anybody else does.” Negative reviews are
“not a vast amount of what I do,” though he knows
it’s those ones which attract most interest. Not that
he really minds. Just look at this publicity photo. Or
the title of his bad-reviews anthology and accompanying
talk: My Dining Hell.
Why do people love savage reviews? I think it’s
to do with the fact that the narratives of bad experiences
are more enthralling than the narratives of
good. When bad things happen, as long as they’re
not happening to you, it’s a more enthralling story,
and certainly the language opens up before you.
So it’s not so much schadenfreude? There is
definitely a bit of that…
Does it make it more enjoyable, or improve
the narrative, if the restaurant is expensive or
pretentious? There’s no point being brutal about
a small restaurant that’s failing all by itself. It’s the
ones that are charging enormous amounts of money,
and have a grandiose sense of themselves, and
believe that they are offering some luxe product,
that really get on my tits. I have no problem with
spending large amounts of money on food experiences;
I’ve done it all the way through my adult life.
I believe what you’re buying is memories. If people
are spending £500 on going to see their team lose
at rugby across a weekend in Paris, I can spend that
sort of money on dinner, but it has to be spectacularly
good. And it’s when you get these grandiose
places, charging £14 a starter and £30 a main course
and it’s just mediocre, and you’re cutting through
Photo by Levon Biss
layer after layer of hype and drivel, that’s when I get
very cross.
How much of your enjoyment of a restaurant
depends on factors other than the food? I always
say, in my restaurant column, that I’m not a food
reviewer, I’m a restaurant critic, and a restaurant is
an experience. It’s about how much pleasure your
money can buy you, and that pleasure is influenced
by an enormous number of things, from the person
who looks up from their clipboard as you arrive, to
how quickly you’re offered a drink, to how quickly
you get your meal to how silly the décor is.
Are you ever able to tell, from the manager’s
reaction when you walk in, whether they know
their restaurant is good or not? The reaction that
would suggest they think their restaurant’s up to
it is no reaction at all, beyond the normal friendly
convivial one. So if they start overcompensating
like mad, or panicking or running around or being
a bit effusive, or whatever, then I would have my
suspicions. Interview by Steve Ramsey
My Dining Hell, Oct 7, The Old Market, 8pm
....53....

tedx brighton
......................................
Marc Koska
The idea that saved a million lives
In 1984, long before he
could justifiably claim to
have saved millions of
lives, Marc Koska was a
23-year-old drifter, living
in the Caribbean. His latest
in a string of jobs involved
making models, for lawyers,
of murder scenes.
Then he came across an
article in the Guardian,
about how syringe reuse could become a big factor
in the spread of HIV. He was intrigued, and – not
put off by his complete lack of expertise in the
subject – decided to try to do something about it.
“I said to myself that I’d study the problem, for as
long as it took, until I understood it well enough
to be in a position to come up with a solution,”
he says. So he spent “about three years” studying
it, doing “anything I could to get by... I’d sand
wooden floors, paint windows...”
He found out that there were something like 270
patent applications already, “but to me they all
seemed way too complicated and way too disruptive
to the process… I woke up one morning and realised
that the answer was very simple, actually.
“There was this particular point in the manufacturing
process that could be changed very quickly and
simply, and there wouldn’t be any negatives, in terms
of extra materials or manufacturing processes.”
This had the potential to save probably hundreds
of thousands of lives a year, and cheaply. One can
imagine the fanfare it received, and how Koska was
immediately acclaimed as a hero. But one would
be wrong. “It took me 17 years before I sold the
first product”. It was “really frustrating”.
Manufacturers weren’t really interested. They use
syringes as loss-leaders,
a way to get access to
other, more lucrative
markets. And needles
are “very low-attention
products. In other
words, manufacturers,
once they’ve started
making them, just want
to keep those machines
running, there’s no
interest in upgrading them or making the syringe
better, because in effect they make exactly the
same amount of money whether they make X or Y.
My product ends up at the same price, about five
US cents.”
Governments could have been quicker to insist on
non-reusable needles, but, Koska says, “there’s a lot
of corruption”. It’s expensive getting elected, and
decision makers end up with favours to repay.
His invention has slowly built momentum, though,
and he’s now sold something like 4.5 billion units,
which means he’s saved “probably in the region of
millions” of lives.
Is it difficult to stay modest? “It doesn’t register,
really. I’m just quite happy to be doing the job
[campaigning on injection safety] and we’ll see
where it takes us. It’s a very ongoing process, it’s
not something where you pass a finish line and
think ‘great, now I can go and do something else’.
I’m more worried about what I’m doing tomorrow
than I am about what happened yesterday.” SR
Marc is a curator/producer of TEDx Brighton. This
year’s theme is ‘Losing Control’. Speakers include
Chris Alton from the English Disco Lovers, Happyologist
Susanna Halonen, and ad-man Rory Sutherland.
30th Oct. Brighton Dome. tedxbrighton.com
....55....

A solo show by Claire Beattie
10 Oct—15 Nov 2015
Gallery open 10.30am—6.00pm Monday to Saturday,
12.00pm—5.00pm Sundays, closed Tuesdays.
CAMERON CONTEMPORARY ART
1 Victoria Grove
2nd Avenue
Hove BN3 2LJ
TELEPHONE
01273 727234
EMAIL
info@cameroncontemporary.com
TWITTER
@Cameronart10
_SussexLife_Advert_93x133_Sept2015_v1AW.indd 2 12/09/2015 16:32

cinema
..........................................
Yoram Allon takes a look at October’s film highlights
Now that the month-long celebration of cinema
that was Scalarama is behind us for another year,
it’s time to turn our attention to more conventional
fare, that’s to say damn fine cinema in a
traditional cinema setting. And this month all eyes
are on the finest cinema space in our fair city, the
venerable Duke of York’s, fresh from a technological
face-lift and special events to mark its 105th
birthday. Sir, we salute you.
The festivities begin on Friday 2nd with the
release of Justin Kurzel’s bold and inventive adaptation
of Macbeth, starring the excellent Michael
Fassbender in the titular role as the Ambitious
One, and Marillon Cotillard as his Lady, driving
him to destruction. The film is a highly visceral
trip, with stunning cinematography and stylistic
flourishes that ensure all vestiges of stage-bound
productions are forgotten: this is a work that fully
utilises the power of cinema to render an archetypal
tale expertly told.
The high-octane fun and games continue with
Dennis Villeneuve’s Sicario, opening on Thursday
8th; a rip-roaring story of kidnapping, drug
cartels and betrayal along the US/Mexican border.
Benicio Del Toro is highly effective as our mysterious
and murderous anti-hero, and Emily Blunt
displays an incredible range in a very challenging
role, offering a career-best performance. Josh
Brolin does his usual Josh Brolin thing, which is
always really worth watching, bless him.
Everything then gets a whole lot weirder. The
master of art-house fantasy horror, Guillermo
del Toro, returns with the thoroughly spooky
Crimson Peak, released on Friday 16th. Continuing
an evident pattern of dream-team leading
couples, tall dark handsome Tom Hiddleston and
the always mesmerising Jessica Chastain provide
the raw menace, but the sheer imagination of this
unique and visionary filmmaker ensures that the
film takes the customary trope of ‘the haunted
house’ to entirely uncharted territory. If you see
one Halloween-themed film this year, make sure
it’s this one!
So by the time of the release of The Lobster, Yorgos
Lanthimos’s unique absurdist romantic comedy,
we’ll all be thankful for the change in gear. In this
dystopian vision of the near future, single people,
according to the laws of The City, are taken to
The Hotel, where they are obliged to find a romantic
partner in 45 days or are transformed into
animals and sent off into The Woods. Remarkably,
Colin Farrell and Rachel Weisz actually manage
to pull this off, and the result is a cinematic experience
like no other. The film is both emotionally
engaging and truly hilarious, a bit like life really.
In addition to these impressive theatrical releases,
the Duke of York’s continues its fantastic ‘Duke’s
After Dark’ season with a special screening of
Jonathan Demme’s masterful Stop Making Sense,
on Saturday 24th, surely one of the best concert
films ever produced, and a reminder of just how
special Talking Heads were, as a band and as an
art project.
Oh, and on Monday 26th, the new James Bond
movie, Spectre, opens on UK saturation release.
But you probably knew that already…
....57....

Julian Germain, Gambela Elementary School, Gambela, Welisso District, Ethiopia. Grade 1, Music. October 9th, 2009. From the
series Classroom Portraits 2004-2015 © Julian Germain.
towner
art gallery
Julian Germain
The Future is Ours
Classroom Portraits 2004-2015
10 Oct - 10 Jan 2016
townereastbourne.org.uk
North to South
Highlights from the Aberdeen Art Gallery &
Towner Art Gallery Collections
12 Sept - 24 Jan 2016
John Napier: Stages
Beyond the Fourth Wall
Tickets £5/£3.50 conc. & members
29 Nov - 31 Jan 2016
Towner is registered charity no. 1156762

art
.....................................
focus on: Mark Nelson
View from the Brooklyn Bridge, 2001, printed on silver gelatin baryta
When did you take this photograph? I was working
for a photography agency called Monsoon in New
York and one of the shots I was doing in 2001 was
of the World Trade Center. I was too close to get a
good shot, so I thought I’d get further back to Brooklyn
Bridge where I could get a better angle. It just so
happened that the building was just lighting up and
you could see all of the people inside working. I got
my shot and went back to New Jersey. A few weeks
later, 9/11 happened.
Have you been back to that spot since? I haven’t,
no. I’ve been up the new Freedom Tower and I had
previously been inside the World Trade Center, but I
haven’t been back to Brooklyn Bridge. When I look at
the photo now and think the majority of people inside
were… have had their lives affected by 9/11, it’s really
tragic. The site is like sacred ground.
Were all of the photos in ‘American Stories’ taken
around the same time? They were taken over the
last 25 years over lots of visits – up to three times a year
- and living there at times. It was the classic American
road trip: to Vegas, the Grand Canyon, along Route
101 through California. I stayed with a couple of
friends, one an artist himself, and he introduced me
to the work of Mark Rothko and Jackson Pollock.
People like that would seep into your system and it
would come out somehow as a photograph. Painters
have always interested me; they see things differently
to photographers. Painters have the advantage of being
able to see what they like, but photographers have
to rely on what’s happening in front of them.
What is ‘silver gelatin baryta’? Silver gelatin paper
is a very thick, high quality fibre-based paper, held together
by gelatin, which is now available digitally as
baryta. There’s a silver coating to it, which gives the
ability to print digitally exactly the same as you used
to be able to. I was a printer before a photographer, so
I learnt my skills in the dark room, being inspired by
the landscape work of Ansel Adams. I used to have one
of his quotes on my wall: ‘the negative’s the score, but
the print’s the performance.’
Rebecca Cunningham
‘American Stories’ will be exhibited at 35 North until
mid-October. 35northgallery.com. firstlightclick.com
....59....

art
.....................................
focus on: Kate Sherman
Untitled, Oil on board, 9x9”, £450
It looks like the view out of a car window...
It is. I used to do a lot of paintings from photos
taken through the windscreen, but now I take
them though the side window. There’s more of a
sense of movement, of life passing you by, quickly,
which I think a lot of people suffer from. Of
time running out.
I hope you’re not driving when you take the
pictures! If I am, I’ll get one of my kids to take
them. I take hundreds and hundreds, and then
it’s a question of sifting through them to get one
that’s just right. Then I’ll play around with it on
the computer to get the tone and colours right,
and try to paint it as accurately as possible.
Though the sideways brushstrokes help with
the sense of speed… That’s right. I run a piece
of card across the painting to achieve that texture.
Are there ever any people in your paintings?
If they appear in the photo, I’ll edit them out. I
like to portray emptiness, and anonymity. For the
same reason I don’t title the paintings after where
I took the picture. I don’t want them associated
with a particular place. I like it that they could
have been taken anywhere.
Edward Hopper comes to mind… A lot of people
say that. There were sometimes people in his
paintings, but they were usually lonely figures.
Hopper’s not a direct influence, though. I’d say
Peter Doig and William Nicholson were much
more influential.
Take us to your favourite gallery. I’ll take you
to 57th Street in New York, where there are lots
of private galleries, sometimes two or three in the
same building.
What painting would you hang from your
desert-island palm tree? One of Peter Doig’s
snowy scenes, to cool me down a bit. AL
Kate’s exhibition ‘Moving Images’ is on at the Jointure
Studios, Ditchling, Sat-Sun or by appt 17th-
25th October. kateshermanpaintings.co.uk
....61....

design
................................
Su Hardy
Mooncup designer
I’ve watched enough Dragons’ Den and Apprentice
to know there are plenty of failed entrepreneurs
far less self-effacing than Mooncup MD Su Hardy.
Since launching her business from a Brighton bedroom
in 2002, Su has built a global brand around
a reusable menstrual cup she redesigned to suit
modern women. “I still don’t consider myself an
inventor or an entrepreneur,” Su tells me. “[The
business is] sort of an organic thing.”
The daughter of an engineer, Su discovered the
concept while travelling in Australia. She met
women who were using menstrual cups that had
been manufactured since the 1930s but were hard
to obtain. Su thought the cup “a brilliant idea”, so
she brought some back to Brighton and began circulating
them among friends.
Su says the cup’s ‘environmental advantage,’ most
appealed to her, as did its practicality. “I’m a practical
girl; I’m a practical girl.” Her friends ‘were
as impressed,’ although the brown latex of the
original product was a put-off. This, and learning
about latex allergy, led Su to discover a medicalgrade
silicone and a UK manufacturer. Her early
guerilla advertising - stickers I remember seeing at
Glastonbury - promise a ‘safer, greener, cheaper’
alternative to towels and tampons.
It’s not all been easy, however. Soon after Su
launched, an American firm trademarked ‘Mooncup’
and began selling a similar product. Gratifyingly,
US bloggers began recommending Su’s
Mooncup over the other, under the name MCUK,
as it is now sold in the States. “It’s unfortunate that
this has to happen in the world of women,” Su says.
“It’s the sort of thing that you associate with bigger
global organisations rather than small, cottage industry
stuff, but that’s how it is and we live with it.”
I ask whether being in Brighton helped Su build
her business. In many ways, it seems, not least
in that Infinity Foods became her first national
wholesaler. “There’s a community of open-minded
folk here,” says Su. “A lot of what stops people
doing things is the social construct around us. If
you’re in an environment where you’ve got other
free thinkers it’s easier to suck it and see.”
I’ve made a few jokes about the Mooncup in my
time, but having spoken to Su, no kidding, I could
be converted. “When people hear about Mooncup
for the first time you get this kind of yuk factor,”
Su says. I wonder whether this is symptomatic of a
broader belief that women’s bits are distasteful?
“Yeah, exactly,” says Su. “Whereas in actual fact
they’re a natural part of life: without them, there
would be no life.”
“Those [negative] associations still exist,” Su says,
“but my experience is that women now are much
more open about talking about periods.” I think
Su should accept good credit if a more positive
attitude to menstruation is breaking through; she
has always worked to personally introduce women
to her product. “We’d talk to complete strangers
about their periods: I love that,” says Su. “I think
women have always wanted to do this; they just
didn’t have the space to before.” Chloë King
mooncup.co.uk
....62....

literature
........................................
The Humans
We are aliens too
Most of us will have experienced
feeling like an alien.
These moments can come in
many guises: repeating a word
until it loses its meaning and
language becomes foreign to
us, for instance. Or overhearing
someone else’s opinions
on an important matter and
being surprised that you are of
the same species. Or noticing
certain human behaviour and
recognising how peculiar it
is. In the extreme, struggling
with physical and mental ill
health can feel alienating; the
world around you operating
in a way that seems so separate to you. When
I meet Matt Haig for a coffee we talk about these
moments, and how having humans as the alien in
his novel The Humans works to make the reader call
up such instances.
The original concept for the novel was a nature
documentary, which focused on the behavior of humans.
This is unsurprising given that the thing Haig
finds most alienating about people is our apparent
“inability to look at ourselves as animals. I never
really realised that until I had depression and I think
we sort of forget our perspective, we forget about
the universe and the world very easily. We forget
there are millions of other species. We are the most
advanced species on our own terms but I am sure that
humpback whales, in the terms of humpback whales,
consider themselves the most advanced species.”
And so Haig soon realised that this kind of observation
of humans would only work if it came “from
the perspective of something that is not us but is
watching us”. Despite his editor’s
request to make the alien
element metaphorical, Haig was
determined to have some fun
and make the book sci-fi. Influenced
by his own experience and
nature - “I am naturally quite
cynical” – by Carl Sagan’s book
Cosmos and by the violent sci-fi
films of his childhood, Haig created
a novel which moved from
“harshness to acceptance to joy”
about his fellow humans.
The central character, a Vonnadorian
alien sent to Earth to
destroy the human threat to his
species, is initially repulsed by
human behavior and customs. Clothing is beyond
his comprehension, nor can he understand the way
humans don’t say what they mean, how they smile
when they want to scream. He finds every human
face disgusting and in particular is appalled by the
violence of humans; he calls the news ‘The War and
Money Show’. However, the alien grows to accept
humans and by the end of the novel is very attached
to them; Haig’s “effort at being positive”.
The Humans, which has been picked as this year’s
‘City Reads’ book, has achieved international critical
acclaim. Evidently a lot of people feel a little alien.
Haig hopes that the book will appeal to a wide
crowd, saying that he “just wanted to write a book
which you could read around a campfire, a book
that was for everybody, every gender, every age,
every sort of background. A book that is relatable.”
Holly Fitzgerald
Matt Haig in conversation with Alex Clark, City
Reads 2015, The Old Market, Nov 1st, 5pm
....63....

© Stuart Mackay
let your feet
our store 42 bond street, north laines, brighton, bn1 4rd
movelshoes movelshoes facebook.com/movelshoes

ighton maker
................................
Baines & Fricker
Brighton rockers
What do you make? We
design and make furniture
and accessories, as well as
illustrated wallpaper and
cushions. One of our bestsellers
is the rocker, which
we first made in 2011 and
re-create each year; this
year we’re making it using
London Plane wood
with bright green Kvadrat
upholstery. What a lot of
people don’t know is that
we also design bespoke
pieces for residential and
commercial clients. We’ve
designed interiors for local
businesses like Dowse
on Western Road and zero-waste restaurant Silo.
What direction were you given in the design of
Silo? The main brief was to reuse materials as much
as possible, to fit the concept of the restaurant, but
obviously there are limits to what we can make with
recycled materials. The next key criterion was to
use materials which could be found in abundance,
which is why we decided to use a fair amount of
OSB (a kind of chipboard), which is essentially a
waste product from the wood manufacturing industry.
We developed a great relationship with Cat
Fletcher, the founder of Freegle, and we were given
lots of old school desks which had been thrown out
because the schools didn’t have the budget to get
them repaired. They were too low to use as tables
but too high for seating, so we chopped the bottom
off some of the legs to make them into benches and
welded the offcuts onto the bottom of the others to
make them into tables.
Is re-use of materials
something you like
to bring into your own
work? We’re very conscious
of not creating
waste and using recycled
materials where it makes
sense to. If we use new
timber certified from a
sustainable source, we
know that for every tree
we use, two more are
planted in its place. Sometimes,
because of the need
to process recycled materials
or the quality of the
finished product, it can be
a false economy.
What types of residential projects have you
worked on? We’ve designed bespoke kitchens, including
a ‘Meccano’ kitchen for some clients who
wanted flexibility in the space, so we created everything
on casters. Our designs are quite functional;
we love designing little hidden features which
make the most of the space. A lot of our projects in
Brighton tend to be for storage, or smaller pieces of
furniture to fit into the spaces people have.
Do you prefer working on bespoke pieces to
making products you’ve made before? The great
thing about making bespoke pieces is that it gives
us a good variety of challenges. We wouldn’t like
to work on rockers all day long, but when we’ve
worked on a few different projects and then come
back to making something familiar, it’s really satisfying
to see the end product. Steve Baines and Eliza
Fricker were interviewed by Rebecca Cunningham
bainesandfricker.net
....65....

talking shop
................................
Mo:vel shoes
Soul soles
What makes Mo:vel shoes unique? The
shoes are inspired by Brazilian ‘Ginga’, a fluidity
of movement that permeates the Brazilian
way of life and the beat of Brazilian music, so
they are designed to let the feet move freely
and fluidly. We have three styles: Rio Grande
which are the high-tops, Bahia are the lowcuts,
and São Paulo, the joggers. Every season
we introduce new prints designed by up-andcoming
Brazilian artists. For our first collection,
we collaborated with artists Bruno Nunes
Coelho and André Coelho Moreira, who have
created unique, joyful prints inspired by the
rhythms of Bossa Nova, Axé and Forró. The
original prints are on display in the shop
alongside the artists’ explanation of their work.
Are they just for dancers? They’re for everybody
who wants the freedom and comfort
to move well, from skateboarders to gym-goers
and city-strollers. The look of the shoe is
only half the story; the soles are made from
expanded foam with extra support around the
heel and three shock-absorbing pads for total
fluidity of movement, so it’s not only about
how they look, but how great they feel. As an
ex-dancer myself I know how important it is to
have the right shoes for your feet.
Why did you choose Brighton for your first
store? The Lanes are full of new and independent
brands you wouldn’t find anywhere
else, so we thought the open-mindedness of
everybody here made it the ideal place to start
out. And we love the community spirit; last
month we organised a Zumbathon with Federico
from The Zumba Zone to raise money
for the Rockinghorse charity.
What was the concept for the shop interior?
We wanted the shop experience to reflect
fluidity and freedom of movement so we
asked architects rather than shop-fitters to design
the space. All our styles are displayed in
all sizes, for customers to walk through and try
on without having to wait. Also, shoes are seen
from the top, as if you were wearing them.
What will you have in store for this season?
This month we’ll be getting in some
really lovely new suedes in beautiful colours.
We all get involved in the design meetings,
so we all get a chance to discuss ideas
and trends we’ve seen emerging. We’ll also
be having a two-hour student lock-in this
month – visit our website for more info.
Rebecca Cunningham interviewed Jenna Aarons
movelshoes.com
....67....

Brighton ad_Layout 1 23/01/2015 17:03 Page 1
Est.1976
www.hobgoblin.com
NOW IN BRIGHTON!
The ALADDIN’S CAVE of MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS
BEGINNERS’ ARABIC & CULTURE COURSE
Guitars, Banjos, Mandolins, Ukuleles, Harps, Fiddles,
Autoharps, Dulcimers, Concertinas & Accordions,
Woodwind & Brass, Huge whistle selection. Drums,
Cajons, Bodhrans, Djembes, Shakers & much more,
Keyboards, Amps, Accessories & Books for all.
108 Queens Rd, Brighton BN1 3XF
01273 760022 | www.hobgoblin.com/brighton
Expert staff are always on hand to
give you free, friendly advice.
13 - 20 DECEMBER ’15
£389 PER PERSON
£649 PER COUPLE
ONLY 12 PLACES AVAILABLE!
• 20 Beginners’ Arabic Lessons
• Two Cultural Seminars
• Tours Of The Old Medina
• Atlas Mountains Excursion
• Weekend In Coastal Essaouira
• Hotel/Riad Accommodation Included
• All Transport Included (exc. Flights)
• Half Board Meals Included
BOOKING VIA: CONTACT@STARLINGSTUDYTRIPS.CO.UK
MORE INFORMATION AT WWW.STARLINGSTUDYTRIPS.CO.UK
PROTECTED BY ABTOT
(MEMBER NO. 5325)

the way we work
This month, we dragged Adam Bronkhorst out after dark to photograph some
of our local taxi drivers, who help get us home safe and dry after a night out.
We didn’t ask them to drive us anywhere, but we did ask them:
What’s the furthest you’ve taken a passenger?
www.adambronkhorst.com | 07879 401 333
Nigel Chambers
A young guy, travelling to Cardiff from Brighton. Originally he was going by train
but changed his mind on his way to the station because he wanted to get back
home in time for a beer with his mates. Paid me £378 for the journey.

the way we work
Dean Coverdale
The furthest I’ve been to date is Gloucestershire, which took me most of the day there and back.
I don’t like to turn down work, so I’d go pretty much anywhere in the UK.

the way we work
Kin Tang
I was driving a passenger to the airport and she asked me to go on holiday with her. She had
broken up with her boyfriend and had a spare ticket. We spent three days in Tenerife together.

Open
daily
from
12pm
DJ’s
Bands
Cocktails
Private hire
Areas to reserve
Local beers & ales
Free high speed WiFi
Book now for Christmas
www.patternsbrighton.com
10 Marine Parade, Brighton, BN2 1TL

the way we work
Luise Tait
I drove a Chinese lady, who was in a wheelchair, from the Metropole in Brighton to
the Metropole in the centre of London. She was the flag bearer at the front of the China
team in the Beijing Games, which made a long trip very interesting.

the way we work
Ali Khan
I drove some Arab students who were studying in Brighton to the embassy in Cardiff because
they were transferred there. They loved Brighton, they were telling me about all the bars and
clubs here. When we arrived in Cardiff they said ‘Oh my god, this is like a different world.’

Food & Drink directory
Raise Bakery
Our well-established, family-run bakery has opened its first shop, offering
a wide range of sweet treats, breads, lunches, coffees, breakfast options,
smoothies and milkshakes. Everything in store is handmade in Sussex with
a modern British/American style. We also stock a range of baking supplies
for the avid baker. Free Wi-Fi and power points. Join us in our friendly,
relaxed environment, open seven days a week.
facebook.com/raisebakery
twitter.com/raisebakery
100 Church Road, Hove, 01273 778808, raisebakery.com
No.32
No.32 has it all and
more in this all-in-one
venue. A restaurant, bar
and club in the heart of
Brighton, serving freshly
made food and drink
seven days a week. From traditional grills to
fashionable burgers to freshly made cocktails.
With the sound of great music from local DJs
you can eat, drink and dance at this all-encompassing
modern setting, so come and visit us for
an evening to remember!
Burgers, grills, bites, platters, sandwiches, salads.
Modern & classic cocktails. Craft & draught
beers. Happy hour Sundays - Fridays 5-7pm.
No.32 is a restaurant, bar and exclusive late
night venue in Brighton with regular live
music and special events.
32 Duke Street, 01273 773388, no32dukestreet.com
Terre à Terre
Watch out for lots of
new autumnal treats
on the menu at Terre
à Terre, the local
go-to for the most
creative vegetarian
food in Brighton and
always delivered with
a cheeky little pun!
Open 7 days a week
offering brunch,
lunch and dinner
options from small
plates, sharing tapas to 3-course set meals, and
not forgetting their magnificent afternoon-tea
menu, multi-tiered savoury, sweet and traditional
delights available from 3-5pm daily and
lots of organic wines, beers and juices!
71 East Street, 01273 729051, terreaterre.co.uk
MARKET
Situated in the heart of Brunswick village, MARKET Restaurant Bar is all
about the very best of Sussex. MARKET is a Marketplace; a place for great
people, for great food and for great drink. MARKET is a hub, a hive of
activity and the setting for many good times. Sharing is very much a theme
of MARKET, with a wide variety of small plates on offer plus MARKET
classics, Sunday roasts and the weekend Big MARKET Brunch.
Sit at one of the many stools at the kitchen bar that overlooks the chefs, take
a table or book the upmarket private dining room, ‘DownMARKET’.
42 Western Road, 01273823707, market-restaurantbar.co.uk

advertorial
Boho Gelato
6 Pool Valley, 01273 727205, bohogelato.co.uk
Ranging from Vanilla to Violet, Mango to Mojito and Apple
to Avocado, Boho’s flavours are made daily on the premises
using locally produced milk and cream and fresh ingredients.
24 flavours are available at any time (taken from their
list of now over 400) and, for vegans, Boho Gelato always
stock at least five non-dairy flavours. Gelato and sorbet
is served in cups or cones or take-away boxes.They were
recently included in the Telegraph’s top 10 ice creams in the
UK and last summer were featured in Waitrose Magazine.
Saint Andrew’s Lane, Lewes, 01273 488600
1 Hove Place, Hove, 01273 737869, thebetterhalfpub.co.uk
Pelham House, Lewes
A beautiful 16th-century four-star town house
hotel that has been exquisitely restored to create
an elegant venue. With beautiful gardens, a
stylish restaurant and plenty of private dining
and meeting rooms it is the perfect venue for
both small and larger parties.
www.pelhamhouse.com
Facebook: Pelham.house
Twitter: @pelhamlewes
The Better Half
The Better Half pub has put the heart and soul
back into one of the oldest public houses in the city
just off Hove seafront. There’s a superb wine and
spirits list and some great ales and ciders on offer,
as well as a hearty and wholesome menu to enjoy,
making the best of local ingredients. The Better
Half is relaxed, friendly and easy-going, making all
feel welcome and comfortable when you visit.
“We’re just around the corner.”
Ten Green Bottles
Wine shop or bar? Both, actually... wine to take away
or drink in, nibbles and food available. Many wines
imported direct from artisan producers. We also offer
relaxed, fun, informal private wine-tasting sessions from
just two people up to 30 and for any level of wine knowledge - we encourage you
to ask questions and set the pace. We also offer tastings in your home or office,
and will come to you with everything you’ll need for a fun, informative and even
competitive evening. The best-value destination for great wine in Brighton!
9 Jubilee Street, 01273 567176, tengreenbottles.com

....78....

food
...........................................
Fatto a Mano
Neopolitan-style pizza
What do you do when you put a magazine to bed?
You go for a celebratory lunch, somewhere good.
Fatto a Mano is a new pizza place at the Preston
Circus end of London Road; walk in and you know
you’re going to have a good experience. It’s bright,
largely painted white, you can see the wood-fired
oven from where you’re sitting, and there’s an inordinate number of white-clad staff scurrying around.
Their MO is to do pizzas like they do them in Napoli, where the pizza was invented. LL goes for a Margherita,
and I drone on for a bit about the fact that the first ever pizza was made for Queen Margherita when she
visited the city, the red, white and green of the tomato, mozzarella and basil representing the colours of the
Italian flag. Yawns all round. I go for a ‘Salsiccia e Friarielli’ pizza bianca (ie no tomato) number with sausage
and broccoli; RC chooses a Calzone, which has always to me represented a bit of a cop-out. I mean, go for a
pizza, and you want a pizza, right? I also order a Poretti beer, which, when it arrives, hits the spot.
As does the pizza. The Neapolitan variety has a soft, spongy dough, and they’ve done it just right. The sausage
is exceptional; I enjoy every mouthful. You know that feeling when you’re disappointed it’s all over? Check.
Afterwards we have a coffee on the terrace, and sort out the bill. £41, including drinks and a salad. Great
value, then, too. Can’t wait till the next deadline’s passed. Alex Leith 01273 600621/fattoamanopizza.com
一 攀 眀 挀 甀 猀 琀 漀 洀 攀 爀 猀 漀 渀 氀 礀 ⸀ 倀 氀 攀 愀 猀 攀 焀 甀 漀 琀 攀 ᠠ 嘀 䤀 䈀 ᤠ
....79....

....80....

ecipe
..........................................
Spicy South Indian Fish and Chips
Head chef and co-owner of the Curry Leaf Café, Kanthi Kiran Thamma, cooks up
a spicy twist on a pub classic, available from their new kitchen at the Temple Bar
Indian food is one of the most popular cuisines in
the UK, but the majority of curry houses and restaurants
are North Indian or Bangladeshi. Having
grown up in South India, I know the cuisine has so
much to offer, so when I opened my own kitchen I
wanted to put the food that I grew up with on my
menu and see if people enjoyed it.
In South India, there are five different states and
the food is so different from one to the next. In
Hyderabad in Telangana, where I come from, there
is a big Persian influence, because in the past the
rulers came down and brought this style of cooking
with them. Dishes like biryani are popular. It’s a
complete contrast to other South Indian states. The
biggest change was when the Portuguese brought
down chillies from Mexico, and food in the area got
much hotter.
This dish is from the menu we’re serving at Temple
Bar, inspired by the food you’d get in pubs in India.
We’re really big on pairing our food with craft
beer, which very few restaurants are doing at the
moment. I always have to consider things from a
non-chef point of view, and when I first spoke to
Euan, the co-owner of Curry Leaf Café, he said
‘whenever I eat Indian food the one thing I want
to go with it is beer.’ There are so many great craft
beers coming out of this country, and from around
the world, so we’ve tasted hundreds to help us pick
the right ones to go with the menu. Euan loves craft
beer. To match this dish he recommends the Moog
Brew Bastard Bunny Double IPA, which, he says: ‘if
you drink on its own, tastes like hoppy lager, strong
and crisp. But if you drink it with something like
this you start to get banana and caramelised flavours
coming through.’
The fish I use is coley, because it’s more sustainable
than cod. We used to use cod during the seasons
that there was plenty of it available, but coley actually
takes the spices really well because it hasn’t got
too much flavour of its own. For this recipe, serving
four, you’ll need about 400g skinned and pinned.
Cut the coley into four-inch-long pieces and
marinate them in the juice of one lemon, 1/2tsp
turmeric, 1/2tsp red chilli powder or paprika and a
couple of pinches of salt.
To make the batter, combine 100g gram flour, 50g
rice flour, 1tsp ginger paste, 1/2tsp garlic paste, one
chopped green chilli, six curry leaves, chopped, and
two pinches of salt. Add sparkling water little by
little and work in with a whisk until you get a thick
coating-consistency batter.
Dip each piece of fish into the batter, making sure
it’s completely coated, and gently drop into hot
oil, either in a deep fat fryer or a deep pan with oil
on a medium flame. Fry for about three to four
minutes until golden brown and crisp, then drain on
a kitchen towel. Serve with a side of hand cut chips
or wedges sprinkled with chat masala and red chilli
powder and a squeeze of lemon. A spicy ketchup is a
great accompaniment – just mix ketchup with some
hot chilli powder or hot chopped chillies.
As told to Rebecca Cunningham. Photo by Lisa Devlin,
whose food-photography website is cakefordinner.co.uk
Temple Bar, 121 Western Road. thetemplebar.pub
....81....

food review
...........................................
Market Restaurant Bar
Small portions, perfectly formed
I arrive twelve minutes
late, full of apologies,
but Sarah doesn’t seem
to mind. She’s already
found a place facing the
busy bar and is tucking
into a starter and a glass
of sherry. She’s chosen a
bowl of artichoke hearts,
and she pushes them
over. I dissect one with
my fork – they’re tender enough for this operation
– dip it in aioli sauce, and in it goes. Yum. This is a
good start.
MARKET (their caps not mine) is at the west end
of Western Road – that bit of Hove that still feels
like Brighton – and is in the space that Graze used
to be. Indeed, it’s run by the same team, who’ve
decided on a refurb of the space, and a complete
makeover of the menu.
It’s been quite a refurb. Gone is the red velvet posh
look: now it’s all green metro tiling, urban-chic
lights, and sat-at-the-bar punters. There’s astroturf
on one of the walls in the corridor down to the
toilet, and in the wall cavities where they put their
wines and spirits, strange pictures of wild horses
with blond hairdos. It’s safe to say that I’ve never
seen anywhere quite like it. Jungle Boogie is playing.
A second Sarah-choice starter arrives; fingershaped
fries in a glistening sauce that turn out to
be goat’s cheese churros in white truffled honey.
These are insubstantial delights. She suggests a
Reisling to share, and I think ‘what the hell?’ It’s a
night of outside-your-comfort-zone experiences, so
German wine seems apt.
MARKET is all about small dishes that you can
share, and we order two more apiece. I go for
‘warm octopus, capers and
smoked paprika’ from the
‘fishmonger’ section of
the menu, and sea bream
fillet with spiced aubergine
and piquillo pepper
salsa from the specials
board. Sarah chooses
broccoli, kale and tahini
(from the ‘greengrocer’)
and truffled mac and
cheese. She uploads Shazam on her iPhone to find
out what music’s on now and, as we suspect, it’s still
Kool and the Gang.
The dishes arrive, and they’re all compact, and well
thought out. They’re designed – à la 64 Degrees
– to share, which is a bit unfair on my vegetarian
companion, but she’s the giving type so I get to try
everything. The octopus is chewily gorgeous. The
bream in sauce is crispy and zingy. The kale has
a pleasant crunch to it. The mac and cheese is a
sweet guilty pleasure.
We finish with a cheese platter (‘from the cheesemonger’)
choosing from the selection on the board
some Golden Cross goat’s cheese, Shropshire Blue
and manchego, which comes with membrillo,
chutney and crackers. We play the game of making
this last as long as possible, then, out of the blue,
we are offered a second, complementary platter,
which we eat with some gusto, freed from such
bonds of austerity.
We ask to pay, as Get Down on It comes on. Yep,
it’s been wall-to-wall Kool and the Gang tonight.
Cool. The bill comes to £99.55: Sarah pays, and we
exit, happily, into the real world outside. Alex Leith
42 Western Road. market-restaurantbar.co.uk
01273 823707
....83....

food news
...........................................
Edible Updates
Lovers of Italian food rejoice! There’s a great new start-up
eatery in the centre of town, with a second to follow in early
November. Let’s start with Edendum (Latin for ‘eating’)
an independent restaurant bar run at 69 East Street by a
Piemontese couple, Diego and Lorenza. They serve dishes (see
right) inspired by recipes throughout Italy, but specialise in the cuisine of the North West of the country.
Everything – including the pasta – is made freshly on the premises. And here’s a heads up for the opening of
Purezza, at 12 St James Street, in early November. Purezza means ‘purity’ in Italian, and owners Tim and
Stefania will offer gluten-free, organic stone-baked pizzas, as well coffee, salads and smoothies.
Olive Grove, meanwhile, on Meeting House Lane in the Lanes (where Yum Yum Ninja used to be) are
offering a range of Mediterranean-inspired food, with Italian dishes as well as French, Spanish and – straying
into the Atlantic here – Portuguese. Word on the street is good. As it is for Skyfall, who opened in
mid-August at 42 Church Road in Hove, specialising in surf and turf, especially lobster and burgers. Their
popcorn Martinis sound interesting. Finally, food-wise, a big welcome to Bincho Yakitori, a Japanese tapas
restaurant at 62 Preston Street, run exactly like a proper Japanese tapas restaurant in Japan, which specialises
in grilled skewered meat and veggie dishes, washed down with cold beer.
Which just leaves enough room to mention Bartleby’s, the micro-brewery who’ve opened up in Coachwerks
in Hollingbury, creating – and delivering – small-batches of real ale. Hipster hipster hooray.
Send your food news to food@vivamagazines.com
FESTIVE FUN AT THE
RENDEZVOUS CASINO BRIGHTON
Whether you are looking to treat employees in style, or organise an intimate
gathering for friends, Rendezvous Brighton has something for everyone.
Festive dining packages start from £35 and include:
❄ THREE COURSE FESTIVE MEAL ❄ LIVE ENTERTAINMENT
❄ DJ UNTIL LATE ❄ £5 FREE BET ❄
For more information or to book your Christmas party
email Aimee Lowles – alowles@lciclubs.com or call 01273 785848
01273 785848 alowles@lciclubs.com rendezvouscasino.com/Brighton
The Rendezvous Casino, Brighton Marina Village, Brighton BN2 5UT
Over 18s Only | Challenge 21 Policy in Operation | Know When To Stop Before You Start,
visit gambleaware.co.uk | drinkaware.co.uk. Rendezvous Casino is a part of Caesars Entertainment UK Limited

food
...........................................
The Better Half
The Better Half’s website invites us to darken their doorstep, and so
we do. On an autumnal Thursday evening it’s a welcoming prospect,
with its smart sage green paintwork and gilt letters. Inside it’s a relaxed
and grown-up affair, with the warmth of a local lent a hipster edge by
those clever designers at We Like Today. Obligatory filament bulbs
glow on random lengths of twisted flex and half-panelled walls, the
copper-topped bar and smart buttoned leather banquettes create an
air of trendy trad. The menu is upmarket, locally sourced pub fare and
every dish that comes out of the kitchen (it’s busy) looks mouthwateringly
good. We’ve opted for the crumbed halloumi (£8.50), which chef Andy Keir has elevated from
squeaky cheese to something altogether more delicious with an arty squirt of thick red pepper dressing (I’d
have liked some more of that) and a fresh and peppery salad. We’ve also ordered a generous and glossy pile
of scallops, prawns and Serrano ham, strewn with asparagus and mixed leaves and dressed with a curried
aioli (£9.25). Both plates are all but licked clean. Unashamedly middle-aged music plays below the level
of conversation, affable landlord Simon unobtrusively stops by every table making sure everyone has what
they need and, whilst I’m a long way from my native North Laine, I’m feeling decidedly at home. So I have
another half. Lizzie Lower 1 Hove Place, Hove, East Sussex BN3 2RG thebetterhalfpub.co.uk
....85....

4.0%
alc
vol
4.4%
alc
vol
transformed with new and
improved beer and food
IT’S THE BEST IT HAS EVER BEEN!
STOUT
WITBIER
THE PERFECT
ACCOMPANIMENT
TO OUR SELECTION
OF BEERS
OF CRAFT BEER
in town
INDIAN STREET FOOD
Freshly prepared at The
Temple Bar by Curry Leaf
Cafe’s award-winning chefs
Opening hours
Tuesday to Friday
12pm-3pm / 5:30pm-9:30pm
Saturday 12pm-10pm
Sunday 12pm-6pm Indian Brunch Menu
121 Western Road brighton BN1 2AD thetemplebar.pub
@TempleBarBtn facebook.com/templebar.brighton TempleBarBtn

we try...
......................................
Rathfinny Trail
Coffee and cake in wine country
We last visited the
Rathfinny Wine Estate
in May and, whilst it
was an impressive sight
to see, there wasn’t a
drop to drink. Not so
anymore. Their labours
have borne fruit and
the first Rathfinny still
wine ‘Cradle Valley’ – a
blend of Pinot Blanc
and Chardonnay - is
now available in The Gun Room in Alfriston. I’m
no expert, but having tried some, I can report that
it bodes well for the fizz, for which a little further
patience is required. The first vintage, slowly
fermenting in 5,500 bottles nearby, won’t be ready
until January 2018.
There have been other developments on the Estate,
too. The 180 acres of vines have been establishing
themselves, and preparations are underway
in the Winery to receive the 50 to 60 tonnes of
ripened grapes they expect to harvest this autumn.
Visitors are welcome to see for themselves and
guided tours, complete with a Winemakers Lunch,
will start again in April 2016. If you can’t wait that
long, walkers are invited to take the two-kilometre
Rathfinny Trail all year round, with maps available
from The Gun Room.
We decide to walk in on a golden autumn morning
and set out from the car park at Bo Peep. I’ve forgotten
the map, which results in an unholy havoc
involving dogs, partridges and badger sets, but it’s
worth all the mayhem when we arrive around an
hour and a half later. We stroll down past acres and
acres of young vines to the ‘Flint Barns’, the converted
farmhouse-cumhostel
accommodation
for seasonal pickers and
pruners at the bottom
of the Estate. Its manager
Adrian is waiting
to offer refreshment
from an old Citroën
van, lovingly nicknamed
‘Raffy the Café’. We
sit and take in the view
as we recount the tale
of our off-piste expedition over coffee and cake.
(Coffee & walnut, and lemon drizzle polenta, by
the way, and both delicious.)
The incredibly stylish ‘hostel’ accommodation is
available for bed and breakfast when not in use
by the Estate. It’s all soaring ceilings, stripped
oak floors, open fires and endless views, and can
accommodate single walkers through to groups of
45 in a variety of room sizes and configurations.
‘Hostel’ doesn’t begin to do it justice and with its
cosy communal lounge, dining room and in-house
chef for parties of ten or more it makes the perfect
South Downs retreat. Adrian tells me it’s like a
‘home away from home’, but it’s decidedly nicer
than my house. There’s also talk of supper clubs
and Sunday roasts and, tempting as it would be to
stay (indefinitely), we pick up a map and head back
on the trail, in a more orderly manner than we
arrived. Lizzie Lower
Flint Barns café will be open from 10-4 Friday –
Sunday until the end of October. Check website for
supper clubs and Sunday lunches. Rooms from £35
pppn year round. Rathfinny Wine Estate, Alfriston
01323 874 030 flintbarns.com
....87....

family
...........................................
JoJo & Billie’s Tour de France
Hi-vis bicycle percussionists
JoJo and Billie
have had a cycling
accident. In search
of somebody to
help them fix their
bikes, they stumble
upon an old bicycle,
which magically
transforms
into an imaginary
person named Albert.
Albert invites
the pair to spin the
spoked wheel of fortune to determine where their
journey will take them next…
French theatre company Compagnie Animotion
have been creating highly visual performances for
the last ten years, with the aim of making theatre
more accessible to deaf audiences. “Some of our
first shows had sign language,” explains Hayli
Clifton, the company’s Artistic Director, “but now
we try not to use any language at all to make the
performance accessible to everyone.” The audio
is instead provided by a live musical accompaniment,
composed with the entire audience in
mind: “Normally if we play music with a lot of
bass, or if we put the speakers on the ground, deaf
children will be able to feel it.”
One of the less conventional musical contributions
will come in the form of ‘bicycle percussion’,
which involves hitting different parts of
the bicycle to achieve different sounds. “You can
hit the bicycle just like you’d hit a set of drums;
you’ve got the spokes, the saddle, the wheels and
tyres.” Before some performances the children
in the audience have taken part in creating the
percussion using a loop station.
JoJo and Billie
promises to be
‘as French as a
croissant wearing
a beret’, taking the
audience on a journey
from northern
France, across to
the freezing cold
snowy Alps. “Then
we take a trip down
through the north
to Marseille,” Hayli
tells, “where there’s nice hot weather and we can
play on the beach.” From Provence and Marseille
the audience travels back up through the middle
of France, through the volcanic land. “In some
of the regions there are more cows than people,”
she says. “We carry on travelling, enjoying the
countryside, until we get to Britanny. It’s close to
Britain, and it’s very foggy there too. We find lots
of seafood, like there is in the south of England.
Then our final stop is in Paris, the city of love.”
Children’s theatre often depends on loud
characters and expressive narratives to keep the
little ones engaged, so in the past parents have
wondered whether their child will be able to sit
still throughout the show. “We’ve had parents
from the audience come up to us at the end,
really surprised that their child has stayed silent
because there’s no speech,” Hayli explains, “but
the visuals really work for this age range. There
are even parts where the audience are encouraged
to get involved and take sides, and they really
understand what’s going on.” RC
17th October, 2.30pm, Ropetackle Arts Centre,
Shoreham. compagnie-animotion.org
Photo by Laurent Quinkal
....89....

HEALTH & FITNESS
......................................
Alex Backhouse
PT to the PTs
The pop artist Derek Boshier has a mixed media
piece entitled In California everyone goes to a therapist,
is a therapist, or is a therapist going to a therapist.
If we substitute ‘Brighton’ and ‘Personal Trainer’,
then the PT at the end of the equation is likely to
be Alex Backhouse.
After ten years of facilitating the fitness of all
shades of martial artists, sportspeople and gymphobes,
Alex set up his own studio this summer.
During those ten years he learned directly from
behemoths such as Charles Poliquin and JC Santana,
and is midway through an MSc in Strength
and Conditioning.
Of course, most PTs have a bunch of qualifications,
and CLR James’ rhetorical query ‘What do
they know of cricket, who only know cricket?’ can
come to mind. Not so with Backhouse. A former
professional musician with a residency at the Casablanca
jazz club, he spent much of his mid-to-late
twenties hitting and getting hit in the boxing ring
and mixed martial-arts cage, he can explain what
Narcissistic Personality Disorder is, has a good
handle on the hormonal impact of particular foods
on particular people, and he brings all this to the
training table.
“I was a guitar-playing geek, which was all about
putting in the hours to achieve mastery. Learning
an instrument is a perfect analogy to fitness and
nutrition: one hour a day, four or five days a week
for three months will get you much further than
staying up all night trying to cram like you might
for an exam back at school. You can’t cram how to
play the piano!”
That doesn’t always sit well with folks coming
along believing that a ‘beasting’ is the instant and
only solution to their fitness situation.
“I’ve got a reputation that I’ll destroy people, and
you get the monster guys saying ‘Come on and
fuck me up!’ but the point is anyone can break
something, it takes an expert to build it back. The
key is building a good enough foundation, and
then, and only then, people surprise themselves.
I’m so obsessed with form, with getting technique
spot-on, that I’m not going to allow ‘bad’ destruction.
‘Do no harm’: first week, first year ethics! I
don’t drop anyone in at the deep end until they’re
ready to swim against the tide, but when you’re
ready - be prepared for a dunking. You might not
think you are. But that’s the whole point.”
Therein lies the art, rather than science of what he
does, the becoming attuned to the potential of a
specific client, rather than counting out a set number
of reps like they tell you in the mags. Something
metaphysical, in addition to the getting ludicrously
strong and ripped, can then occur.
“This higher state of consciousness that people
seek through many mediums, can only be achieved
by passing through a certain door. I do hate the
phrase ‘comfort zone’, because it implies what’s
beyond the door is uncomfortable. Comfort is
now irrelevant. Beyond the door - that’s where the
magic happens.” Andy Darling
Alex Backhouse Training Studios, Langfords Hotel,
Third Avenue, Hove BN3 2PX (07786 552011)
alexbackhouse.com
....91....

㜀 㜀 㠀 㘀 㔀 㔀 㜀 㤀 㤀 㠀
䤀 一 䘀 伀 䀀 䈀 伀 䐀 夀 ⴀ 䠀 䄀 倀 倀 夀 ⸀ 䌀 伀 ⸀ 唀 䬀
圀 圀 圀 ⸀ 䈀 伀 䐀 夀 ⴀ 䠀 䄀 倀 倀 夀 ⸀ 䌀 伀 ⸀ 唀 䬀
倀 䔀 刀 匀 伀 一 䄀 䰀 吀 刀 䄀 䤀 一 䤀 一 䜀 䤀 一 䄀
倀 刀 䤀 嘀 䄀 吀 䔀 Ⰰ 䘀 唀 䰀 䰀 夀 ⴀ 䔀 儀 唀 䤀 倀 倀 䔀 䐀
匀 吀 唀 䐀 䤀 伀 䤀 一 䌀 䔀 一 吀 刀 䄀 䰀 䠀 伀 嘀 䔀
∠ 䘀 刀 䔀 䔀 䤀 一 䤀 吀 䤀 䄀 䰀 䌀 伀 一 匀 唀 䰀 吀 䄀 吀 䤀 伀 一
∠ 䠀 䤀 䜀 䠀 䰀 夀 ⴀ 儀 唀 䄀 䰀 䤀 䘀 䤀 䔀 䐀 䄀 一 䐀
唀 一 䐀 䔀 刀 匀 吀 䄀 一 䐀 䤀 一 䜀 吀 刀 䄀 䤀 一 䔀 刀 匀
advertise with us
email nickmetcalf@vivabrighton.com

football
......................................
The Albion: behind the scenes
Darren Balkham - Dedicated Football Officer
All the policing of football
matches in Sussex and Surrey
comes through me. But
Brighton & Hove Albion is
my biggest commitment, and
I deal with every home and
away match.
I use the word ‘we’ when I
refer to the Albion. I support
Man United, but I’m a
Brighton bobby, and I work
so closely with the club, I
consider it a team effort.
I’ve been doing this job for
19 years, and in that time
we’ve moved from the ‘village’
of Withdean to the ‘city’
of the Amex, with the average
attendance rising from 7,000 to 26,000.
There are five different categories of match:
‘police free’, ‘spotter only’, and Category A, B and
C. ‘C’ is a high-risk game. Most games are ‘spotter
only’ which means we’ll have four officers on duty
that day, including two from the away team’s area.
We can call more if we need them, but we’ve only
had to do that once in five years.
We have a community-based approach. We’re
policing a habit. People have a routine when they
go to a match. They’ll leave home, go to the same
pub, and then go on to the stadium at the same time
every game. Then they’ll do the same in reverse
afterwards. If you don’t know the habit, you can’t
police it.
Before the match we’ll wander round the
Queens Road/West Street corridor, where most
of the fans congregate before matches. We’ll liaise
with landlords, and speak with fans. It’s all about
tone setting. It’s natural for
fans to do a bit of drinking
and singing before a game,
but it can become inappropriate
and if the landlord
can’t handle it himself – he
usually can – he will call us
for assistance. Often then it’s
about talking to the friends
of the lariest person, asking
them to calm him down.
Or: “Why don’t you make
your next drink a coffee,”
that sort of thing. If you start
upsetting fans, then you have
a problem.
Most away fans come in
twos – father and son and so
on – so if we can help them by taking photos of both
of them with the stadium behind, we will. That’s
what community policing is all about, and it sets the
right mood.
There are two main reasons why people
complain about policing: either if we are too
heavy-handed, or if we don’t keep people informed
of what’s happening.
I find that, even if fans don’t necessarily agree
with one of our policies, as long as it has been
explained to them, they accept it. Here’s an example:
we decided it was best to hold back the Crystal Palace
fans for 20 minutes after the game, the last time
they played. It wasn’t popular, but the fan groups
were told about it beforehand, so everyone knew
what to expect and it meant that everyone could
get straight on the train without waiting. It worked,
there was no trouble, and everyone was happy.
As told to Alex Leith
....93....

Joy of Movement
Holistic dance for health
A guided class combining simple, flowing and easy to
follow steps with mindful movement for adults of all ages,
fitness levels and experience. Feel balanced, connected
and energised as you find your own natural way of
moving in a relaxed and friendly atmosphere.
First taster class free.
Brighton - Wednesdays 11am-12pm (from Sept 23rd)
The Loft (above Little Dippers), Upper Gardner St, Brighton, BN1 4AN
Lewes - Thursdays 10.30 - 11.30am (Ongoing)
Cliffe Hall, St Thomas a Becket, Cliffe High St, Lewes BN7 2AH
Drop in £8, or 5 classes for £35 (Concessions available)
Call Stella on 07733 450631
Email: stellahomewood@yahoo.com
www.stellahomewood.com

cycling
...........................................
Road cycling gear
Ollie Pepper, Morvélo director
People often sneer at what road cyclists wear,
but there’s good reason why their clothing and
equipment is designed the way it is.
Take the tight-fitting padded shorts. If a cyclist
wears baggy shorts or jeans, they’d be sliding
around on the saddle, making for a much more
uncomfortable ride. And the padding is there for
good reason: the best shorts incorporate memory
foam, anti-bacterial foam and polyester, for maximum
comfort. The longer your ride, the more you
appreciate these comforts.
Tight-fitting jerseys are practical, as well. As
the material hugs close to the body it means the
sweat goes through the garment quicker, and thus
evaporates quicker. Another reason for the tight fit
is to avoid wind resistance. Baggy tops will blow
you around, acting like a parachute.
There are three pockets at the back of
purpose-designed cycling shirts: in these you
can carry all sorts of things which are useful for
your ride, from food, to spare clothing, to wallets
and keys and phones, and a pump, too. They’re
at the back of the shirt so they don’t affect your
pedalling action.
Some people like to wear branded cycling tops
like their professional heroes, or yellow jerseys,
or World Championship jerseys, just like people
having a kick-around in replica football shirts. But
there are many plainer versions on the market,
or shirts which are styled to match high-street
fashion, which we specialise in. We’re doing a lot
of repeat and floral patterns at the moment, for
example. People are starting to regard bicycles as
desirable well-designed objects, and cycle clothing
is following suit.
It’s difficult to find a helmet on the market that
would look good if you weren’t riding a bike,
but in context helmets can look good. I’ve had two
or three crashes when I’ve looked at my smashedup
helmet, and thought ‘that would have been my
head’, so I’m a big advocate of wearing them.
We design cycling caps as well, which can be
worn under helmets to protect the eyes from
sun and rain. There’s not a lot of technology to
these, and they haven’t changed with the times:
they’re very simple and light and small and can fit
in your pocket.
Cycling shoes that clip into the pedal are a
must if you cycle long distances – though I don’t
know anyone who hasn’t fallen off their bike when
they’re not yet used to them. If you wear trainers
you’ll waste a lot of energy as your shoe will move
around the pedal. They enable you to go further
and faster with less effort.
In winter you’ll need more gear: waterproof
tights and gilets and gloves. The old saying always
rings true: there’s no such thing as bad weather;
you’re just wearing the
wrong clothing.
Cycling gear is usually
a year or two behind
high-street fashion.
We’re trying to
counter that trend at
Morvélo. We started
by selling t-shirts
to friends: now we’re
selling gear, designed in
Brighton, all over
the world.
As told to
Alex Leith
morvelo.
com
Photo by Alex Leith
....95....

THIS COULD BE THE DAY
THAT CHANGES YOUR FUTURE
Whatever your business story, the Brighton Summit is made for you.
You might be starting out as a freelancer. You might be a CEO.
It’s a day for anyone with big ideas that deserve to be made real.
It’s a business conference you’ll come away from excited and
ready to work.You’ll be inspired by others’ growth stories
and challenged to write your own.
THE BRIGHTON SUMMIT, FRIDAY 16 OCTOBER
8.30 AM TO 6 PM, THE CLARENDON CENTRE
Book your ticket, from £75:
www.brightonsummit.com

ighton business news
.............................................................
Where do you want to be in five years’ time? If
you’re running a business it can be hard to find the
time to even ask the question, let alone find the answer.
So, if you could do with a little expert help to
focus the mind, generate some fresh ideas, or give
yourselves a tune up, join us at the Brighton Summit
on 16th October, where we’ll be attempting
to do all of those things. Organised by Brighton
& Hove Chamber of Commerce, there’ll be
workshops, panel discussions and conversation
sessions designed to help you come away with some
answers and a plan. Keynote speeches come from
Nikki Gatenby of Propellernet and Jim Duffy of
Entrepreneurial Spark; the experienced business
coaching team, Generate, will help to set you on
the right track. Tickets are £99 or £75 if you’re a
member of the Chamber. Book yours at brightonsummit.com
Following huge success in London, Handmade
Mysteries have opened their immersive team game
Lady Chastity’s Reserve at The Black Lion in Brighton
and this one is rumoured to be even better.
You’ll spend an hour solving clues and unravelling
secrets on the hunt for Lady Chastity’s legendary
aphrodisiac wine. brightonhandmademysteries.com
Kate & Aud, the Trafalgar Street home of the ladies
fashion & vintage clothing label, has changed its
name to All About Aud. As well as retailing in
many independent boutiques in the UK, these
style doyennes and their pop-up bazaar were also a
regular fixture on the festival circuit. They’ve now
parted company (and remain the best of friends)
with Kate concentrating on the festivals and Aud
staying put in the North Laine store.
Beginning as an idea amongst musically-minded
friends, Small Pond Recordings have opened their
doors at 27 Castle St. With six rehearsal rooms, a
recording studio and a record label located just off
Preston Street, their fully fledged audio production
team have got your recording, mixing, mastering
and post-production work covered. Check them out
at smallpondrec.co.uk.
Further West, on Portland Road, Wick candle boutique
is an independent candle and scent boutique
with incense, bath products and body oils sourced
from near and far. It stocks cult Seattle-based brand
Blackbird Incense, ‘soul-nourishing’ Skandinavisk
scented candles and Liha Beauty organic handmade
beauty products, so you’ll be able to smell it
before you arrive. wickcandleboutique.com
Opening in early October and injecting a little
eclectic creativity into North Street, Indie-mart
brings a much needed high street home to many
of the city’s smaller retailers, artists, designers and
makers. The indoor market at numbers 16-17
(which was previously the home of Cargo and The
Pier) will offer retail units to sellers that might
otherwise struggle to afford city-centre rents. We’re
looking forward to seeing a range of Brighton’s
brightest and best under one roof. For space enquiries
contact hello@indie-mart.co.uk.
Lizzie Lower
If you have any business news you’d like to see mentioned
in this space, please alert lizzie@vivamagazines.com
(though we can’t guarantee every e-mail
will lead to a mention!)
....97....

inside left: Chain Pier Extension proposal, 1883
...................................................................................
If this bold plan to extend the Chain Pier had come to fruition, the Palace Pier (now Brighton
Pier) may never have been built. On August 20th 1883, Parliament passed the Brighton Marine
Kursaal Act, enabling a group of promoters to proceed with the ‘Construction of [a] Pier Head
with Saloons and other Accommodation thereon at end of Chain Pier at Brighton’. ‘Kursaal’ is a
German term, meaning ‘Cure Hall’, a place of recreation.
The Chain Pier, at the foot of Old Steine, had been built in 1823, primarily as a docking point for
cross-channel paddle steamers to Dieppe and the Isle of Wight. From the beginning there were
amusements – including a camera obscura – on the pier, to attract tourists to the 350-foot promenade.
It was the first ‘pleasure pier’ of its kind, enabling visitors a unique experience. According
to the Chairman of the Brighthelmstone Suspension Pier Company, the pier was ‘a structure that
has been the subject of conversation throughout the Kingdom’.
The construction of the West Pier, however, in 1867, and the growing popularity of Newhaven as
a (superior, deep-water) ferry port, led to a reduction in visitor numbers. What to do? Brighton
Corporation, Brighton Aquarium and the London Brighton and South Coast Railway Company
got together, and came up with this bold plan, extending the pier a further 200 feet into the sea,
with a 300-foot platform ‘with all necessary works and conveniences thereon for the landing,
embarking and accommodation of passengers, and the erection of saloons, baths, reading, dining,
refreshment and other rooms, and erections thereon’. It would have been quite an attraction,
especially as the first stretch of the Volks Railway had just been built, linking it to the Aquarium.
For various reasons, though, it was never built and the Chain Pier continued, instead, to decline.
In early 1896 it was declared ‘unsafe’, and the ‘Great Storm’ of 4th December of that year almost
completely destroyed the structure. Its days, anyway, were numbered: it was due to be dismantled
on the completion of the Palace Pier, in 1899.
This print is on show as part of the ‘Views of Brighton and Hove in the early 19th century’ exhibition
in the Print Room of Brighton Museum.
....98....

eeze up
to the Downs
kids go
FREE!
See leaflets
for details
77
You can now breeze up to Stanmer
Park and Devil’s Dyke by bus
seven days a week, and up to
Ditchling Beacon at weekends.
For times, fares, leaflets and walk ideas,
go to www.brighton-hove.gov.uk/breezebuses
or call 01273 292480
Or visit www.traveline.info/se
to plan all your journeys.
5480