Viva Brighton Issue #40 June 2016

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vivabrighton
Issue 40. June 2016
EDITORIAL
...................................................................................
The day I realised that I was more likely to crash into a sheep
than a bus was a revelation. Viva, you see, has offices in both
Lewes and Brighton: most weekdays I have to pedal between the
two, and I’ve realised after two years of toiling down the Lewes
Road and along the cycle path next to the A27 that I can cycle
over the South Downs Way, instead. Getting to work, strangely,
has become one of the highlights of my day.
Sorry if that sounds smug. I never learnt to drive, you see, and
now I’m wondering whether I ever will. I used to carry this gap in my skill set as a badge of
shame; nowadays it can be passed off as a political commitment to sustainability. Truth be
told, there are times when I feel stupid not being able to drive, especially when it could help
others, but by and large there’s rarely a time I feel the lack of a car. Which makes me wonder
whether all those drivers need to be so reliant on theirs.
This month’s theme is ‘getting around’ and this month’s most valuable message comes from
Keith Baldock, Brighton & Hove Council Safety Officer, who tells Viva that any time you
spend on the road - whether that’s as a pedestrian, or a cyclist, or a motorist - is the most
dangerous time of your day. So take care out there, for your sake and everyone else’s. Oh, and
I’ll watch out for those sheep. Enjoy the issue...
THE TEAM
.....................
EDITOR: Alex Leith alex@vivamagazines.com
DEPUTY EDITOR: Steve Ramsey steve@vivamagazines.com
ART DIRECTOR: Katie Moorman katie@vivamagazines.com
PHOTOGRAPHER AT LARGE: Adam Bronkhorst
EDITORIAL ASSISTANT: Rebecca Cunningham rebecca@vivamagazines.com
ADVERTISING: Anya Zervudachi anya@vivamagazines.com, Nick Metcalf nickmetcalf@vivamagazines.com,
Hilary Maguire hilary@vivamagazines.com
PUBLISHER: Lizzie Lower lizzie@vivamagazines.com
CONTRIBUTORS: Alexandra Loske, Amy Holtz, Andrew Darling, Ben Bailey, Chloë King, Di Coke, Holly Fitzgerald, Jay Collins,
Jim Stephenson, JJ Waller, Joda, Joe Decie, John Helmer, Julia Zaltzman, Lizzie Enfield, Martin Skelton and Nione Meakin
Viva is based at Brighton Junction, 1A Isetta Square, BN1 4GQ
For advertising enquiries call 07596 337 828. Other enquiries call 01273 810 259
Every care has been taken to ensure the accuracy of our content. We cannot be held responsible for any omissions, errors or alterations.

Challenge your taste buds and
explore our wild landscape with
family and friends
2 – 3 July
Open all year-round
On B2028 between Turners Hill and Ardingly
For details visit: kew.org/wildfood
In association with Fantastic British Food Festivals

CONTENTS
...............................
Bits and bobs.
8-23. Our cover monster, dreamed
up by illustrator Mark Oliver, drives
a moped down Madeira Drive; 19thcentury
signalling engineer John
Saxby rides on the buses; JJ Waller
spots a giant in Pool Valley; and
Alexandra Loske uncovers some rare
plans for the Royal Pavilion.
38 58
Photography.
25-31. A FotoDocument project by
train - and bus, and bike - spotter,
Jonathan Goldberg.
My Brighton.
32-33. Brighton born and bred, taxi
driver Denis Breskal tells us what he
loves – and hates – about the city.
63
61
Columns.
35-39. Amy Holtz, Lizzie Enfield and
John Helmer.
In town this month.
41-57. We round up the local music
scene, including nine-piece ska &
soul band the Meow Meows, and jazz
comedian Ian Shaw at the new Crossing
Borders festival. Plus anarchic
comedian Jo Neary, art documentary
maker Phil Grabsky, Ruby Wax on
‘yoga for the mind’, Joseph Fiennes
playing the mysterious Aircraftman
Ross, pop pianist Ben Folds at the
Dome, Brideshead adaptor Bryony
Lavery, Brainfruit’s Roy Hutchins,
and author Julia Lee.
....5 ....

CONTENTS (CONT)
...............................
Art and design.
58-69. Collaborative printing collective
Fatherless, the group behind the Hove
Plinth, the art of bus design, inside and
out, plus a quirky costume shop for all
occasions.
82
The way we work.
71-77. Adam Bronkhorst photographs
five local delivery people and finds out
what delivery service they’d wish for.
Food.
78-85. A feast for two at Brighton’s
newest Mexican, Wahaca, Friday
lunchtime street-food at Yardy, train
station food South Indian-style from
Curry Leaf Cafe, and a recipe from new
pop-up restaurant MAW.
Health (and safety).
89-93. We sign up to a four-week
women’s bootcamp, we meet ultra-longdistance
cyclist Josh Ibbett, as well as
Jon Wilde, as he sets off on a five-year
pilgrimage, and we learn how to keep
safe on the roads, with the council’s
Keith Baldock.
89
79
Politics.
94-95. In or out? Green MEP for the
South East Keith Taylor and Lewes MP
Maria Caulfield argue their points of
view on this month’s EU referendum.
Bricks and mortar.
97. The newly reopened Attenborough
Centre - formerly the Gardner Arts
Centre - at Sussex University.
Inside left.
98. A photograph of one of Brighton’s
last trams, taken in 1939.
....6 ....

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THIS MONTH’S COVER ARTIST
..................................................
A hamster? A sumo
wrestler? We weren’t
sure what to call
the creature on this
month’s cover, designed
by artist Mark
Oliver. “My wife
named him the Viva
Beaver!” he told us.
“But he’s a monster,
really.” Mark has a talent
for creating monsters;
it was his illustration of a pimply green sea
monster rising up out of the sea by the Palace Pier
which caught our attention at the MADE Brighton
show last year. The Brighton Beach Monster poster
was created for a Brighton Festival exhibition in
2010 and is available to buy at Notonthehighstreet,
along with some of his other pieces.
If you look closely at the Viva Beaver you can spot
the familiar ice-cream cone outline of the Level
and Park Crescent just above his right eyebrow,
and Seven Dials on his right arm – or leg? Mark
used an old transport map of Brighton to create
the effect, one of the techniques he uses to add texture
to his illustrations. “Once I used part of an old
map of Russia I had found. I didn’t think too much
of it, it was a textural decision rather than having
any relevance to the design, but somebody actually
bought the print because he recognised that part of
the map as somewhere he had lived.”
Mark also creates illustrations for advertising, edi-
....8 ....

MARK OLIVER
..........................................
torial and publishing projects. One of his books,
Monsters: An Owner’s Guide, was long-listed for the
prestigious Greenaway Medal in 2011 and won the
Stockport Children’s Book Prize in the same year,
a prize which he also won in 2006 with his book
Robot Dog. “Thankfully I’ve had some really nice
commercial work,” he says, including working with
clients like Harper Collins, American Express and
The Science Museum. One of his projects, which
you can see online, is a promotional pack of playing
cards for Škoda, with Mark’s signature style applied
to depicting Škodas through the ages.
As well as his 2D works, Mark creates three-dimensional
collage and assemblage based upon the Victorian
pastime of insect collecting and taxonomy.
“My art work has been exhibited internationally
and last autumn I did a very successful solo exhibition
at the Anthropologie Gallery along the Kings
Road in London, where two pieces were sold to
Professor Brian Cox!” See these and more of his
work at olly.net
Rebecca Cunningham
....9 ....

BITS AND BOBS
...............................
SPREAD THE WORD
ON THE BUSES #14
JOHN SAXBY (6, 29, 49)
Viva reader Heather Atchison ‘took along some
light reading’ on holiday to Tulum in Mexico
last month. Very wise, we thought. Our ‘home’
themed VB38 would have staved off the homesickness
and reminded her that real beaches come
with foot-crippling pebbles, marauding stag parties
and the ever
present possibility of
a downpour.
Meanwhile, in Portugal,
Alice and
Philip Le Cras catch
up on the latest ‘Secrets
of the Pavilion’
before visiting
a miniature, more
domestic version of the same at the beautiful
park and palace of Monserrate, just outside Sintra.
It was built by Sir Francis Cook in the 1850s
to house his own summer parties. Finally, Max
Heale enjoyed his Viva with a can of Carlsberg
in front of Christiansborg
Palace, home of the Danish
Parliament, in Copenhagen.
You can’t get more
Danish than that.
We love our vicarious vacations,
so please keep taking
us with you on your travels
and send your pics to us at
photos@vivamagazines.com
It was pretty bold
of John Saxby
(1821-1913),
who’d left school
at 13 to become
a carpenter’s apprentice,
to think
that he could fix
a major problem
in railway safety.
But Saxby, who apparently had a ‘fertile mind’,
‘considerable foresight… great force of character
and a shrewd business instinct’, had already proved
himself once. When the London, Brighton and
South Coast Railway had hired him, and set him to
making wooden mile posts, he invented a tool that
sped up the process.
In his mid-30s, he became interested in the problem
of getting points and signals to work in unison.
Up to that point, they’d been run by separate
levers, so if an operator made a mistake, a driver
could get a ‘go’ signal when it wasn’t safe. Saxby
started work on a system where one lever controlled
both things, so such errors were impossible.
His first patent, developed in 1856, has been described
as ‘basically unsound’. But by the early
1860s, he’d improved his system enough that he
confidently installed and operated the first one, at
Wivelsfield, ‘before he brought it to the notice of
officials at headquarters,’ his Brighton Herald obituary
claimed.
Widely adopted, the invention ‘added immeasurably
to the safety of railway travel,’ and ‘brought
him fame and fortune,’ the Herald added. Edward
VII, while Prince of Wales, is quoted as having
told the Brighton-born inventor that ‘you have
done more than any other man living in the reign
of Queen Victoria to save human life.’
Steve Ramsey
....10....

BITS AND BOBS
...............................
CHARITY BOX #3: FUN IN ACTION
What is Fun in Action
for Children? We’re a
local charity bringing
long-term befriending
support to children aged
4-16 from disadvantaged
families.
Who refers children
to you? Social workers,
family coaches, teachers,
parents and other
charities. The families
we work with are not without their strengths, but
they struggle to cope with the pressures they face,
whether it’s that one of the parents is disabled or
there’s another sibling who needs extra attention.
How do you choose a suitable befriender? Our
assessment process is rigorous, involving interviews
and training sessions, as well as a full DBS
check. We get to know our volunteers well, which
helps us make good, effective matches with the
children on our list.
What can they do together? All sorts! Typical
activities include swimming, trips to the cinema,
cooking, helping out with homework – one befriender
and her child spent a year making a patchwork
quilt.
What difference does it make to the child? Befriended
children become more confident and better
able to cope with everyday problems, and over
time they become more interested in their school
work. All these changes improve the child’s life and
increase the possibility that they will grow up to
lead a happy, fulfilled adult life.
Who can become a befriender? No special experience
is necessary. We need emotionally mature,
patient and flexible people who are able to work in
a caring and non-judgemental way with the families.
If you’re interested in becoming a befriender,
call 01273 559794 or visit funinaction.org.uk RC
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BITS AND BOBS
...............................
JJ WALLER’S BRIGHTON
A few years ago every bus in Brighton was parked on Madeira Drive for a centenary
bus transport event. There were lots of stalls and a tent that had models of
Brighton transport, including this model of Pool Valley. It was closing time so the
model maker had just removed the plastic cover and was packing away the buses.
It was just a happy coincidence I should be passing through at that exact moment.
It often happens that the last shot of the day yields the best picture of the day. JJW
....13....

BITS AND BOBS
...............................
DI COKE’S COMPETITION CORNER
This month we’ve teamed up with Wolkyshop to offer one reader a pair
of Biker trainers in the colour of their choice. To enter this month’s
challenge, we’d like you to share a photo of your feet on a favourite local
walk – it could be a stroll on the South Downs or even along Brighton
Pier! Share on Twitter, Instagram or the Viva Brighton Facebook page
using the #VivaBrightonComp hashtag. Alternatively, email your entry to
competitions@vivamagazines.com before 30th June 2016. The winner of the
Biker shoes will be the most creative photo, and feature in the August issue.
Terms and conditions can be found at vivabrighton.com/competitions and all
entrants will receive a £10 discount on a purchase from Wolkyshop.
Wolkyshop recently opened its first UK store at 37 Bond Street.
wolkyshop.co.uk
COMPETITION WINNER
For the April competition we asked
readers to share photos of treasured
objects in their home. Georgina Cox
shared a photo of these fabulous porcelain
pigs which once belonged to her great
grandma, and wins a spring cleaning
bundle from Bert’s Homestore.
Di Coke is very probably the UK’s foremost
‘comper’, having won over £250,000-worth
of prizes. For winning tips and creative
competitions, check out her blog at
superlucky.me and SuperLucky Secrets book.
JOY FESTIVAL TICKET GIVEAWAY
Treat yourself to a day out at the Joy Festival, coming to the Convent Fields
in Lewes on the 25th & 26th. It’s a summer celebration of food, drink, vintage
fashion, music and living well. There’ll be a Union Music stage, a tepee
village, wild cocktails, chocolate workshops and a steam-powered funfair.
We’ve got four pairs of tickets to give away. Just tweet us @VivaLewes and
@JoyFestivals using the hashtag #VivaJoy (or email your name to hello@
vivamagazines.com with Viva Joy in the subject line) by midday on Friday
17th June to enter the draw. Winners will receive their tickets by email.
firleandcountry.co.uk. See our website for T&Cs.
....14....

JEWELLERY
VALUATIONS
Tuesday 28 June
10am to 4pm
APPOINTMENTS
AND ENQUIRIES
01273 220000
hove@bonhams.com
VENUE
The Courtlands Hotel
19-27 The Drive
Hove, BN3 3JE
ARE YOU WEARING YOUR JEWELLERY
OR JUST INSURING IT?
Demand for jewellery at auction has never been stronger.
Throughout June Bonhams gives access to our national
network of experienced specialists who can provide free
up to date valuations for items you may wish to sell.
#whatsinthebox
bonhams.com/jinj

Saturday 14 May
to Sunday 11 September
Opening times
Until 29 May: Noon-7pm
From 30 May:10am-7pm
except Tuesdays Noon-7pm
Early morning from 30 May:
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Adults £4
Junior & Concessions £2
/pellspoollewes
@pellspool
Pells Pool
Brook Street
Lewes
Infoline
01273 472334
www.pellspool.org.uk

JOE DECIE
...............................
....17....

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BITS AND BOBS
...............................
Painting by Jay Collins
PUB: THE SIGNALMAN
Look just below the roof-line directly above the
front door of The Signalman, and you’ll see its
original name carved into its handsome front:
‘The Railway Hotel’. Until Drink In Brighton
gave the pub its current moniker, in 2009, it was
known to everyone simply as ‘The Railway’, and
its history is entwined with that of London Road
Station, directly opposite, on the other side of
Ditchling Rise.
The London Road Station Partnership, who tend
the gardens there, have delved into the history of
the area, and you can see the fruit of their studies
on the Italianate walls of the station, which
was opened in 1877. The architect was David
Mocatta, who also designed Brighton Station, and
it’s pretty much an exact replica of a couple of
others in Sussex.
The line the station is on – running to Lewes and
beyond – was built in 1846, and an 1848 painting
of the viaduct shows quite clearly that there
was no housing in the area, only green fields.
Brighton, however, was growing fast, and the
railway grew to serve it. In 1869 the Kemp Town
branch was built diverging from the Lewes line,
and a new station was deemed necessary. The station
came with its own community: the houses on
Ditchling Rise, including the Railway Hotel, were
built pretty much simultaneously.
‘The Railway’ back in the 1980s and 90s used to
be the sort of place that brings the darts scene in
American Werewolf in London to mind, though the
preferred pub sport before the place was refurbished
was pool – there were several tables. Drink
In Brighton did a pretty thorough makeover,
exposing brick, building quite a substantial library,
and filling the place – as is their wont – with
bric-a-brac. The result? A thoroughly welcoming
space, with eatable food.
Oh, and one of Brighton’s best pub gardens,
too. I make my latest visit in the middle of that
early-May heatwave, and I only stay in the pub
interior long enough to get a cup of filter coffee,
and ascertain that the music coming through the
speakers is by the Hot 8 Brass Band.
Out in the sun I sip my drink (I’ve heard good
things about the way they keep their beer but it’s
an early midweek afternoon) fish out my magazine,
and realise that one of the remaining unread
pieces is a long article about railway culture in
Victorian times. A case of serendipitous synchronicity,
then, which makes me feel even better
about the space I’m in. Alex Leith
....19....

BITS AND BOBS
...............................
MYSTERY OBJECTS OF THE PAVILION
AN AMPHITHEATRE FOR THE ROYAL PAVILION GARDENS?
The joy of working
in archives is that
often it feels like an
archaeological dig or
a treasure hunt: you
never know what you
are going to find. As
part of my role as
curator of the Royal
Pavilion archives I
have recently been
selecting prints and
drawings for an
exhibition in 2017
of unfamiliar, little
known or rare views of
the Royal Pavilion estate.
While looking for
interesting 20th-century
images I found
two curious drawings
we don’t know much
about and I was wondering
whether any
Viva Brighton readers
can shed any light on
them. They show a
proposal for performance
spaces in the Royal Pavilion grounds, most
prominently a kind of amphitheatre to the south of
the main Dome structure and various ‘courses for
pageants’.
Although they are clearly proposals for new structures
and a change in layout of part of the Pavilion
grounds they are not professional design drawings.
They rather look as if an amateur artist wanted to
put up a grand idea for
discussion and illustrated
it to the best of
his or her abilities. The
designs are quite crudely
drawn, but charming
and colourful. They
are not dated, but must
have been created after
1921 as the India Gate
appears to be in place.
The joyful, positive
and ambitious plans
for large municipal
performance spaces
in the Royal Pavilion
Gardens clearly predate
the Second World
War, so we are looking
at the inter-war period.
If anyone knows of any
records that mention a
proposed amphitheatre
on the Royal Pavilion
estate in the 1920s or
1930s please contact
me. Even if we can’t
find out more about
these drawings, they will certainly be included in
the 2017 exhibition at Brighton Museum, joining a
group of designs for the palace and its gardens that
were never realised. Alexandra Loske, Art Historian
and Curator at the Royal Pavilion
A longer version of this article will appear on the
official Royal Pavilion & Museums blog at brightonmuseums.org.uk
Images © Royal Pavilion & Museums, Brighton & Hove
....21....

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BITS AND BOBS
...............................
MAGAZINE OF THE MONTH: HUCK
Huck is our magazine of the
month for June. That’s not because
it shares a theme with
this issue of Viva. It’s because I
was looking at the current issue,
amazed as usual, convinced we
had reviewed it at some point in
Viva Brighton. So I wrote a review
of something else and as I was filing
that review away I looked to
see what we said about Huck some
months ago.
Except we hadn’t said anything.
There has been no review of Huck.
I can’t believe it. There isn’t a single issue that I
haven’t loved and that, since we opened, hasn’t sold
out. First started in 2006 - it’s a granddaddy of indie
mags - their recent 10th anniversary issue (What
I’ve Learned) was out and out just brilliant.
The current issue arrived during May. It’s tagged
Nowhere To Run and if it is about anything it’s
about the fear we all feel. Huck isn’t a magazine
that fakes it; it mixes joy and pain, success and failure,
equally. This issue contains
strong features on how fear has
driven the rise of Trump, on
surfers and musicians overcoming
fears to breakthrough to
some form of success, on the
water crisis and on the real fears
of millenials and many of us
who aren’t millienials. There’s
more, of course, and all of it is
thoughtful, reflective and unceasingly
illuminating.
On its website (also really good)
Huck describes itself as ‘refusing
to be civilised since 2006’. That’s true but… there
is a but. Huck’s thoughtful and open approach to
pretty much everything isn’t always civilised but it
is always civilising.
I so can’t believe we haven’t reviewed Huck before
that I’ve just checked again before sending this
copy off to Viva. Nope. Nothing. My apologies,
Huck. You deserved better from me.
Martin Skelton, Magazine Brighton, Trafalgar Street
TOILET GRAFFITO #17
You can tell we’ve been getting around a bit this
month, heading all the way ‘up west’, where they do
things properly. Even the pub toilets have wallpaper,
and not the wash-down, poor-man’s panelling Anaglypta
variety either. Everything is that bit classier in
Hove, as a matter of fact.
But which pub boozer has such elegantly appointed
ladies’ loos?
Last month’s answer: The Sidewinder.
Send your examples of Brighton toilet graffiti to
hello@vivamagazines.com
....23....

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PHOTOGRAPHY
..........................................
Jonathan Goldberg
Transport photographer
Over the last few years,
Brighton has slowly been
turning into one of the
greenest (and most varied)
cities in the UK when it
comes to transport. Jonathan
Goldberg set about
documenting it all…
How did you come to be
documenting the various
methods of travel Brightonians
are using? There
was an open call from Brighton’s FotoDocument
to apply for a photo-essay commission. Ten photographers
were selected to depict ten principles
relating to One Planet Living, a status bestowed
upon Brighton and Hove for its sustainability
credentials. My choice was ‘Transport’ because a
passion for this theme has surfaced previously in
my personal work.
Do you think there’s any difference in the way
people travel here, compared to the rest of
the country? Brighton is the greenest city in the
UK. There are miles of cycle lanes, a bus company
which runs its fleet on recycled chip-fat oil (The
Big Lemon) and bus usage throughout the city
which is second only to that of London. Add to
that you have a very compact centre which lends
itself very well to skateboarding, and some very
forward-thinking entrepreneurs who are challenging
car culture, like cycle couriers ReCharge,
who distribute parcels on behalf of DHL on their
eco-friendly electric bikes. I was surprised by
initiatives coming from the council to encourage
their staff to travel green e.g. shower and lock-up
facilities for cyclists; and an initiative for certain
staff to stay at home in order
to set their carbon footprint
at zero. I was also surprised
to have discovered some of
the private initiatives like
bike co-ops, which are run
by dedicated volunteers in
order to assist cyclists in
maintaining their frames,
like Cranks in Kemptown.
How did you find your
subjects? As my pictures
were going to be for public consumption for passers-by
at Brighton Station I wanted to convey a
sense of fun and big splashes of colour in my photos.
What better way to do this than feature lots of
Brighton landmarks? I also wanted to spread the
gospel of sustainable transport, and really tapped
into my own passion for cycling by photographing
endless cycle lanes in a way which wasn’t boring.
This generally involved searching or waiting for
eye-catching people or compositions.
Finally, what’s your favourite journey? It’s hard
to beat the romance of the train, though you can
probably tell that I’m not a daily commuter by
that statement. I really love the route coming into
Brighton when I glimpse the rows of box-like
houses in pastel hues and sense the sea in the air
and the sound of seagulls. A large part of that
stems from my love of Brighton and a sense of
happiness when I return, but there’s also the anticipation
of alighting into the glorious Victorian
station and a first glimpse of the sea behind the
station wall. Jonathan was speaking to Jim Stephenson
of The Miniclick Photography Talks.
jongoldberg.co.uk miniclick.co.uk
....25....

PHOTOGRAPHY
...............................
....26....

PHOTOGRAPHY
...............................
....27....

PHOTOGRAPHY
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....29....

匀 倀 䔀 䌀 䤀 䄀 䰀 䤀 匀 吀 匀 䤀 一 䴀 䔀 䐀 䤀 䌀 䄀 䰀 一 䔀 䜀 䰀 䤀 䜀 䔀 一 䌀 䔀
䌀 䰀 䄀 䤀 䴀 匀 䄀 一 䐀 䌀 伀 刀 伀 一 䔀 刀 ᤠ 匀 䤀 一 儀 唀 䔀 匀 吀 匀
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匀 漀 挀 椀 攀 琀 礀 愀 猀 攀 砀 瀀 攀 爀 琀 猀 椀 渀 琀 栀 攀 ǻ 攀 氀 搀 猀 漀 昀 洀 攀 搀 椀 挀 愀 氀 渀 攀 最 氀 椀 最 攀 渀 挀 攀
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䔀 愀 猀 琀 最 愀 琀 攀 䠀 漀 甀 猀 攀 Ⰰ 䐀 漀 最 ˻ 甀 搀 圀 愀 礀 Ⰰ 䘀 愀 爀 渀 栀 愀 洀 Ⰰ 匀 甀 爀 爀 攀 礀 Ⰰ 䜀 唀 㤀 㜀 唀 䐀
圀 圀 圀 ⸀ 䜀 伀 伀 䐀 䰀 䄀 圀 匀 伀 䰀 䤀 䌀 䤀 吀 伀 刀 匀 ⸀ 䌀 伀 ⸀ 唀 䬀 켥
㈀ 㜀 アパート 㤀 㔀 㘀 ㈀ 㜀

PHOTOGRAPHY
...............................
....31....

Photo by Adam Bronkhorst
....32....

INTERVIEW
..........................................
MYbrighton: Denis Breskal
Brighton cabbie
Are you local? I was born at the Buckingham
Road Maternity Hospital, and have ended up
spending most of my time waiting in the taxi
rank at Brighton Station round the corner. Lived
here all my life. And I feel lucky I can say that.
What do you like about the place? You know
one of the main things is that it’s so tolerant.
My teenage boys go to school with so many
different nationalities you can’t believe it, and
I think that’s great, because there doesn’t seem
to be the racial tension you get in other places.
You can do what you want here: if a bloke walks
down the street in a dress, people won’t bat an
eyelid. Though they might tell him his shoes
don’t match.
What’s it like driving round here for a living?
A lot of the streets were built for a village and
they’re serving a city, so it’s difficult. And some
of the planning for cycle paths has been crazy:
I’ve picked up two passengers with broken arms
who’ve been knocked off their bikes on Church
Street because drivers haven’t realised there’s a
contraflow cycle lane there. The 20mph limit
has made things a bit safer. It’s not that people
drive under it, but I reckon people are driving at
about 28mph, when they used to do 38.
But you like being a cabbie? I wouldn’t have
done it for the last 24 years if I didn’t. What I
like is that you’re your own boss and can make
your own hours. Every Thursday, for example, I
take the day off to play golf. That’s just magic.
What don’t you like about the city? The
Green councillors, the traffic, the parking problems,
the expense of everything, the appalling
leisure facilities, the fact there’s nothing for kids
to do, there’s a whole lot of things I could get off
my chest. And don’t get me started on the i360.
Plus it’s a pity that youngsters who move out of
home can’t afford to live in the city.
What’s your favourite boozer? There’s one
five doors down the road, where you can get
great grub and the staff are really attentive and I
hope you get all this in the mag because I might
get a free pint. It’s called the Poet’s Smoke and
Ale House. Used to be called The Eclipse and
there was a pool table and a darts board and a
good old ruck at 8.30pm. Most of the pubs used
to be like that, to tell you the truth. Brighton’s
got a lot less violent.
Are you an Albion fan? I’m a season-ticket
holder. I’ve been going since 1976 or 77, though
I didn’t go so much in my wild late teenage
years, because I found other things to do. I love
the Amex, I think it’s brilliant, though enough
time has passed for me to hark back to the Withdean
days.
When did you last swim in the sea? I used to
go all the time. I think I went in once last summer.
Most of the exercise I get is from playing
golf, but I also like tennis, and table tennis, and
cycling up to Devil’s Dyke. I used to play ice
hockey. You know Brighton used to be the Man
United of the ice hockey world? They pulled the
rink down, promising to build a better one, and
it never happened. Crying shame.
Where would you live if not in Brighton?
Hove.
Interview by Alex Leith
....33....

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Opening Hours: Mon-Fri 9am-5pm

COLUMN
.............................
Lizzie Enfield
Notes from North Village
Illustration by Joda, jonydaga.weebly.com
The last time I was on a rope suspension bridge it
was strung between two mountainsides in Nepal,
enabling me to pass across a 100ft gorge. Had there
been an alternative route, I would have taken it. But
there wasn’t, so it was a case of hold on tight and try
not to think about the fact there were no sides and
a lot of the planks which formed the walkway were
missing; oh and there was a herd of donkeys coming
the other way and they were ignorant of ropesuspension-bridge
etiquette.
There was a point when it seemed likely I would
be knocked off and plunge to my death. It was a
long time ago but the experience left me with a lasting
aversion to rope suspension bridges. And yet I
recently found myself heading across the newly
opened Geierlay suspension bridge, the longest in
Germany, which takes you right across the Hunsrück
Mountains.
But this is the home of Vorsprung durch Technik,
I told myself. And so the engineering will be of the
precision variety.
“The engineers went to Nepal to learn how to construct
it,” my guide tells me.
Really? Is that supposed to inspire confidence?
I mean, fair play to the Nepalese, they didn’t have
the materials to play with, but they got the maths
right and I know that with the right maths you can
suspend an elephant from a meat hook on an elastic
band. But, to be honest, even if Einstein was demonstrating,
I’d rather not be standing directly beneath
elephants suspended by rubber bands.
Better if Nelly was hanging from a galvanized German
steel rope. So, thank goodness for small mercies
- this particular bridge is made of substantial
stuff: built to withstand hurricane-force winds and
elephantine weights. I bear this in mind, as I make
my way, gingerly, across.
I’m on a press trip, getting around in just about every
way known to man: trains, planes, automobiles,
boats, bikes, Shanks’ pony and, just when I thought
the suspension bridge was going to be the hairiest
bit of the trip, I find myself vineyard-climbing up
the granite mountainsides of the steepest vineyard
in Europe – in the rain, in shoes that are not really
fit for purpose, without ropes where ropes would be
a definite plus, in order to reach a hut and sample
some Riesling. The things we do...
There are two ways down: the way we came or a
Heath Robinson-style monorail that plummets over
the side of the mountain like a rollercoaster without
a safety rail. It doesn’t help that the driver has just
mentioned his brother’s instant death, in a tractor
accident, not so long ago, or that I can’t work out
the exact maths of the risk to life and limb. All I do
know is that weight (i.e. me) plus velocity plus very
steep slope probably equals impending disaster and
a couple of glasses of Riesling do nothing to take the
edge off my fear…
....35....

䜀 漀 漀 搀 䌀 儀 䌀 䤀 渀 猀 瀀 攀 挀 琀 椀 漀 渀 刀 愀 琀 椀 渀 最

COLUMN
...........................................
Amy Holtz
The truth is, I’m a Minnesotan
So a few Saturdays back, I go
out on my bike because, I’m
delighted to tell you, there’s a
small gaggle of Shetland ponies
a mere four miles from the
Patcham pylons. Either that, or
they’re just not fully grown yet.
Anyway, the atmosphere in
town is a bit stifling, grown
men wandering around in
blue and white-striped jerseys,
looking agitated. I’m just getting over the trauma
of cruising past a dead bunny on the side of the
A23 when a couple stop me. They’d seemed to
be having a leisurely cycle when I’d passed them
earlier; but when I make it back up the hill at
Pyecombe, they are there waiting for me.
“Excuse me,” the girl says politely, “do you know
how to get to Brighton?”
Aha, I think, I’ve got this one. “This way,” I say,
pointing like the Scarecrow in several different
directions, mind whirring with the permutations
of the trip back from here. So then I say, “How
familiar are you with Brighton?”
As soon as the words leave my mouth I realise
how ridiculous this sounds. She’s managed to flag
down the only person in the sticks who is not
only from another country but was, five minutes
prior, taking selfies with tiny ponies.
She assures me she’s well acquainted with our
fair city, so I launch into a detailed description
of the trail. “And then, you’ll come across a bull.
Don’t go into the field - he’s enormous - but go
left down the hill and you’ll get to these really
big fields”. Here I gesture grandly with my arms,
because, for the life of me, I
can’t remember what Waterhall
is called and my mind keeps
repeating ‘Withdean’ like one
of those alarms that goes off
when someone robs a bank in
a cartoon.
“Is that by the racecourse?” she
asks, puzzled, leading me to believe
she’s lied or I’m terrible at
directions - the latter being the
less far-fetched assertion. In the end, they thank
me, but I’m not sure they ever made it.
This reminds me of another faux pas I made the
other week when I encountered a guy lounging
on his bike, scrolling through his phone, at
the crossroads on the edge of the old A23. In
truth, it’s the end of the fun part of the cycle to
Hurstpierpoint and the start of all the hills, so I
thought maybe he was just savouring the peace
while it lasted.
“Are you lost?” I said, in a way that acknowledged
both that he probably wasn’t lost, but
kinda looked it, and if he didn’t want any more
cyclists asking him if he was lost, he should probably
not have looked so lost.
“Do you know,” he asked, “of anywhere around
here with birds, lots of trees, no cars and nature?”
I tried to look encouraging while at the
same time shaking my head. Because whenever
I’m out on my bike I am still searching for that
very thing - the same as my new buddies in
Pyecombe.
“But,” I said, cheerfully, “there’s a golf course over
there. They’ve definitely got birds and trees.”
....37....

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COLUMN
...........................................
John Helmer
A hell of a town
It seems I married a genius.
“You know we had to call off the New York
trip?” says Kate at breakfast.
“Yes,” I say, trying not to sound too fed up.
“Well it turns out I paid for cancellation
protection. We’re going to get a full refund
on the fare.”
I stare at her with a mixture of admiration
and blank disbelief. For a brief instant all
is lightness and grace. Care melts away.
And then I remember the reason we had to
cancel the flights.
We were looking forward to our stay in
Manhattan this Spring, especially Kate.
She spent a whole year living on the Upper
West Side in the mid-eighties – studying art
and working as a nanny for a pair of divorcing
lawyers. She had not yet encountered
the man of her dreams (me) and was still
in frog-kissing mode: gold-hatted, highbouncing
fellows queued up to date
her – one of them the son of a famous
composer. Everyone in Manhattan is
secondhand-famous, and music is in
the air. Presidents, too. At a rooftop
party at a castle in the sky, one mile
high, Ronald Reagan flew past in a
helicopter, so close that she could
have thrown a canapé right in his
twinkly blue eye. She visited her
film-star great aunt and, cool chick
that she is, hung out in all the cool
places. When she talks about that time
her eyes mist over. If she hadn’t hooked
up with me, I’ve no doubt she would
have headed straight back there.
I, on the other hand, was only ever in New
York for four days. My band got booked
to play a punk club there in 1980. On the
flight in, one of the road crew dropped acid
and had to be physically wrestled onto the
bus into town. Within minutes of arriving
at the hotel, our saxophone player got into a
car with some drunken frat boys and disappeared
off the map. We spent much of the
next 48 hours touring radio stations in the
City and Long Island putting out increasingly
anguished appeals for him to get in
touch. Which he didn’t, strolling insouciantly
into the venue just as our sound check
was about to be canceled. As the drummer
counted in the first song, it occurred to me
that I had forgotten to go to bed at all and
was on the point of passing out. We didn’t
crack America.
Kate and I have been talking about going
back to compare our New Yorks ever since
we got married. For a while, it looked like
this was going to be the year. As we talk
about the ill-fated trip now, the sad reason
for its cancellation seeps into the conversation
like that pall of steam rising off the
subway in Taxi Driver.
“Will you wear a wig?”
“Probably not. Headscarfs.”
I picture a beautifully patterned silk headscarf.
“I’ll buy you one. Some.”
A pause.
“We’ll go to New York next year.”
“Yes, we will.”
....39....

LOCAL MUSICIANS
..........................................
Ben Bailey rounds up the Brighton music scene
NATIVE RAY
Fri 10th, Prince Albert, 8pm, £4.40
Having previously released music as Polymers and
Sun Sparks respectively, Robin White and Patrick
Tipler conceived Native Ray as a way to pool the
resources of their solo work to make something
bigger than both. The collaboration is still in its
infancy, but their recent track Talking’s a Pain suggests
they’re onto something: a perky synthesiser
melody repeats over a samba drum pattern until
the whole thing is swamped by layers of electronic
noise and distorted vocals. Both guys play
in Brighton electro-psych band Hypnotized, who
were originally headlining this gig, but luckily they
have a back-up plan. Support comes in the form of
demented electronica from Septillion J and creepy
synth sounds courtesy of Japanese Sweets.
BEATS FROM THE BEDSIT
Fri 10th–Sun 12th, The Greys, £donations
After putting on a
couple of all-dayers
at the same venue
last year, Beat Bedsit
has gone the whole
hog and booked
a three day festival in Brighton’s cosiest pub. It’s
billed as a weekend of ‘anarcho folk’ which in
practise means you’ll hear anything from politicised
singer songwriters (Tracey Curtis, Chuck Hay) and
off-kilter cabaret performers (Mishkin Fitzgerald,
Hannah Rose Tristram) to old school punks with
acoustic guitars (Lost Cherrees, Mercurius Rising).
Promoter Paul Stapleton will be taking to the stage
in his guise as singer of Pog, as will his former
bandmate Wob, but the most eye-catching name of
the weekend has to go to Commie Faggots whose
gender-bending hardline humour should be worth
the hike up Southover Street alone.
COLD PUMAS
Fri 17th, Hope & Ruin, 8pm, £6.50
Repetition, repetition, repetition.
That was the motto of
post-punk trio Cold Pumas
back in 2012 when they
released their debut album
Persistent Malaise. It was a
mesmerising, relentless krautrock jam inspired by
the likes of Can and Sonic Youth, yet the band have
managed to avoid repeating themselves entirely
on their forthcoming follow-up. Now, with added
keys onboard, Cold Pumas are at least on speaking
terms with the idea of conventional song structures
and decipherable lyrics. Though most of them have
drifted off to London, they’ve still got one foot
planted firmly in Brighton in the form of guitarist
Dan Reeves, also boss of the Faux Discx label.
KING NOMMO
Fri 17th, Komedia, 8.30pm, £5
Originally an instrumental
group, King Nommo properly
got into their groove last year
after recruiting Senegalese
vocalist Khadim Sarr. His
soulful singing, and occasional foray into rap and
raga, provides a powerful thread through the band’s
busy rhythms and extended one-chord jams. There
are touches of jazz and funk in the horn-section
blasts and instrumental solos, but it’s the raw energy
of early Afrobeat that provides the core inspiration.
King Nommo not only share musicians with other
Brighton groups like Resonators, Lakuta and The
Voodoo Love Orchestra; they’ll also be sharing
a stage with the latter at this month’s Kemptown
Carnival. All proceeds from this Komedia show go
towards helping migrants via the excellent local
charity Hummingbird Project.
....41....

MUSIC
.....................................
The Meow Meows
‘A delightful cocktail of relentless energy’
We’ve always found it hard to pigeonhole our
music. I think of it as a gift sent down from the
incapacitated Gods of Pinot Grigio, a delightful
cocktail of relentless energy and incessant nonstop
party, to which everyone is invited. I think
that’s why we go down so well live.
The new album is a really varied selection.
We’ve got the usual up-tempo ska with a couple
of angry, heavier songs that sound like punk soul,
and in the other direction some straight-up reggae.
And one ambitious/pretentious prog-ska epic
called We Fade Away, which is lyrically a Bowie tribute,
but musically a tribute to one of my favourite
writers, Tim Smith from Cardiacs. I basically stole
a bunch of his musical trademarks and mashed ‘em
into shape around an incredible horn melody that
Matt our trumpet player came up with.
The mighty King Glover has produced our latest
album. Naturally, in regards to the recording
process, different producers will mean a different
approach too. When we recorded our last EP with
Prince Fatty he would go quiet if he thought what
we were doing was rubbish. Glover, on the other
hand, wouldn’t be shy in telling us, “That sounded
fucking shit”.
There are a few political songs on the new record.
We used to avoid talking about politics as
live we’re more of a party band and we didn’t want
to be po-faced and preachy. But then we realised
that wasn’t the only way of writing a political song,
and you can still have fun with the music. This
time we’re talking about cuts to children’s services,
‘generation rent’, and the harassment that women
have to deal with all the time. Still, there are a few
more songs about (mostly bad) relationships, and
even a happy one about shagging someone you’ve
met on Tinder.
I honestly don’t know if the UK can survive
four more years of Tory politics. It’s easy to see
a worst case scenario in 2020 with Boris Johnson
as PM, a privatised NHS, no BBC, and Britain out
of the EU with attendant loss of basic support for
human/workers’ rights. Oh, and President Trump
in the White House.
We’ve got three amazing bands joining us for
the launch party. Firstly, the infectious, Latininfluenced,
swinging Voodoo Love Orchestra.
Our Brightonian buddies! Secondly, all the way
from Seattle, we have Natalie Wouldn’t - a tasty
five-piece playing their very own brew of ska, soul
and rock’n’roll. Last but not least, local garagefuzz
degenerates T.H.R.U.S.H are making a rare
Brighton appearance.
It’s a blessing and a curse, being such a large
collective. Part of what makes it fun for us, and
hopefully the audience, is the way we all bounce
off each other. And at festivals it makes us feel like
a marauding gang. And we usually manage to get
most of us in the room for a practice. On the other
hand, it does make touring in the traditional sense
pretty much impossible. But I’ve been in bands
with fewer members that got less done. So I don’t
know. As told to Ben Bailey by Ellis and Alex
The Hope & Ruin, Sat 11 June, 7.30pm, £5
....43....

DOCUMENTARY
.....................................
Phil Grabsky
Fine-art filmmaker
EOS Goya Visions of Flesh & Blood Steadicam Shoot at The National Gallery, London
© EXHIBITION ON SCREEN, David Bickerstaff
Phil Grabsky is a documentary filmmaker and the
director of Brighton-based Seventh Art Productions.
After producing a number of films about the
lives of great composers he went on to launch Exhibition
on Screen – cinema documentaries based
on major fine art exhibitions.
Everyone thought it was a crazy idea when I first
mooted it in 2009; who’d go to the cinema to see
an art exhibition? But live screenings of theatre
and opera were just taking off and I really felt audiences
would go for it.
I’d been making films about the arts for TV
for years so when I initially approached the National
Gallery, they knew me and trusted me, even
if they didn’t entirely get what I was trying to do.
The timing was perfect because they were about
to open the biggest Leonardo da Vinci exhibition
ever seen.
After we’d made Leonardo Live, I persuaded the
Picturehouse chain to show it and 40 of their 41
UK screenings sold out. There were people sitting
in aisles. That’s when I was convinced we were
onto something.
For lots of viewers, it’s a way to see a major exhibition
in a relaxed, immersive atmosphere.
You’re not being interrupted or jostled; your view
isn’t being blocked by someone in front of you.
The films offer a perspective on the works that you
can’t always get in galleries. One artist I know said
he saw things on that 20ft screen that he’d never
have noticed with the naked eye.
The curators love it – these are shows they’ve
often been working on for five years or more and
yet they will only be open for a few months. We
....44....

DOCUMENTARY
.....................................
EOS Renoir_Martha Lucy & Barbara Buckley at The Barnes Foundation
© EXHIBITION ON SCREEN, David Bickerstaff
Claude Monet , The Artist’s Garden in Argenteuil, 1873
© The National Gallery of Art
Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Bather (Baigneuse), c. 1890, The Barnes Foundation
give them a longer life and help bring the show to
people who’d never have been able to make it in
person. A woman in a wheelchair came to one Komedia
screening and left in floods of tears at being
able to see an exhibition she had assumed would be
off-limits for her.
The films often drive people to visit galleries as
well. People get reeled in and although they might
not see that exhibition in person, it will often inspire
them to go and see the next thing that’s on.
When I was making a film about the life of Mozart
I was very struck by a letter he wrote to his
dad. He said that everything he wrote was for two
audiences; the audience who really understood the
complexity of what he was doing and the audience
who were just going to whistle the melody the next
day. It’s exactly the same for every film I’ve made.
You have to do a lot of research, underpin every single
word by evidence, but in a way that my 14-yearold
son or my brother who’s not interested in art
will understand.
It’s boring to proclaim that everything is a masterpiece.
We want to show why Rembrandt painted,
and how. We want to know where he sourced his
materials, who was commissioning him, the luck,
the parenting, who he was stealing ideas from; none
of these great figures exist in a void.
You do have to be careful in which names you
choose. I turned down Delacroix at the National
Gallery because we knew it would end up being
too much of a loss for us. I’m also not sure Raphael
would be a big enough draw. But we’re doing [Hieronymus]
Bosch, who is perhaps not an obvious
choice, just because I really want to do it.
I’d love to do a major female artist but it’s tricky
because who would it be? Frida Kahlo maybe. Historically
there are fewer names and even when you
get to contemporary art it’s a challenge. But there
are fewer contemporary artists of either sex that can
compete with the Goyas and Caravaggios.
We’re in 42 countries now, which you can definitely
spin as a success story, for Brighton and for
Britain. As told to Nione Meakin
Exhibition on Screen’s Renoir, June 1st; Monet To
Matisse, June 4th and Goya, June 8th at Ropetackle
Arts Centre, Shoreham, all £12
....45....

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MUSIC
....................................
Ian Shaw
Earth citizen
Ian Shaw is an award-winning jazz
singer, a stand-up comedian and
a former Brighton resident. This
month he’s performing at The Old
Market as part of the Crossing
Borders festival – a week of gigs
celebrating seekers of sanctuary
and the music of exile. It’s also a
fundraiser for groups helping refugees.
We spoke to Ian about his
upcoming concert and the work
he’s been doing in Calais.
What have you got in store
for us at The Old Market this
month? I’m in duo setting at the
Crossing Borders fundraiser with
one of my oldest friends, Brighton’s own Claire
Martin. The UK’s best woman jazz singer! But
we’ve also got musicians from The Montpelier
Strings and Alice Russell – so who knows what may
happen! After us, Grupo Lokito are playing a fusion
of Cuban and Congolese music, so it should be
quite a night.
Do you keep your comedy separate to your music
or is there some overlap? Music and comedy
sit very close for me. The legendary saxophonist,
Ronnie Scott, was a mentor to me and he combined
the two brilliantly. Joni Mitchell once said: “crying
and laughing, you know it’s the same release.”
Have you been to Calais recently? I try to get to
Calais every week if I can. I first went late summer
2015 and was horrified and inspired at the same
time. Horrified that Europe could let this happen.
Horrified that our Home Secretary chucked up a
double razor fence to keep refugees from trying to
get to the UK. Horrified that there was no UK/
French co-system in place to process the identity of
these people, young guys, mothers
and babies, unaccompanied kids.
After hearing the dreadful stories I
was inspired and moved to help in
any way I could.
What do you think caused the
crisis? The cause of the refugee
crisis is quite simply war. A war that
we, as a nation, have exacerbated.
We’ve then turned our back on its
casualties, proffering governmentapproved
charities that do very
little. In Calais alone, there are no
UK charities, just grassroots NGOs
and volunteers.
What can people do to help?
People can go to Calais or Dunkirk and volunteer
with one of the NGOs: Care4Calais, SideBySideRefugees
or Help Refugees. Is there a long-term
solution? Stop destroying countries and operate a
fairer, more humanely profiled asylum system that
puts vulnerable children first.
Has international touring informed your perspective
on borders? I’m writing this in Germany,
a country that has reacted in the most humanitarian
way to the refugee crisis. Despite now having to reexamine
its border issues, it still adopts a humane,
practical and inclusive approach to rehoming
displaced people. I loathe patriotism/isolationism.
It’s the root core of war and it’s inward-looking and
regressive. We are, as earth citizens, doomed or
enlivened by where and to whom we are born. We
are conditioned by our lineage to prosper, survive
or suffer. Interview by Ben Bailey
Ian Shaw performs at The Old Market as part of the
Crossing Borders festival on 23rd June, 8.30pm, £15.
crossingbordersfestival.co.uk
....47....

THE FLOWER SCHO O L
B R I G H T O N
Day & Evening Workshops
Wedding Floristry
Bespoke Floristry Parties
Contact Vicki on
01273 563363 / 07867 544218
www.theflowerschoolbrighton.co.uk
info@theflowerschoolbrighton.co.uk
一 攀 眀 䈀 爀 椀 最 栀 琀 漀 渀 戀 漀 甀 琀 椀 焀 甀 攀
一 伀 圀 伀 倀 䔀 一
䤀 渀 琀 攀 爀 挀 栀 愀 渀 最 攀 愀 戀 氀 攀 樀 攀 眀 攀 氀 氀 攀 爀 礀
愀 渀 搀 愀 挀 挀 攀 猀 猀 漀 爀 椀 攀 猀
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䘀 愀 猀 栀 椀 漀 渀 ᤠ 猀 ǻ 渀 椀 猀 栀 椀 渀 最 琀 漀 甀 挀 栀 攀 猀 昀 漀 爀 圀 漀 洀 攀 渀
䌀 漀 䌀 渀 漀 琀 渀 愀 挀 琀 愀 琀 挀 樀 琀 愀 洀 䨀 䨀 攀 䀀 猀 䨀 䀀 樀 䘀 䨀 樀 氀 䘀 愀 甀 氀 愀 渀 甀 琀 渀 ⸀ 椀 琀 ⸀ 椀 愀 琀 渀 愀 搀 渀 搀 洀 洀 攀 渀 攀 琀 渀 椀 漀 琀 椀 渀
漀 渀
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STAND-UP
.....................................
Ruby Wax
Building mind muscles
Mindfulness is so on trend, but you’ve used
it for some time now, haven’t you? I don’t take
anything for my depression, and I don’t like alternative
therapies, to me it’s a waste of time. So, I was
curious to see what actually happens – the physical
evidence – which is why I went to Oxford (Ruby
graduated in 2013 with a Master’s degree in mindfulness-based
cognitive therapy). Not everyone has
to do that! But if I’m going to waste my time with
something I would rather it was results-driven.
Is it a bit like yoga for the mind? Yes, you could
say that. It’s a little bit like going to the gym, and
eventually you see a muscle forming.
What does practising mindfulness entail for
you? When you realise that your mind is ruminating
(because the build-up isn’t stress, it’s stressing
about stress), you take your focus to one of your
sensations, breathing, for example, and your levels
of cortisol come down. You’re not going to stay
like that, just like you wouldn’t stay in one position
during a sit-up, but eventually you get to recognise
when your mind starts frazzling, and you build the
ability to be able to focus, so that when the real shit
storm comes, you have this stronger muscle to use.
Why did you feel the need to write about it and
then take it to the stage? It’s an excuse to be humorous,
of course, but also I’m interested in how
people think, and why we are ruminating. In the
past we just got stressed, so when did we start to
have these critical thoughts? I happened to study
mindfulness – I didn’t study witchcraft – so I’m
qualified to give you the physical facts, as well as
the exercises.
So you’re going to be imparting techniques
that the audience can go away and use?
Yeah, that’s what’s so exciting! If you make people
laugh, they’re very open to things. In the last show
I talked more about why we’re screwed, and in this
one it’s how to get out of it!
Do you think being in the spotlight has helped
or hindered your experience? I think it’s being
in the spotlight in a different way. There’s a point
to it, rather than just showing off how funny I am,
so you get the pleasure of changing people’s lives a
little bit, and that’s thrilling.
Do you think there’s a correlation between
comedy and depression? No, I don’t. Your insides
don’t know what your outside does for a living.
One in four people suffers from depression,
but not that many people are funny.
If you were to impart one technique for people
to take away and use, what would it be? I
guess it’s noticing when you’re hitting your tipping
point, rather than going over and hitting burn out.
It’s recognising when you’re getting close, and doing
something about it. It doesn’t need to be mindfulness,
but when you notice, be nice to yourself.
Julia Zaltzman
Frazzled, Theatre Royal, 19th June, 7.30pm
....49....

COMEDY
...................................
Jo Neary
‘I’m anarchic and rude’
Photo by Steve Ullathorne
London Road’s Presuming
Ed Coffee House is a bit eccentric
- a gold torso here, a
mangy panda toy there, menus
disguised as old comic annuals.
It seems an appropriate place
to meet Jo Neary, an actor and
character comic renowned for
her off-kilter menagerie of
creepy cats, quietly hysterical
1940s housewives, sanctimonious
hippies and spot-on
Björk impersonations.
A Brighton University graduate,
Neary began her career in
performance art before realising
she could attract bigger audiences by billing
her work as comedy. While interpretive dance
routines still serve her well, she’s best known for
sublime comic monologues that have seen her
compared to broadcast comedy favourite Joyce
Grenfell. Neary thinks that’s slightly misleading,
however. “I think I’m more anarchic and rude. If
people come to see me expecting Joyce, they’re
going to be disappointed.”
Creations like Fiona, who just wants to realise her
dream of taking bongos to ‘Arfrica’, and Peg Bird,
a self-styled ‘conceptual artist’, have been honed
through years of shameless eavesdropping. “I once
heard a woman in Toni & Guy on East Street ask
another woman about her weekend. The response
was so brilliant I had to run to a nearby café to
write the entire thing down on a napkin,” she
says. Others are inspired by the ‘phone voices’
employed by members of her family, or over-exposure
to celebrity TV presenters. “My characters
are usually a foil for getting out what I think
about things…but in disguise.
I have a dolphin character
who laughs at humans but in
a very concealed way and in
my new show, I play a version
of Kirsty Allsop, who I’m just
baffled by.”
Faceful of Issues, the show
Neary is bringing to The
Old Market this month, is
hosted by her enduring Celia
‘Jesson’, a 1940s housewife
who comments on the modern
world in the clipped, undulating
tones of Brief Encounter
actress Celia Johnson. In a
‘village hall chatshow’ in aid of a kitten that needs
an iron lung, Celia introduces showbiz exclusives
and bawdy locksmiths, a recipe for air soup and a
photograph of a conker.
The other show she’s been touring, Jo Neary Does
Animals and Men, is her first attempt at straight
stand-up, albeit not much of an attempt since it’s
still full of characters, including her own parents.
“My mum likes it,” she grins. “It’s a little bit of
infamy.” As an actor, Neary also veers towards the
off-beat roles, most notably as nervy necrophiliac
Judith in Johnny Vegas’ BBC sitcom Ideal. She’s
just filmed her part as ‘a posh archaeologist’ on
fellow character comedian Morgana Robinson’s
new TV show and is waiting to find out if a Radio
4 pilot she’s made is going to be commissioned.
For now, however, she’s off to bed before a show at
the Hobgoblin later that evening. Being Jo Neary
is clearly a tiring business. Nione Meakin
Jo Neary’s Faceful of Issues is at The Old Market on
June 7th, 8pm
....50....

SPOKEN WORD
.....................................
Poetry Can F**k Off
‘Incendiary words from revolutionary wordsmiths’
Roy Hutchins tells a funny story to explain why the
radical performer/poet/conjuror Heathcote Williams,
his long-term collaborator, has ‘politely declined’
to do this interview himself.
Williams’ show Poetry Can F**k Off, narrated by
Roy, and produced by Brainfruit, the charity-cumproduction
company they run together, is returning
to Brighton Fringe, hence our request. Roy is joined
on stage by three actors, reciting poetry – from Shelley
to The Fugs – which has made a political difference
to the world.
“Heathcote’s only done one interview in the press
in the last five years,” he says. “And he doesn’t like
meetings. In the late 80s Random House were offering
a $100,000 advance on his epic poem Whale Nation,
and they wanted to fly him out to New York for
talks. He said: ‘No thanks, I don’t like aeroplanes.’
So they offered first-class tickets on the QE2, and he
said: ‘Sorry, I’ll have to travel in a car at the other end
of the journey, and I don’t like cars’. Then they said
that he could do a whole tour of the States on trains,
and he came back with the response: ‘Sorry… the
thing is, I don’t like America.’ Roy ended up going
out in his place, though the QE2 offer didn’t stand.
Despite living in different cities (Heathcote in Oxford,
Roy in Brighton) the two are in daily contact,
with Heathcote offering feedback after being sent
videos of rehearsals and performances, and sharing
the triumph of successful performances from afar
“like gangster boss Noel Coward running the tin
cup across the prison bars in The Italian Job” .
Brainfood is a registered charity, set up to enable
people in culturally deprived areas of Brighton, as
well as older people in the city, to get involved in
spoken-word performance. It’s also a platform for
Heathcote’s work, which is universally of a radical,
anti-establishment nature. “I am an anarcho-libertarian,
so I agree with all the political sentiment in
his work,” says Roy, “though of course I don’t agree
with all the personal sentiment. The poem Counting
the Cats in Zanzibar is about his hatred of flying, for
example and I don’t mind flying… though I don’t
want to do it for the sake of it. What is it someone
said? ‘Civilisation makes hypocrites of us all’.”
When I get back to the office (from Presuming Ed)
I google that quote, and up pops the comedian Sameena
Zehra*, who performs alongside Roy in the
piece, along with current Young Poet Laureate Selena
Nwulu and ‘sustainable nihilist’ Johnny Fluffypunk.
They’ll voice words by the likes of Maya Angelou,
Jim Morrison, Billie Holliday, Sophie Scholl,
Emily Dickinson, Abu al-Qasim al-Shabbi, Martin
Luther King, William Blake, Arundhati Roy, Victor
Jara and Gil Scott-Heron. A collection of writers
who have seriously fucked off authority. The Brighton
Tubthumper Choir and five local poets also
make an appearance. Word on the street is that it’s a
thought-provoking, uplifting, heavy-duty-beautiful
experience. Can’t wait. Alex Leith
*Turns out Sameena is quoting Roy quoting
Heathcote quoting Karl Kraus.
The Warren,
June 5th,
6.30pm
....51....

MUSIC
....................................
Ben Folds
American singer-songwriter
Finding good music back
in the 90s wasn’t as easy
as it is today – albums like
Whatever and Ever Amen
were like contraband for
kids in the sticks. How do
you feel about accessing
music now? I’m glad that
we can access any kind of
entertainment quickly. It’s
changed the business obviously, and it’s changed
the way music reaches us. I’ll be the first to admit
– I’ll audition the shit out of things on YouTube
and if I like it I’ll spend money on it. I saw this
nature programme last night with thousands
of turtles trying to crawl into the sea, and birds
coming down picking ‘em off, one by one. That’s
pretty much the idea with the economy of music
now – one out of a thousand makes it. You can
count on there being brilliant music in all eras. It
doesn’t change the art – we adapt to it.
What’s best – writing, recording or performing?
That’s interesting – it’s different all the
time; the last gig I played in Boston – I loved the
singing, because I could hear myself in a way that
meant I could play with it. Sometimes I fucking
hate touring and just want to make a record.
Basically, I want a result - a piece of music that
moves me, that says something I haven’t heard
before, that makes me happy. Getting there always
involves a lot of suck. I’ve never been someone
that could tell you honestly that I like the process
of writing a song; the kind of dance that I have to
do with the words to finish a song is pitiful. You’d
have to put me in a straitjacket - but I’d hate more
not having done it.
You’ve starred in a lot
of epic collaborations.
Let’s talk Shatner. We’re
talking about a Christmas
album right now. For ten
years I’ve been telling him
it’s a bad idea, but this year
I thought ‘You’re right’
– Bill needs to weigh in
on Christmas. With other
artists, it’s like running into each other at intersections
– I’m most interested in unpredictability.
Shatner is a perfect example, because we had the
opportunity to make a record that had never been
made. Or something like Weird Al coming to
work on Time; his presence means something different.
And there’s no one like Amanda Palmer.
So There is part pop album, part piano concerto;
what informed the musical backbone of
the concerto? The piano concerto really retired
from pop culture after Gershwin. Pretend there’s
an online forum and there was all this activity
from the first half of the century and then,
suddenly, people stopped posting, and you think
‘Wow, that’s old news’. But then, someone starts
posting again. That’s what I was thinking - picking
up the conversation where it left off in the mid-
20th century.
There’s some experimental devices in the concerto
that are underplayed, but odd. One involves everyone
getting out their cell phones; a few places,
everyone is a few steps sharp or flat of each other
and then come into tune. I didn’t see a problem in
taking a little bit of a journey.
Amy Holtz
Brighton Dome Concert Hall, June 22nd, 8pm
....52....

THEATRE
.....................................
Joseph Fiennes
Will the real TE Lawrence please stand up?
The role of Aircraftman Ross is complex in that
you’re playing a character, TE Lawrence, who
is himself assuming an identity... Exactly. Ross is
a fascinating play about identity over and above the
story of Lawrence; that wasn’t even his real name.
He had a rather complex upbringing whereby his
mother met a married man called Thomas Chapman
who assumed the name of Lawrence, so even
at an early age he was battling with identity. I found
out recently that Ross was the name of a gentleman
in the RAF who he befriended around 1960 before
the Arab revolt really kicked off, and he became a
close friend and supporter, so it’s curious that later
on amidst a breakdown he assumed the name Ross
when he entered the RAF.
So how do you take all of that history on board
and use it to approach the role? Well, ultimately
I have Terrence Rattigan’s very solid, brilliant, robust
play, which is very much of its time in terms
of its voice and style - it’s detailed and articulate - so
I’m guided by that. Of course Rattigan was gay, and
clearly looked up to Lawrence in all that Lawrence
was going through (some people say Lawrence was
a suppressed homosexual, others say he was asexual)
but nonetheless you do get the sense of repression,
from being in the 1920s and certainly in the army,
and you feel that this repression led to an amazing
willpower and resilience. You feel Lawrence was
prepped for this monumental time.
One thing you can’t get away from when you
mention Lawrence of Arabia is Peter O’Toole in
the 1962 movie – how does your on-stage Lawrence
differ? You put your finger on it – you can’t
get away from it. And that’s what Lawrence couldn’t
get away from. It was WW1, at deadlock, but Lawrence
knew that if he could get the press on his side
he might be able to win back territories which were
grabbed from Arabia after the revolt, so he kind of
rolled with the publicity in order to garner more
support, but he also wanted to get away from it. Curiously
enough the Rattigan script was meant to be a
film, but it got bumped out the way by the brilliant
David Lean film. But I think the play is different, it’s
more cinematic, it gets into the interior of the man,
and we examine the breakdown as well.
Do you prefer working in theatre to film? I love
them both, but they have their own virtues. Theatre
is definitely a medium more favoured towards the
actor, whereas film is more towards the director.
What about a Fiennes family film? Well we have!
Strangely enough one of my first jobs straight out of
drama school was a fleeting moment when I played
the younger brother of TE Lawrence, who was
played by my brother (Ralph Fiennes) in the film A
Dangerous Man, so now and again it happens!
Julia Zaltzman
Ross, Chichester Festival Theatre, 3rd-25th June,
from £10
....53....

Carmina
Burana
Carl Orff
with piano duet and percussion
The Rio Grande Constant Lambert
Director: Sandy Chenery
Soprano: Michelle Stone
Baritone: Matthew Sprange
Saturday 18 June 7.30pm
Sarah Abraham Recital Hall, Brighton College,
Eastern Road BN2 0AL
Tickets £10 in advance, £12 on the door (Under 16s free)
Advance tickets available via our website, or from
Brighton College on 01273 704345
See www.esterhazychoir.org for more details
Accountants for digital
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OZKAN-Viva-Brighton-ad-128x94.indd 1 04/05/2016 11:25

THEATRE
.....................................
Bryony Lavery
Brideshead adaptor
When Bryony Lavery decided to accept the job of
writing the first major stage adaptation of Evelyn
Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited, she very quickly decided
not to rewatch the 1979 Granada TV version
of the novel in case it affected her version too
much. Even though she had the boxed set at home.
I tell her that, as a matter of fact, I’ve recently
watched it, and it hasn’t aged badly at all. She expresses
envy. “It was a golden moment of TV,” she
says. “But it would have been a bad idea to watch
it. I wanted to write an adaptation of the book. I’m
going to wait until the play’s run is over.”
You might remember Bryony’s name. She was the
author of the Broadway hit Frozen, which led to
allegations of her plagiarising the writer Malcolm
Gladwell. Gladwell later interviewed Bryony, and
all but exonerated her of any wrongdoing in the
subsequent article in the New Yorker, applauding
her for giving what he’d written new life.
And here she is again, breathing new life into something
already written. And also – let’s delve even
further into the truth-meets-reality murk – analysing
how Brideshead itself was an adaptation of events
that had happened in Waugh’s life. “A lot of it was
based on his relationship with the Lygon family,
who lived in a country house called Madresfield.”
“Even when I was a teenager reading Brideshead I
wondered why Lord Marchmain had to leave the
country in disgrace for having an affair. I mean everyone
was having affairs. I later found out that the
character he was based on was fairly openly homosexual
– he used to feel up [male] servants’ buttocks
before hiring them, for example – but it wasn’t till
he crossed someone influential that he had to escape
the country. It was, of course, illegal, then.”
And so to the ‘friendship’ between Charles Ryder
and Sebastian Flyte that drives the first section of
the novel. Does Bryony think that Waugh intended
the reader to understand this was a sexual relationship?
“I think when Charles speaks of their behaviour
registering ‘high on the catalogue of grave
sins’ he’s suggesting the relationship was sexual,”
she says. She decided to leave the matter open to
the interpretation of the director and actors. “We
were working on their scenes together, and we decided
‘yes, they did it’.” There is, it seems, a kiss.
It was a job fitting a 300-odd page book into two
hours something on the stage: “but once I realised
this was a piece about Charles’ memory, it was easy.
That gave us the licence to whizz around wherever
we wanted to go.” Lovers of the book will be happy
this includes Venice and Tangiers and Oxford and
London, and that pretty much all the familiar characters
are included, though not always as you might
remember them from the TV - or later cinema -
adaptations: “it was a choice not to have everyone
white and posh playing everyone white and posh.”
Alex Leith
Theatre Royal, 7th-11th June, 7.45pm
Photos by Mark Douet
....55....

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local children with life-shortening
conditions and their families enjoy
every little moment together at
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Registered charity no. 256789

LITERATURE
....................................
Julia Lee
Mysterious misadventurer
For some time children’s literature
has been attracting greater
interest in the media; a certain
boy-wizard probably has much
to do with that. But in the last
few years children’s authors have
been garnering greater prestige;
that a children’s novel won the
Costa Book of the Year Award for
2015 is testament to this. We have
entered what children’s author,
Julia Lee, calls a “golden age of
children’s books.”
Julia’s career in writing for children came about
by accident: “Years ago,” she tells me, “I wrote a
children’s book for fun, but never showed it to
anyone. When I was failing to deliver on another
project, I sent it to my agent to keep her happy.”
This eventually became her award-winning
debut children’s book The Mysterious Misadventures
of Clemency Wrigglesworth, described by one
reviewer as ‘Dahl meets Dickens’.
That, and its follow-up The Dangerous Discoveries
of Gully Potchard, were set in Victorian times;
Julia has turned to the 1920s for her latest
offering. “I was inspired by the golden age of
English detective fiction... I’d always wanted to
write a crime novel. Agatha Christie often used
amateur detectives and I thought: who better to
know what goes on behind the scenes and have
access-all-areas than a housemaid?” Setting the
book in that era also allowed Lee to indulge her
love of “writing about past times.” She revels in
researching past eras, playing and exaggerating a
little and “having fun with language.”
‘What the housemaid saw’ has been a popular
literary device in adult fiction; to
make it interesting to children
Lee fashioned the book’s central
character, Nancy Parker, as an
intelligent young girl who keeps
a diary to help her with her investigations.
Nancy, 14 years old,
is “glad to be done with school”
and goes straight on to become a
housemaid, “as there were few options
for working class girls except
service” at this time.
Her seeming naivety is the reason
she is taken on: who would imagine someone in
such a lowly position would be able to outfox the
resident villains? Yet Nancy manages to turn this
to her advantage: “she goes so unnoticed that
no one would suspect her of a little detecting
between chores.” The detective element works
as it does in adult literature, “offering the chance
to solve an intriguing puzzle and be proved right
at the end.”
As for the current vogue for children’s literature,
Julia is “thrilled to be writing just at the right
time”. This popularity should not surprise given
that “children’s and teen titles account for almost
a third of book sales.” These books are important
for a number of reasons but largely because
they deal with a whole range of issues and
“crises of every kind” and in so doing they “help
children process life at the stage that’s right for
them.” To understand the true significance of
children’s literature, Julia suggests: “think of the
books that really stick in your mind; I bet a good
few of those are stories you read as a child.”
Holly Fitzgerald
....57....

ART
....................................
Jamie Eke
Reworking Ravilious... on the buses
Last year, the Brighton and Hove Bus Company
approached local creative firm Harrison Agency
to come up with an innovative way of getting
more people on the buses. “We didn’t think a
traditional poster and leaflet campaign was going
to cut it,” the team at Harrison said, “so we turned
our attention to one of the biggest billboards in
the city – the bus itself.” The first concept – the
‘Arts’ bus, designed in collaboration with doodle
artist Jason McQuillen – was launched during the
2015 Fringe, hosting free on-board performances
during the festival. The ‘Beach’ bus, featuring a
giant ‘99 ice-cream being eyed up by an enormous
seagull, was next. And then came the ‘South
Downs’ bus.
Freelance graphic artist Jamie Eke was hired to
design the exterior. “The bus company had said
that they’d like the bus to have a link with Eric
Ravilious, because he did so many paintings and
watercolours of the South Downs. He was an
amazing artist; he produced so much work, and in
such a short life too. He died when he was only
about 40, in a fighter plane that was lost at sea.”
Taking inspiration from the artist’s lino-cut works,
Jamie illustrated twelve of the landmarks and
wildlife species that can be spotted in the Downs.
Rather than painting or printing the images, as
Ravilious would have, he sketched out the designs
using fine line pens, ‘imitating’ the artist’s style.
“That style of drawing was new for me,” he says,
....58....

ART
....................................
“but I enjoy exploring different techniques. As
an illustrator my work is quite varied, so it really
suited me in that sense.”
And as a graphic designer, too, Jamie was able to
transform his set of illustrations into a complete
bus re-design. The wording along the exterior,
from Tennyson’s Prologue to General Hamley,
reads: ‘You came, and looked and loved the view’.
The typeface is inspired by Ravilious’ Alphabet design,
which he created for Wedgwood. The pastel
colour palette, used in blocks and stripes across the
bus, is also influenced by this range. Overlaying
the colours with his illustrations, Jamie created
a wallpaper design which lines the outside of the
bus, as well as sections of the interior.
So if you find yourself on the pink-and-bluestriped
bus any time soon, even if you’re on your
way to work, have a good look around it and
remind yourself that all that natural beauty is just a
bus ride away. RC
Photos by James Pike jimpix.com
....59....

ART
....................................
The fifth plinth
Hove sculpture project
“We’d seen how public sculpture can enhance
your experience of walking round a city, and how
art can be a magnet for visitors. And we realised
that while Hove had a lot of Victorian sculptures,
there was nothing more recent. So we thought
‘let’s do something about it.’”
The ‘we’ Karin Janzon is talking about is herself
and other members of Hove Civic Society, who
are organising an exciting new project on the
seafront – The ‘Hove Plinth’.
We’re going back three years now; a ‘task group’
was set up with expert advisors and local sculptors
getting involved, and all sorts of people were consulted,
including Wilfred Cass (the director of the
sculpture park at Goodwood). “He said something
that really resonated,” remembers Karin (we’re
sitting in Marocco’s, near the site chosen for the
project). “He said that after a while people stop
‘seeing’ a permanent sculpture; that periodically
changing a sculpture in the same space gave it
more impact.”
“The obvious inspiration from that point was the
Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square,” she continues.
“And having chosen the spot on the Promenade in
front of Grand Avenue for a Hove plinth, we went
about getting a licence from the council, and planning
permission, and, of course, money to finance
the project.”
A £10,000 grant from the Arts Council allowed
the group to launch a national competition for
sculptors to pitch their ideas: over 70 responded
from which ten were shortlisted. Images of these
were displayed in several public exhibitions (in
both Brighton Library and Hove Library, and on
the seafront) and the results of a public vote, as
well as votes from an expert panel, were counted
up to choose three winners, to be put in place
for a year to 18 months each, over the next few
years. “The order in which the sculptures will be
displayed has not yet been decided,” says Karin.
One of the winners – Pierre Diamantopoulo – is
a Brighton resident: his sculpture, The Flight of
the Langoustine (above), was inspired by a mangled
lobsterpot he found washed up on Brighton beach.
The other winners are Matthew James Davies,
from Oxford, with Escape, and Jonathan Wright,
from Folkestone, with Constellation.
The organisation have received £80k in grants,
donations and ‘in kind’ support so far, but still
need around £100k to carry the project into its
next stage, and have set up a crowdfunder campaign,
as well as a Founder Scheme for potential
sponsors, to raise the money necessary to build the
plinth and pay for the first sculpture.
We walk to the site where the plinth will stand; a
yellow outline already marks the spot. Hopefully,
this will become the base for some exciting art
which will draw people Hovewards for years to
come. So when, I wonder, can we expect to see the
first one? “All going well,” she says, “in the spring
of 2017. May would be nice.” Alex Leith
See the Hove Plinth video at Brighton’s Big Screen
10th June-11th July. Donate at crowdfunder.co.uk/
hoveplinth. hoveplinth.org.uk
....61....

ART
....................................
....62....

ART
....................................
Fatherless
Mid-Western print-artist collective
In what sense are you ‘fatherless’?
As all five of us contribute
to every work, no-one is able to
identify who the ‘father’ of the
image is.
Isn’t that a case of ‘too many
cooks’? It’s more of a dangerously
delicious stew situation.
Do you all have a different role
in the process? First and foremost
we are all creative. From there we
spread out tasks or action items
that must be accomplished. We are
like a team or a great rock band.
Individually we each have our
talents but like any good band you
take away the subtlety and nuance
of each individual member and it
affects the end result.
Do you all have similar taste
in art? We actually have different
tastes and skill sets that come
together to produce something
we are all related and attracted
to on some level. For me the joy
comes when these elements cross over and create
something unpredictable and engaging. Once
you get to know each of our personal styles you
can start to see whose art is whose buried deep
into each print.
How much is your Mid-Western culture important
to the resulting artwork you produce?
Our culture is reflected in the classic Mid-Western
work ethic. We all come from “blue collar”
backgrounds where we were raised to work
for opportunity. We see progress and creative
maturation as a result of hard work and collective
effort. Each of us sees the responsibility to the
greater whole as a driving force of the collaboration.
Any measure of success we experience
comes from our collective efforts.
How digitised is the process you
use? A large portion of images go
through some sort of processorbased
device. Our films are generated
by a machine that attaches with
a USB cord.
How important is the anonymity
of each member, (or at least the
lack of accreditation) to Fatherless?
The work we do together is a
team effort. We’re also on the run
from the law so it helps with that too.
Most of the central images in your
prints are drawn from a bygone
era. Where do you get the source
material to work from? Yard
sales, found ephemera, magazines,
newspapers, discarded packaging,
sketchbooks, etc. Many times we find
things we think the others will get a
charge out of. We try to impress/entertain
ourselves first, believing that
the audience will enjoy the results as
much as we do. We like to say “anything
goes - but not everything works.”
What is it about the work that is modern?
Although the process of printmaking has been
around for ages, we have taken an approach that
is counter-intuitive to the ‘mass-production’
aspect. It takes restraint to only use a screen for
only a handful of prints at a time.
We can see the 60s pop art influences…
which other artists have influenced your (collective)
style? Sister Corita Kent, Sigmar Polke,
Warhol, Rauschenberg, and the DIY mentality of
early punk rock music.
Interview by Alex Leith
Fatherless will be exhibiting at Unlimited Gallery,
9th June-8th July, closed Tuesdays
....63....

BRIGHTON MAKER
....................................
Chhipa
Block-print shirt makers
How did Chhipa begin? Last
January Claudia and I went out
to India for a month to visit some
people we knew who were living
out there. Claudia is a screen
printer so she was really into the
idea of block printing and, being a
milliner, I was really interested in
the beautiful fabrics and embellishments.
We started asking around
and eventually found someone who was a block
printer in a little village just outside Jaipur.
There are whole villages there centred round
block printing, so they’ll have block carvers and
printers and dyers and driers, and each piece will
go from one person to the next. We had the best
day looking around this place. We came back
really excited and started working on our first
collection, with four different patterns and two
styles of shirt.
How are the blocks produced? We give the
team from that village a print-out of the patterns
we’ve decided on, which we’ve put into an allover
repeat, and they use an oil to transfer the
design onto the wooden block, and then carve
the shapes by hand. These patterns use a resist
method, so they’ll cover the block in this sort of
mud, stamp the motif onto the fabric repeatedly,
and leave it to dry. When the mud is dry they dye
the fabric in indigo, and the areas covered by the
mud are left white.
Do they print the whole roll of
fabric using a single block? Yes,
it’s an amazing process to watch –
we’ve put a video of it up on our
website. Some of the fabrics have
two shades of blue, which means
they’ve been double-dyed, so
they’ve gone through the dyeing
process once, then had a second
layer of mud printed and been dyed
and washed again.
Who sews the fabric into the shirts? We have
a stitcher-man in Jaipur called Kaiv. He actually
joked about not being into our first collection on
our last trip, but he loves the new designs we’re
bringing out in September.
Is indigo the traditional dye for this method
of printing? Yes, they have a vat of indigo in the
village which is about twelve feet deep, it’s a bit
like a well. Our new collection uses grey and green
acid-free dyes, which are made using a mixture of
plant ingredients. We definitely won’t stay away
from indigo forever but there are some other really
beautiful natural dyes available over there.
What’s your next collection going to be like?
We feel the patterns are a bit more refined; one
print is made up of some dark grey mountains
and another has some very tiny squares, which
the printers weren’t too happy about…
Rebecca Cunningham interviewed Liz Lock
chhipa.co.uk
....65....

DESIGN
......................................
Camira Fabrics
Moquette in motion
© Camira Fabrics
It so happens that the Viva Brighton editor is
hot on the content he commissions being about
Brighton & Hove. It was cheeky therefore, on
being given the theme ‘transport’, to chase up an
interviewee based not in sunny Hanover, but less
sunny Huddersfield.
Janina Crook is Design and Development manager
for Transport Fabrics within Camira Fabrics Ltd:
a global company that designs and manufactures
contract fabrics, including a million metres a year
for transport applications.
Camira supplies woven moquette - that familiar,
fuzzy-feeling, stain-eating, upholstery fabric - to
the public transport networks in our area and far
beyond: from Southern trains and the Brighton
& Hove Bus Company (their Regency Route has
been newly made-over in purple) to the London
Underground and the Orient Express. Many of
Camira’s products are still manufactured in the
UK. If there was ever a theme that could let me
stray, surely, this is the one?
The design appeal of transport fabrics is, I think,
pertinent. Both decorative and functional, they
exemplify what good design should be: often
appealing, sometimes surprising, occasionally
invisible and always useful.
As Janina tells me over the phone (of course), “I
always think that if something is well designed for
the environment it is in, you don’t automatically or
obviously see it.”
I happen to know that moquette is intriguing because
strangers tell me so. On a recent trip to Lon-
....66....

DESIGN
......................................
don, a woman interrupted my conversation about this
article to say excitedly that the Underground fabrics
are available to buy on everything from carpetbags to
pouffes at the London Transport Museum.
Janina says that Camira Fabrics have been ‘heavily
involved’ with the London Transport Museum for
their Transported by Design season and the Designology
exhibition that opened on 20th May. Says Janina,
“One of the things behind the Transported by Design
events… is to highlight that whether it’s a button on
a ticket machine, a button on somebody’s uniform, or
on a seat cover, all these things were designed.”
“If I ever start chatting to people on buses or trains,”
Janina says, “people are always wanting to share what
they think of the fabrics they travel on… like you say,
some people don’t really notice the fabric, while others
are fascinated to find out that somebody designed
it, that it actually has something behind it.”
The London Underground fabrics are beloved,
perhaps because their design is so conceptual: their
colouring is chosen to reflect that of the lines. The
Barman fabric, named after Christian Barman, the
pioneering TfL publicity officer of the 1930s, is
known by professionals like Janina as Landmarks,
because the motif features the London Eye, Tower
Bridge, St Pauls and Big Ben.
Janina’s job is varied, she says. Some clients bring their
own designs that need to be actualised and manufactured,
like Brighton & Hove buses, whose livery is
designed by Best Impressions. Others ask for a fully
bespoke service taking into account their branding
or issues such as their seats’ varying shapes. Overall,
Janina says the moquettes are broadly influenced
by trends such as fashions in home and automotive
furnishings.
“Things change and [clients] want to reflect this in
their fabrics,” she says. “Years ago, people probably
didn’t think about redecorating their homes with the
frequency that they do now… It’s all part of the bigger
pattern.” Chloë King
ltmuseum.co.uk / camirafabrics.com
© Brighton & Hove Bus Company
© London Transport Museum
....67....

....68....

TALKING SHOP
....................................
Barbary Lane
Think colourful
What kind of shop is this? It’s quite hard to
sum up in one word… the easiest way to way to
describe it is to say it’s a party shop. It’s inspired
by a programme that was on a couple of years
ago called Fabulous Fashionistas, which followed a
group of ladies in their 80s and 90s who were determined
not to blend into the background – one
of whom was Sue Kreitzman [google her, she’s
incredible] whose tagline is ‘beige kills’.
Have you always dressed very colourfully? I
grew up in a little village in Oxfordshire and as
a teenager I loved wearing hats and bow ties and
leg warmers. When I came to Brighton I was 19
and I was going to go to Sussex Uni. I was going
to dye my hair some mad colour but then I got
here and everybody had dyed hair, so I had a period
of my life when I started to dress a bit tame
and cover up a lot… but you do reach a certain
age and think, ‘I am what I am, take it or leave it.’
What sorts of occasions do you cater for? It
could be a big birthday, a graduation, or even a
divorce! Any occasion that you just want to treat
yourself to something special that nobody else at
the party is going to have.
Do you love throwing parties? Weirdly I’ve
always hated throwing my own parties because
they’re so stressful, but I love having them for
other people. I remember once organising a party
for a friend who was really into sailing and we
made the whole room feel like ‘under the sea’.
We hung blue and silver streamers from the ceiling
and we all dressed up as sailors. But with my
own parties I always worry, will anybody come?
Is it going to work?
Where does the name come from? Some people
get it and some people think it’s just a pretty
name. Barbary Lane is from the book Tales of the
City by Armistead Maupin, set in 70s San Francisco
in its very bohemian gay scene. There’s this
older matriarch called Anna who’s the landlady
to the other characters, and she’s always floating
around in these amazing kimonos. I haven’t quite
got there yet, but I’m working on it.
And where do you find the products? I’ve been
working with designers and makers from all over
the country, because I want to find things that
you can’t buy anywhere else in Brighton. The
jackets are from the designer who makes Sue’s
clothes. The little bags have probably been the
most popular so far – they’re Fair Trade, made by
the Huong tribe in Thailand. I like things which
have a sense of humour and a story.
Interview by Rebecca Cunningham
95, St George’s Road
....69....

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THE WAY WE WORK
You can have pretty much anything delivered straight to your door nowadays. For this
transport-themed issue, Adam Bronkhorst has been photographing some of Brighton’s
deliverers with their various delivery vehicles. But if they could have any one thing
delivered to their door, any time of day or night, what would it be?
adambronkhorst.com | 07879 401 333
Simon Jones at Era, era-brighton.com
“Jennifer Lawrence with a Cornish pasty.”

THE WAY WE WORK
Darren Kis at Swat, swatmarketing.co.uk
“A cold bottle of cider, droned in.”

THE WAY WE WORK
Sam Keam at ReCharge, rechargecargo.co.uk
“A doting grandparent.”

BARTLEBY’S
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ne Street VivaBtn June Ad AW.indd 1 17/05/2016 15:23

THE WAY WE WORK
Matt Wilson at Bartleby’s, bartlebysbrewery.com
“Potting compost.”

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THE WAY WE WORK
Paul Lewis at Dinner2go, dinner2go.co.uk
“A brand new car?”

FOOD
...........................................
Yardy
My flatbread brings all the boys to the...
Even if you’ve ventured into Marwood, that
studiedly ramshackle and very Brighton café in
the Lanes, you might not have noticed their back
yard, as untidy-yet-cool as the interior.
It is there that Jake from Guerilla Grill has set up
‘Yardy’ a (very) mini street market that takes place
on Friday lunchtimes. There are two stalls the day
I go, during that mini heatwave in May: his own,
selling Dexter short-rib beef kebabs with all sorts
of succulent extras, and another guy selling bao,
steamed buns filled with tofu and crispy vegetables
and ground peanuts.
I go for the former, and it’s part of the pleasure
of the experience watching Jake flatten a patty
of dough with a rolling pin, chuck it onto a little
charcoal grill, toss it over a few times, and then
dollop on all those extras.
There are too many ingredients for me to accurately
remember them as I write this up, but
here’s what I remember: pomegranate seeds, spicy
yoghurt sauce, some sort of North-African guacamole
deal, some pickled beetroot, a bean-andradish
salad, a crunchy spicy hazelnut mix, and the
sweet beef. It’s a balanced diet of a lunch, he tells
me: everything you need and nothing you don’t.
The next five minutes is filled with pleasantly
surprising tastes and textures, with every corner
of the palate catered for. What’s best is the menu
within the flatbread will change every week: I’m
certainly planning further Yardy Fridays. AL

Food & Drink directory
ADVERTORIAL
The Westbourne
The Westbourne is a rarity, a
truly independent freehouse.
The bar features an everchanging
range of excellent
craft beers and cask ales
from exciting breweries, with
proper cider showcased in
the Cider Shack. There is a secluded garden,
perfect for the summer gin menu and a serious
Sunday roast offer, all delivered by a friendly,
passionate team.
90 Portland Road, BN3 5DN, thewestbournehove.co.uk
Polygon Pop-up
Polygon Pop-up will be back
in the ribot premises in Seven
Dials throughout June, July
and August. Polygon create a
platform for chefs and breweries to run pop-up
events from street food, fine dining, beer pairings,
wine pairings and supper clubs. This year
they will collaborate with 64 Degrees, The Set,
Plateau, Troll’s Pantry, Guerilla Grill, Brewdog
and many more! The opening night will be on
June 3rd, with Baby Bao and the Polygon Bar.
ribot, 1 Buckingham Place, 07544 822589
Edendum
Edendum is a slice of Italy
transported to Brighton,
with authentic flavours,
fragrances and freshly-cooked recipes that will
give you a chance to discover some less known
Italian dishes, a selection of Italian wines and
artisan beers and a range of traditional products
for sale. Seasonal ingredients are always included
in our recipes; the new summer menu is
now available with some special treats!
Italian & genuine: better eat better.
69 East Street, Brighton, 01273 733800, edendum.co.uk
MAW
MAW Pop-up restaurant
is open Thursday, Friday
& Saturday nights serving
an eight-to-ten course
tasting menu by chef Mark
Wadsworth, in the heart of
the Lanes.
£40 per person and BYO.
Bookings through tabl.com
Also open as a café during
the day, closed Mondays.
14 Brighton Square, maw-restaurant.co.uk 07812 700138
Terre à Terre
‘Big and Bravas, Brekkie in
a Bun, Sweet and Savoury,
Run Rarebit Run, Arepas,
Patatas a Scrunch and a Munch, Grapple our
Granola it’s time for Brunch!’
Terre à Terre is now open for ‘BrunchyLunchy’
daily from 10am–1pm, where diners can pick
from a selection of hearty brunch dishes from
‘Brunchy Rosti’ to ‘Big Muffin Butty Buns’ or
enjoy tea or coffee with a sweet side like Pastel
de Nata. Dishes start at £6.
71 East Street, Brighton, 01273 729051, terreaterre.co.uk
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.
1 Hove Place, Hove, 01273 737869, thebetterhalfpub.co.uk

FOOD REVIEW
...........................................
Wahaca
A Mexican adventure
“I’m gone for an hour or
so,” I say to everyone in the
office, who are heads-tothe-digital-grindstone,
working on the lay-out of
this magazine. “Off to…
Wahaca.” Is that a frosty response
I detect? It’s a lovely
sunny day outside.
Wahaca is an ethically
minded Mexican street-food chain; its latest franchise
has replaced Strada on the corner of New
Road and North Street. They’ve cordoned off a
section of the pedestrianised street for diners, and
to my delight, after queuing just three minutes,
I’m shown to a table-for-two in the sun. Almost
immediately my companion Pauline arrives, and a
couple of information-heavy A3+ menus are laid
in front of us, with enticing headers like ‘TAQUI-
TOS’ and ‘ENCHILADAS’ and ‘BAJA TACOS’.
Wahaca was set up in London in 2007 by former
Masterchef winner Thomasina Miers, who decided
to try selling ‘authentic’ Mexican street food, using
good quality locally sourced ingredients. It’s been
such a success that there are now 18 branches in
the capital, as well as outlets in Cardiff, Bristol,
Manchester, Liverpool, and now Brighton.
As soon as we’ve settled, a nice waitress takes us
through the ordering process. There are ‘Nibbles’,
and ‘Street food’ (ie tapas) and ‘Bigger Food’ (ie
main courses) as well as a couple of set menu
options. “Don’t expect it all at the same time,” she
says. “Things will arrive as they are cooked.”
We go for the ‘Mexican Feast’ set menu, subtitled
‘An Adventure’, which offers seven different things
for two people to share (for £34): Scallop and
shrimp ceviche; Pork pibil tacos; Chipotle chicken
quesadilla; Cactus & courgette
tacos; Summer mint
and pea empanada; Toasted
cornbread with chipotle
honey butter; Churros y
chocolate.
Our savoury dishes all arrive
within ten minutes, and
before we know it, our table
is full of stuff to choose
from, mostly wrapped in some sort of bread parcel.
It all looks so good it’s difficult to choose what
to eat first… we keep a wary eye on one another,
to ensure there’s some sort of parity of consumption.
You can’t be too careful with someone who
harbours as ‘healthy’ an appetite as Pauline.
The food is great, perfect for a lunchbreak treat.
My absolute highlight is chipotle honey butter,
which sets off the cornbread beautifully, but
also makes a fine accompaniment for the sweet
potatoes that have unaccountably found their
way in front of us. That and the cactus from the
vegetarian taco, which offers the most interesting
taste, tickling the umami-appreciating spot of
the palate. Oh, and the pulled pork is amazingly
succulent, and the quesadilla is sensational and… I
could go on.
We’re so sated we forget about our churros y
chocolate entirely (probably just as well, given the
highly calorific nature of much of what we’ve consumed
so far) and finish off with a shot of ‘Mexican
hot chocolate’, an interesting alternative to a coffee,
which plays the same sort of icing-on-the-cake
trick. And so back to that digital grindstone, sated
with grub and sun, trying not to look smug.
Alex Leith
Wahaca, 160-161 North Street, 01273 934763
....81....

Photo by Lisa Devlin, cakefordinner.co.uk
....82....

RECIPE
..........................................
Roasted cod with red pepper purée
Even before he started cooking professionally, Mark Wadsworth liked the thought of
owning his own restaurant. Now, together with his wife Alex, he has opened
MAW pop-up restaurant on Brighton Square, in the Lanes…
The name ‘Maw’ means ‘the gullet of a greedy
person’. We wanted the restaurant to have a
meaningful name, and with the menu being a tasting
menu of fantastic ingredients, the word ‘greed’
suited quite well. Here is a savoury dish that has
gone down particularly well in the first month
we’ve been open, which is bound to be a regular
on the menu.
INGREDIENTS: (serves two)
Two small skinless cod fillets (about 180g each)
Maldon sea salt flakes
Two red peppers
One bulb of garlic
100ml vegetable stock
200g rope-grown mussels
A splash of white wine
Two banana shallots (these are larger than regular
shallots)
Fresh thyme
Four sprigs of fresh rosemary
Rapeseed oil
150g butter
Juice of one lemon
Finely diced chorizo
RECIPE: Take the two cod fillets and liberally
cover them in sea salt flakes. Place them in the
fridge for two hours. After the two hours wash for
30 seconds under cold running water to rinse away
any excess salt then refrigerate.
For the red pepper purée, finely slice the two red
peppers and two cloves of garlic. Sweat in a pan
until they have softened and then add 100ml of
vegetable stock. Cover the pan with cling film and
lower the heat to steam the mixture for 30 minutes.
Turn off the heat and allow to cool slightly,
then blend the mix to a purée and add a touch of
sea salt.
Steam open the mussels with the white wine,
garlic, shallots and thyme. Once open, pick the
meat out of the shell and refresh immediately in
cold water. Reserve the mussel stock – that will be
used later.
Heat some oil in a pan to about 170°C and cook
the four sprigs of rosemary in it until the fizzing
sound stops and the rosemary is crispy. Season it
with salt as soon as it’s out of the oil.
Heat a pan with a touch of the rapeseed oil and
add the cod fillets for a few minutes. Then place
the cod in an oven, heated to 180°C for a further
six minutes. While the cod is cooking, pour
some of the mussel stock into a pan and reduce it
down. Lower the heat then slowly add the butter,
emulsifying it into the stock using a whisk. Season
the mix with salt and the lemon juice, then add
the mussel meat and chopped chorizo. Keep the
mixture warm.
To serve, spoon some of the red pepper purée
onto the plate and lay the fish on top of it. Add the
mussels, chorizo and sauce. Sprinkle some crispy
Rosemary over the top to finish.
As told to Rebecca Cunningham
Photo by Lisa Devlin, whose food photography website is
cakefordinner.co.uk
maw-restaurant.co.uk
....83....

FOOD
...........................................
Curry Leaf Cafe
Tikka to ride
Roll Out the Barrel - An
East End Knees Up
Lewes Road, Brighton
Friday 17 June, 7:30pm
Pie & mash, singing, gin, raucous
dancing and trifle – tickets £23
Secret Door Berlin Supper
Club
Bar Broadway, Brighton
Saturday 9 July, 7:30pm
Enter a little known 1920s cabaret
club and enter a world of luxury
and decadence – tickets £53
facebook.com/SecretDoorSupperClubs
twitter.com/SecretDoorSC
One of the
best meals I’ve
ever had was
a thali, eaten
in the civilised
surroundings
of the womenonly
carriage
on a 30-hour
train ride
from Delhi to
Panaji. I think it cost me around 50p (it was a
very long time ago) and everything about it was
perfect. Anyway, spicy food and railways still
conjure wonderful Merchant Ivory-esque memories
for me so the Curry Leaf Cafe outpost at
Brighton Station induces a happy reverie.
There are tandoori chicken and vindaloo
bacon sandwiches, daal of the day, samosas
and curries, and much more besides to choose
from, but I opt for a tongue-twisting tandoori
paneer tikka paratha wrap. It’s basically a
foot-long Indian burrito - the spicy paneer,
yoghurty dressing and crunchy salad rolled
up in a soft paratha. It’s seriously good, as is
the mango lassi I add for the £5 meal deal. A
bargain providing you’re not using my thali as
a comparator. It’s more than enough for lunch
but I can’t resist adding some vegetable pakoras
with chutney (£3.95 for 6), a fruit cup (£2.95)
and a cheek-suckingly sour nimbu paani (£2.50)
to wash it all down.
Like everything we’ve come to expect from the
Curry Leaf Cafe, the subcontinental flavours
are wonderfully authentic. It’s just a pity there’s
no option to be lulled to sleep by the clickedyclack
of the railway track on the sleeper train to
Goa. Lizzie Lower
....84....

FOOD
...........................................
Edible updates
Three cafés and a festival
For those who can afford to tuck away a few
extra calories, or those who don’t care, Glazed,
by the Level, is a café whose USP is what they
sell with their drinks, which is… doughnuts! All
varieties of doughnuts, in fact, baked by 23-yearold
entrepreneur James Brightmore, whose
slate-grey-painted joint looks like a perfect
stop-off point for all those passing skaters. A
sticky business? You bet: but, supermarkets and
the pier apart, can you think of a good place to
get a freshly-baked doughnut? Café Plenty offers
the latest evidence of the renaissance of artisan
baking: based in Circus Parade, it’s run by chef
and baker Mitch and his associate Dan, who sell
cakes and ‘craft’ bread as well as coffee, in a vast
space that’s all exposed brickwork and lightbulbs
on rope. They also
do quick breakfast
and lunch. Finally,
a new café, Plant, is
opening within the walls of the homeware shop
Edited, in Brighton Square, serving Allpress
coffee; as their name suggests, their food will all
be plant based. Actually finally: Viva’s Anya’s new
fave haunt is Velvet Jacks, on Norfolk Square,
run by wife-and-wife team Jacky and Eve, and
offering coffees or beers in the sun, pizza and
cakes… June will see the Polygon Pop-up restaurant
pop up again in Seven Dials… and we’re excited
about Brighton’s latest seafood restaurant,
The Jetty, landing in Kings Road this month.
Send your food news to chloe@vivamagazines.com
....85....

Bentley Motor Museum
Petrolhead heaven
MY SPACE
....................................
What sorts of cars do you keep at Bentley? We try to
get a really good cross section here, and not only cars –
we also have a collection of motorcycles, a horse-drawn
hearse and a 1937 Dennis fire engine.
Where do they come from? They are all privately
owned. We charge a very modest rent to keep them here
and in return we cover the insurance and security.
Who owns the fire engine? That one belongs to
Crowborough Council – it was found in a field and
restored. Its bell was found being used in a pub on one
of the Scottish islands, where somebody recognised it as
the fire engine’s bell. The publican gave it to him and he
brought it back.
How long has the motor museum been here? We
opened in April 1982 with 25 cars. The very first one
was the 1928 Minerva, which is 17 feet long and weighs
two and a half tonnes, so the rest of the museum was
built up around that! I’ve been in that one once a long
time ago – the wheels are so big that you go over a bump
and don’t even notice.
What’s a typical day at the museum? We open at
10am, and a big part of the job is walking around and
chatting to the visitors, but then there’s always a lot of
running around that you don’t expect. Sometimes an
owner will come in and want to start their car up, or
you’ll see something that needs a bit of a polish. Some
days we have school visits.
What criteria does a car have to meet to be kept
here? It depends on what it is… it has to be in pretty
excellent condition, it has to have an interesting history
and it has to be in some way educational.
Do you own any of them? The pre-war Austin 7
replica belongs to my husband. He came to Bentley to
talk about keeping it here – he didn’t expect to find a fellow
car enthusiast with no wedding ring – so that car is
responsible! We had all sorts of fun and games in that.
Which car in the museum is the most expensive?
We couldn’t say, but there are two cars here which are
insured for over a million. See if you can guess which
ones they are… Rebecca Cunningham spoke to Angela Gould
bentley.org.uk
....87....

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Psychotherapy Training
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– interviewing now for Oct 2016.
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● Safeguarding – 25 June
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Viva Lewes a5 June 16.indd 1 11/05/2016 14:03
吀 爀 愀 渀 猀 昀 漀 爀 洀 礀 漀 甀 爀 栀 漀 洀 攀 眀 椀 琀 栀 漀 甀 爀 昀 椀 渀 攀 猀 琀 焀 甀 愀 氀 椀 琀 礀
匀 㨀 䌀 刀 䄀 䘀 吀 洀 愀 搀 攀 ⴀ 琀 漀 ⴀ 洀 攀 愀 猀 甀 爀 攀 椀 渀 琀 攀 爀 椀 漀 爀 猀 栀 甀 琀 琀 攀 爀 猀 ⸀
琀 ⸀ ㈀ 㜀 アパート アパート アパート 㠀 㐀 ㈀
攀 ⸀ 挀 漀 渀 琀 愀 挀 琀 䀀 戀 攀 氀 氀 愀 瘀 椀 猀 琀 愀 猀 栀 甀 琀 琀 攀 爀 猀 ⸀ 挀 漀 ⸀ 甀 欀
眀 ⸀ 眀 眀 眀 ⸀ 戀 攀 氀 氀 愀 瘀 椀 猀 琀 愀 猀 栀 甀 琀 琀 攀 爀 猀 ⸀ 挀 漀 ⸀ 甀 欀

WE TRY...
...........................................
Fitbitch
Bootcamp for broads
I arrive for my fitness
assessment with
Fitbitch founder Rachael
Woolston in my one
and only workout outfit.
I bought it a couple of
years ago when I decided
to take up running with
the assistance of one of
those phone apps and,
whilst it still fits (it’s
stretchy), the running
didn’t stick. It just wasn’t that much fun running
with a disembodied robotic voice for encouragement.
I’m ready to give it another go, but this time
I’m signing up to a women-only bootcamp that
focuses on achieving fitness goals and developing
an exercise habit that lasts beyond the camp.
So four mornings a week, for four weeks in June,
you’ll find me down at Hove lawns at the crack of
dawn for a workout. “It takes 21 days to create a
habit, good or bad” Rachael tells me, “so the design
of the four-week bootcamp was no accident”.
The programme is varied to keep the body and the
mind engaged, and the small group size (14 max)
quickly builds a supportive community that keeps
you going. “Some people want to drop out in the
first week but by the second they’re hooked.”
Before I can join the bootcamp, we need to assess
the status quo. Rachael and I talk through my
background, lifestyle and goals and then she assesses
my posture and biomechanics – essentially
how my body moves and the factors that could
be affecting it - whilst I complete a few inexpert
squats and lunges. She measures my weight, BMI,
hydration level and muscle mass and it’s clear that
my fitness journey may be
a long one.
Rachael founded Fitbitch
in 2009 when she realised,
after 15 years as a journalist
on women’s lifestyle
magazines, that “there was
just too much emphasis on
how women looked and
not enough on how they
felt”. She’s been a life-long
fitness enthusiast but her
real speciality is her “interest in people and helping
them to realise they can achieve anything”. So
she created an intensive and progressive exercise
and healthy eating programme that would kick
start a fitness regime for any woman.
I’m looking forward to meeting my fellow fitbitches-in-the-making
later this month. I’m told
they’ll come from all sorts of backgrounds, with
all sorts of fitness levels and, whilst many will
be nervous as first, they’re all up for a challenge.
Goals start as losing weight or looking better,
Rachael tells me, but their targets soon become
more challenging; ‘I’ve seen people do some
amazing things…’ as illustrated by the Fitbitch
alumni competing in the first Brighton triathlon in
September. I’m not sure I’ll be ready to join them
this year, but a journey of a thousand miles, and all
that… Lizzie Lower
Camps start from £120 and run at Hove Lawns and
Queens Park year round. New camps in Worthing,
Lewes & Shoreham in June. You can win a fourweek
Fitbitch bootcamp course by entering our
exclusive giveaway. Visit vivamagazines.com to enter.
fitbitchbootcamp.com / 07855 742195
....89....

HEALTH
...........................................
Jon Wilde
Mindful pilgrim
Jon Wilde, formerly a star writer
for Loaded magazine, slowly sets
off from Hove on a five-year
mindfulness pilgrimage…
‘I think I always knew that I’d end
up as some kind of nomadic type.
I distinctly remember sitting in
the classroom aged six, staring
with fascination at this picture in
a book. It depicted a vagabond
walking down a country road on
a sunny day, whistling as he goes,
with saucepans hanging off him.
A businessman in a bowler hat is
hurriedly exiting his house on the
way to work. I remember thinking
I’d much rather be the gentleman of the road than
the business feller. The former looked content with
his lot and he’s in the moment. The latter looked
like he was about to have a cardiac arrest and he’s
not remotely present in his own life.
I’ve managed to avoid doing ‘proper’ work all my
adult life. For 30 years I’ve earned my living as a
journalist/interviewer for newspapers and magazines.
Since 1997 I’ve lived in Brighton and Hove.
On the surface, life was going swimmingly, but the
truth is I was unravelling. Mindfulness teacher and
author Ed Halliwell, also an ex magazine man, talks
about a rumbling under the floorboards, feeling for
some years that something wasn’t quite right in his
life. My experience exactly. Something had to give.
By the end of 2012, it became clear that the life I
was living was no longer sustainable. I was drinking
heavily. I was emerging from yet another
disastrous relationship. My father was dying. Financial
problems were escalating. I had a couple of
major health scares.
A friend mentioned mindfulness
to me. With the help of a
book (Finding Peace In A Frantic
World by Mark Williams and
Danny Penman) I started to
meditate daily and enrolled
on an eight-week course with
Brighton teacher Nick Diggins
at the Anahata Health Clinic.
It was immediately transformative.
It really felt as though
I’d found something I’d been
looking for all my life, without
even realising it. Truly, I felt
like I was coming home. My
life since then has largely been
spent in a state of quiet joy. I barely recognise the
old me. If it can work for me…
After completing a mindfulness teacher training
course, I realised Brighton was already blessed with
some of the best mindfulness teachers on the planet.
My calling lay elsewhere. So I decided to take
mindfulness on the road. A few weeks from now
I’m embarking on a five-year pilgrimage around the
UK, accompanied by my 13-year-old spaniel Banjo.
He’ll dictate the pace. Having given up my rented
flat we’ll mostly be living out of a tent. If you live on
my route and you’d like to be taught mindfulness,
I’ll endeavour to come to you. If you’re unemployed
or on low income, I’ll teach you for free. If you can
afford a donation to help keep me on the road, that
would be warmly welcomed.
So, I’m about to become a gentleman of the road.
The seed was sown when I stared at that picture in
the classroom. Now it’s time to heed the call home.’
As told to Andy Darling
mindfulpilgrim.com
....90....

CYCLING
...........................................
Josh Ibbett
Brighton’s Transcontinental champ
The first Transcontinental race I did, in 2014,
was full of disasters. The Transcontinental is an
endurance race, between Belgium and Turkey, over
a total distance of 2,600 miles. I was carrying a
ridiculous amount of luggage, my navigation system
went wrong, I got injured, and I had to do the last
500 miles – over a range of mountains – on a singlespeed
gear. 250 riders started the race, and I came
second. I knew I had a chance to win in 2015.
When they say endurance, they mean endurance.
The less time you spend out of the saddle, the more
likely you are to win the race. Life becomes about eating,
sleeping, and moving forward. It’s very primeval.
My strategy for the 2015 race was to stick to
my plans, and not worry about the other riders.
I decided that I would sleep for three hours every
night, from around midnight, anywhere suitable
I could find. I would set off before dawn, stop for
breakfast, stop for lunch, stop for dinner and then
find somewhere to sleep again. This meant a total of
15 to 18 hours in the saddle, for ten days.
I packed as lightly as I could. My biggest luxury,
on day five, was changing into the spare pair of
socks I’d brought with me. By that stage I was exhausted,
filthy and hungry. You had to buy all your
food along the way – lots of ham sandwiches – but
you could never eat enough. If I was feeling really
low I’d have an ice cream and a coke. That would
give me a boost for an hour or more.
My mind started playing tricks on me, and I
thought I was hallucinating when I saw a caged
bear by the side of the road in Albania. So I took
a picture of it, leaning my bike against the cage.
It was real, and it took a swipe at the wheel… that
would have been a novel way to go out of the race.
My biggest competitor, James Hayden, pulled
out injured, and I came into Istanbul 32 hours
before the next guy. There were a lot of people
waiting for me, but the last thing I wanted was to
talk. I was exhausted! My legs were strong but I was
very skinny, and I’d lost a lot of muscle in my upper
body: after a while your body starts eating itself.
I did the race in nine days, 23 hours and 54
minutes. In a way I was lucky: going faster meant
less time in the saddle: the real heroes were the
guys who came in after 14 days. It was my experience
and my stubbornness that helped me most.
And the bike – a Mason with Hunt wheels combo
– that was so reliable I had no mechanical problems,
and not even a single puncture. A good bike
can’t win you a race, but a bad bike can certainly
lose it for you. As told to Alex Leith
....91....

Take The Bus
To Make Every
STEp Count
Brighton & Hove Buses are proud
to present the Get Active bus at
the Take Part Launch Day. Step on
board to discover how taking the
bus improves your well-being.
STreTch
yOur leGs
HOp On
300 stEps
HOp Off
700 stEps
HOp Off
GRAND PARADE
250 stEps
THE
NORTH
laInE
HOp On
800 stEps
BRIGHTON STATION
HOp On
WanDer
HOp Off
www.buses.co.uk

ROAD SAFETY
...........................................
‘Share the responsibility’
BHCC Road Safety Officer, Keith Baldock
My main message for
road users, whether
that’s motorists, bikers,
cyclists or pedestrians, is
that they should be aware
that their time on the
road is one of the most
dangerous things they’ll
do all day, and they
should pay due attention.
According to police statistics, 42% of collisions
in Brighton & Hove occur because the driver or
rider isn’t paying enough attention to the road…
with 11% due to pedestrians failing to look properly
- that’s as opposed to 2% due to alcohol and
drugs. That’s why making people aware that they
must pay more attention has become the focus of
my campaigns.
The problem is much worse than it ever has
been because of the proliferation of electronic
devices: mobile phones, MP3s with headphones,
etc. It is illegal to handle a mobile phone while in
charge of a vehicle; research shows that hands-free
devices are also dangerous.
When people are driving they should concentrate
on driving, and not on anything else, which
might take them away from full awareness of what
they are doing. Drivers are moving around in a
vehicle that could potentially kill people, and they
should always be aware of that.
Similarly, a lot of collisions occur when road
users are emotionally distracted. We all have to
increase our awareness of what effect we can have
on people around us if we’re aware of ourselves
and not the road.
It’s not always the driver’s fault. One of the accident
hotspots in the city
is on the southbound
Lewes Road, in the
Franklin Road area. Cars
turning left and right
into junctions often can’t
see cyclists travelling at
around 20mph even if
they’re looking out for
them, and this has led to
accidents. My advice to cyclists is to slow down in
this area.
The 20mph signs are not universally obeyed,
but drivers have moved their speed down from
when the speed limit was 30mph. After three years
of the new limits we’ll have the statistics, so it’s too
early at the moment to say what sort of impact the
reduction has had on road collisions.
Here are some figures that give food for
thought: A higher than average proportion of
pedestrian KSIs (incidents in which a pedestrian is
killed or seriously injured) in Brighton are young
(18-30) well-educated city dwellers – a total of
35%. 57% of those are male. 82% of KSIs are
injured within ten miles of home.
My main advice to all road users is to look out
for potential problems so you will have time to
react to them if they occur.
Brighton & Hove streets are often at or beyond
their traffic capacity, and it’s not much fun
using them sometimes. We should all look out for
one another, whether we’re driving, riding, cycling
or walking. We all share the road, so we should all
share the responsibility. As told to Alex Leith
For more information check Facebook: Share the
Roads, Brighton & Hove
....93....

EU REFERENDUM
...........................................
Should we stay...
Keith Taylor, Green MEP for South East England
The EU referendum is the biggest political decision
of a generation, and it is drawing ever closer. As a
Green, I wholeheartedly support the campaign for
Britain to remain part of the EU.
It’s difficult to overstate the importance of this referendum
for our future, our society, and our environment.
Thanks to the EU we now have a Europewide
cap on bankers’ bonuses, vital environmental
safeguards, and social protections while EU standards
on air quality, healthy rivers, and clean beaches
are also forcing our Government to clean up its act.
The EU is responsible for around 80% of environmental
laws in the UK and there are many examples
where it has driven positive change. For example,
protected wildlife sites were being lost at a rate of
15% a year before EU action; now the rate is 1%.
The EU has led the way in pushing for ambitious
targets to tackle the complex, and cross-border,
challenge of climate change and is playing an important
role in promoting the measures needed to
achieve those targets. The switch to renewable energy
and sustainable transport are prime objectives
for our 50-strong group of Green MEPs.
In the South East, the EU has also delivered and
supported thousands of new jobs, improved the performance
of almost 2,000 businesses, allowed another
2,000 to make financial savings from improved
energy efficiency, helped more than a thousand
small businesses reduce energy and water usage by
10%, and reduced the region’s overall CO2 emissions
by more than 40,000 tonnes.
In Brighton, EU funds have supported projects like
‘Build Green’, an initiative which offers local construction
companies the tools to work more sustainably,
recognising that what is good for the environment
is good for business.
EU laws are also helping ensure that air pollution
in the city is being taken seriously, despite the UK’s
government’s reluctance to acknowledge the issue.
Practically, the EU is also funding the University of
Brighton’s ground-breaking research into the most
dangerous types of air pollution. I learned first-hand
the importance of this research, and the EU’s support
for it, on a visit to the University’s air quality
monitoring station earlier this year.
Whether you live in the city or a small village, the
future of the UK’s relationship with Europe will affect
your daily life. Important funding and vital social
and environmental protections are easy to take
for granted, but, with the referendum looming, we
all need to think carefully about how the EU affects
our lives and our country.
I believe the EU is far from perfect, but I want to
take the opportunity to celebrate the many positives
it has delivered for Brighton and the South East. I
know a better Europe is possible but I also know
that while our Government remains committed to
ideological austerity and a deregulatory agenda, our
rights, freedoms, and environmental standards are
under threat and it is our shared EU laws which are
working to protect our future and our planet for the
next generation. @GreenKeithMEP
....94....

EU REFERENDUM
...........................................
...Or should we go?
Maria Caulfield, Conservative MP for Lewes
As I write this, we enter the key period before every
person eligible to vote in British elections will -
thanks to the pledge within this Government’s manifesto
- have the chance to either vote for Britain to
leave or remain within the EU.
After the election, the Prime Minister set about
negotiating with other EU member states in order
to secure reforms to Britain’s membership. Agreements
were reached in March after a lengthy period
of negotiation. They present a welcome step in the
right direction, however, I feel due to the reluctance
of other EU nations, they fail to go far enough.
I have made it my mission to visit as many businesses
as possible, both big and small, to chat about issues
affecting them. It soon became clear that there was
one concern for the majority of those businesses; the
growing wave of bureaucracy, mainly from Brussels.
Whether it be new regulations relating to equipment
used in a hairdressers, or the failing Common
Agricultural Policy which so negatively affects our
farmers surrounding the town, it soon became clear
that our EU membership was having a profoundly
damaging impact on those putting so much into the
local economy.
We need only look a little further afield within the
constituency, at those fishermen working out of Newhaven,
to see an example of how little the reforms
will benefit the UK. A once-thriving fishing town,
Newhaven has seen its in-shore fishing industry
decimated by the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP).
Just before Christmas, I had fishermen expressing
their overwhelming concerns, as, overnight, with no
warning, the EU banned Sea Bass fishing in our waters.
Men who had just spent thousands of pounds
on new nets were now letting crew go because their
business had just been closed down. What could I
do about this as the local Member of Parliament?
Nothing. The decision was made in Brussels.
These concerns in most instances would be enough
to convince most to vote ‘Leave’ on the 23rd June.
However, there is another, for some even more
pressing concern, which relates to the clear disengagement
that the EU has with the British electorate.
Very few members of the public are aware of
who represents them within the European Parliament,
and even fewer seem to care.
Of course, this leaves a breeding ground for unaccountability
with an end result of policy that profoundly
impacts upon the lives of those within the
UK being steered in directions completely opposite
to Britain’s interests. Such an activity wouldn’t be acceptable
at any level of Government within the UK,
so why should it be acceptable within the EU?
On the 23rd June, we have a once in a life time
chance to map our future as a country. No one is
saying it will be easy but for the first time in nearly
forty years we will be masters of our own destiny,
part of Europe but not governed by the EU.
@mariacaulfield
....95....

BRICKS AND MORTAR
...........................................
The Attenborough Centre
Back in business
This was the decision
Sussex University
faced around eight
years ago: The
campus’ Gardner
Arts Centre, which
was respected as a
venue that would
take risks and put on
innovative arts programmes,
had lost its
funding and closed.
The trust that had
been running the venue handed it back to the
University. The University had known that it had
been getting run down, but they hadn’t realised
the full extent of the problem. They discovered
that it would need £7.2m of work, if it were to
reopen again.
They could have left it lying empty, but that
would have still led to ‘a substantial cost’ in
basic maintenance. Knocking it down was never
seriously considered, and wouldn’t have got
past English Heritage, given its Grade II* listed
status. The other option was to take the risk, and
try to reopen it.
Around the time of the Gardner’s closure, Sussex
got a new Vice Chancellor, Michael Farthing.
“People were saying to him, ‘Michael, please
don’t let this happen, we need a cultural hub on
campus’,” recalls Matt Knight, the Attenborough
Centre’s Operations and Resources Manager.
Luckily, Farthing is “an actor, in his spare time,
so he’s very much got a passion for the performing
arts… He was really the leader, to get this up
and running again.”
Though built slightly later than the original campus
buildings, the Centre had the same architect,
Basil Spence, who worked in collaboration with
the theatre designer Sean Kenny. It’s like a big
brick drum surrounded by turrets, with windows
in the ceilings.
Knight calls it “brutalist
but beautiful”.
Its curved walls were
a problem, acoustically,
“because they
didn’t focus sound,
they just bounced
sound everywhere,”
Knight says. Kenny
would surely have
forewarned Spence
about this; if so,
Spence must have decided that the look of the
building was more important.
The acoustics have now been improved, as part
of this wide-ranging refurbishment. The whole
process took longer than originally expected; the
delay was mostly due to listed building-related
complications. But, in May, the renamed Attenborough
Centre hosted its first public-facing
performances as part of the Brighton Festival’s
50th anniversary programme.
Knight accepts that it’s a risk. He already knows
that the place is “never going to make huge
amounts of money. But we’re never going to be
measured purely on financial terms.”
Instead, the goals are more to do with “contributing
to the student experience”, providing a
“cultural flagship” and “a way for the university
to reach out into the community”. While the
Gardner was focused on bringing in touring
companies, the new centre will endeavour to
accommodate students’ needs more than the
Gardner ever did.
“Students and university, community use, and
touring work. We’ll be doing those three things,
but quite what percentage of each, we’ll be working
on over the next year or two.”
Steve Ramsey
sussex.ac.uk/acca
....97....

INSIDE LEFT: BRIGHTON STATION, AUGUST 1939
...............................................................................
Brighton’s last scheduled tram, coming from Upper Rock Street, arrived back at the Lewes Road depot
in the small hours of September 1st, 1939, shortly before the Luftwaffe’s first bombing raid in Poland,
which signalled the start of WW2.
The two events were not related: Brighton’s tram system had only been running since 1901, but it was already
considered outdated, with trolleybuses (in effect double decker buses powered by overhead electric
cables) set to replace them.
The original fleet consisted of 50 cars; 116 were subsequently bought to augment and replace them.
There were ten different lines, given the name of a letter denoting a prominent street on the line: thus E
went up and down Elm Grove and L along London Road. The trams were run by Brighton Corporation,
and went as far west as Seven Dials; Hove was not involved at all. In total there were 9.5 miles of tracks.
The tram in this picture was, like all the trams, coloured in cream and burgundy. And like this one all the
trams were four-wheeled, double-decker, open-top affairs, running on a 40-50 bhp engine from trolley
wires generating 400 volts. This one was on line ‘S’ (for ‘station’) running from the Aquarium to the
railway terminus every five minutes.
Most of the tram cars were scrapped for the war effort shortly after the cessation of the system, but one
has miraculously survived. Tram 53 (not the one in this picture, sadly) was one of three converted into
a shed in the Lewes Road depot (now the bus depot) and it was sold to a pig farmer in Partridge Green,
where it saw service until the 1970s. Having been left to rot for some years, it was purchased by an enthusiast
in the early 80s. The tram was briefly on show on Marine Parade in 1987, but was otherwise left
in storage. In 2010, however, a society – the Tram 53 Society – was formed to renovate the vehicle, and
they are gradually performing that job, hoping to raise enough money for the tram to run again (perhaps
in Preston Park!) See brightontram53.org.uk for more details. The picture, taken in August 1939, comes
courtesy of the James Gray Society regencysociety-jamesgray.com
....98....