Lost London 1870-1945

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These were the days before people were concerned about conservation, and a great many remarkable buildings surviving from as far back as before the Great Fire have been lost. The black and white photographs (more than 500) are such a fascinating feast for the eye, and compel careful study and thought.

However, most photographs are of the tenements and slums of the very poor, because these were the buildings most likely to be pulled down for massive road developments or new streets. When I received it the brown paper at two corners was torn exposing the contents, Needless to say I was not impressed at all.But then perhaps that is how those whose mistakes the book laments thought about the buildings they replaced too? The last section in the book, on the photographs taken in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, shows you the streets lived and walked in by Dorothy L Sayers, Michael Arlen and Noel Coward. The Euston Arch tragedy; the demolition of the Coal Exchange for a road scheme that was never built; the obliteration of the geography of the East End, much of which had, contrary to modern myth, survived the Blitz; the wrecking of restorable, liveable houses and cohesive communities in the name of ‘slum-clearance’… Need I go on? It got to roof level, complete with passages to parliament and to the Tube station, before the money ran out and most of it was demolished.

The great mansions partied in by the Bright Young Things in the 1920s are seen in their dingy, derelict splendour just before their disintegration after bombing. The only thing I wish was that Davies had provided more details on the dates many buildings were originally built - although, I also realize that, in many cases, the buildings were built and re-built over extensive periods of time, so exact dates can be difficult, if not impossible. Peckham was one such village, and one particularly interesting photograph shows a farmhouse that survived as a reminder of Peckham’s rural roots. Important in that context is that "[The images] have been selected to show the commonplace rather than the great-set pieces,.How could it be when character and plot are slaves to the concept, when all we have is the frame of a single camera? This book is a monumental document about one of the world's great cities and about the photographers who documented the changes in London over 75 years. Finance is provided by PayPal Credit (a trading name of PayPal UK Ltd, Whittaker House, Whittaker Avenue, Richmond-Upon-Thames, Surrey, United Kingdom, TW9 1EH). He broke an ashtray in a London taxi, which led to his being chased by police in a different taxi, and spending a night in jail. If you have had two passes replaced and have lost a third in a 12 month rolling period, your replacement request will be referred to your borough.

On the north side of Westminster Bridge (by the way, London’s second bridge, opposed at its construction by City chauvinists) the Opera House began construction during the 1870s. Overall, Gilbey wrote, "Bumps and wrinkles in the film would doubtless have been remedied with the luxury of reshoots. The images also show how the photographers had to work the light to create their photos: look at how buildings in the background are over-exposed due to the exposure time needed for foreground objects. Furthermore, if those who decide the allocations of the real and unreal are cruel, mad or colossally wrong, what then?

If you wish to continue this tour with the rest of us, I'm afraid it has to be with your own eyes, the growing changing city unfolds. In the film, Harrelson, Wilson and Nelson play themselves in a story based on the real event, where Harrelson struggles to get home, while running into friends and members of a royal family. It will take me ages to read because I cannot just flick through it, every page needs to be looked at thoroughly as there are so many interesting things to see in each and every photo. But the war wasn’t the only thing responsible for the destruction of vast numbers of London’s historic buildings: many were purposefully demolished long before the Luftwaffe struck, to make way for road widening and that sort of thing. It is liberally peppered with the most astonishing array of genuinely stunning 'pin sharp' photographs which naturally I have never had the opportunity of seeing before, illustrating not just the buildings but also many of the evocative street scenes of the period.

We published the formal reports on nationally funded excavations and headline-making building-related stories. Read more about the condition New: A new, unread, unused book in perfect condition with no missing or damaged pages.One picture in the book shows one such house with objects such as mirrors laid out along the centre of the room ready for auctioning off. This is, no pun intended (well, maybe a small one), a book in which you get totally, completely lost. While Davies, in his Introduction, does a great job to explain the importance of the images from an architectural history perspective and while he provides us with a socio-economic reference frame for the period covered, it is the images themselves that tell that story best. In The Daily Telegraph, Tim Robey found, "It went alright on the night, with no hideous glitches", adding that, "Breaking new ground with this live experiment was only a matter of time, and single-take gambits of its ilk have been dabbled in for years.