On Friday, when the snow began falling on London — something that is not even necessarily an annual occurrence in the UK — I took a tour by bike around Brockley, my home in south east London, and also visited Ladywell, Lewisham and Greenwich, taking photos as the first snow fell.

I posted the first set of photos yesterday, and was planning to post the second set, featuring Greenwich, today, but then it began snowing again, more heavily than before, and I spent this afternoon on another photographic trip — first of all, taking my son sledging in Hilly Fields, the hill-top park in Brockley that is one of my favourite places to visit, and then cycling through Brockley and on, via New Cross, to Deptford, capturing one of my favourite urban environments in the snow. Read the rest of this entry »

This photo set, the 72nd in my ongoing project to photograph the whole of London by bike, rather sprang upon me yesterday (January 18), when, while still sleep-deprived and rather jet-lagged after returning from my ten-day visit to the US to campaign for the closure of the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, on the 11th anniversary of its opening, I had to make a visit to my local hospital in Lewisham, in south east London — whose A&E Department, and other frontline services, are currently under threat of closure — and was thrilled, in an inner-child way, to discover that it was snowing.

After taking a few photos en route, I reemerged after an hour or so to find that the snow was still steadily falling, and so, after pushing my bike back up the hill to Brockley — to mend a puncture I had received during the short journey to the hospital — I set out to capture some photos of my wider neighbourhood in the snow, taking a well-worn route down the hill to Lewisham, along the River Ravensbourne to Greenwich, and then down to the River Thames and back, a two-hour journey, at the end of which I was half-frozen. Read the rest of this entry »

As part of my ongoing project to photograph the whole of London by bike, my most recent photo sets — with the exception of the set featuring images from Saturday’s massive demonstration in Lewisham to resist plans to close the hospital’s A&E Department — captured a journey I made through south east London, and then along Commercial Road in the East End and back home via Canary Wharf, on a blazing hot day in July. That was exhilarating, and a lovely reminder of the joys that summer can bring, but here and now, as the days get shorter, and the leaves continue to fall, heralding the full-blown arrival of winter, I thought it would make sense to post some more recent photos.

This set — the 61st London set — and the four to follow capture some of the delights of autumn, in and around my home in Brockley, in south east London, and also including Deptford and Greenwich. This first set, however, returns to my local park, Hilly Fields, on a hill commanding wonderful views of Blythe Hill, looking over to the wooded expanse of Forest Hill, where the last vestiges remain of the Great North Wood that once covered most of south London. There are also glimpses to be had of Canary Wharf and the O2, as well as views over Blackheath to Shooters Hill, down to Lewisham and all the way out to Kent. Read the rest of this entry »

With the wheel of the year turning from autumn to winter, the days getting shorter, the cold settling in, and the leaves first of all turning from green to yellows, oranges and reds, and then falling from the trees, I wanted to make sure that I made available some of my photos capturing these changes before winter firmly takes over.

In my ongoing project to photograph the whole of London by bike, in which I recently marked the publication of my first 1,000 photos in 50 sets, I have been out and about relentlessly as the summer gave way to autumn, and now as autumn is giving way to winter, but I have found it impossible to upload the photos to keep up with my productivity. I now have 217 sets of photos to upload — over 4,500 photos in total — taken from mid-July to yesterday, capturing this extraordinary city in bright sunlight, in the rain and the mist, in the early morning, at noon, in the late afternoon and at night, and at all points of the compass, to add to the 1,000 already posted. Read the rest of this entry »