psmv6: Teapots

Many years ago, a correspondent and I took afternoon drinks and smokes on the veranda of the Goring Hotel, near Victoria Station. At that time, an open veranda, behind the bar, overlooking the rather pleasant gardens, presumably created at the expense of the other properties making up the block. The hotel is marked by the orange spot in the snap above.

Presumably built at a time when Victoria was a rather different place to that it has become, and when Watney's nearby Stag Brewery was going strong. From the snap above, taken at the time of its demolition and lifted from reference 4 - the name of same being a reminder of the days when Westminster was an island - a good sized place, which must have dominated the area.

While from reference 2, I associate to the Regent Palace Hotel, roughly contemporary with this one, famous for not having bathrooms. I have a fond memory of being conducted to my bath there - ready filled - by a mature maid.

Proceedings started at the Wetherspoon's overlooking the concourse of Victoria Station. Another place for drinks and smokes in days gone by, during my time in the world of work. On this occasion the concourse was not busy, but I did notice the red ring around the clock in the middle of the indicator board. Odd that I had not noticed it before.

Checking with Gemini this morning, I had an interesting conversation with him covering the Railway 200 project, the Rail Clock and the brown wood slats covering the ceilings at London Bridge Station. I had forgotten that the red ring is actually animated, a version of the Network Rail logo of old which also functions as the second hand. And I learned that the brown wood slats are made of the very same Western Red Cedar which featured at reference 8, the very slats which I had once suspected of being plastic extrusions, in the way of those at the Wisley Gardens entrance cafeteria. The cedar which the Pacific coast totem poles were made of. Just noticed the one error along the way.

We kicked off at the Goring by taking sherry, at least some of us did. With one of the party going so far as to take a Gin Sling, which the bar man managed with no fuss at all. Without the plastic umbrellas deployed by lesser establishments.

Moved onto to the splendid tea room, called the 'Veranda' and built at the back of the hotel since my last visit. The white rectangle to the right of the orange spot in the opening snap above. Where we were given the full tea performance, that is to say, some way removed from the bread, butter, jam and cake which features in Agatha Christie adaptations, for example Julia Mackenzie's take on 'A pocket full of rye'. And, indeed, from the sort of cake that BH or I might make.

The veggie option was all present and correct. Foie gras was absent. The system had worked.

We learned that the teapots were serviced by a teapot company, rather in the way that lots of office buildings subcontract their pot plants to pot plant companies. So the hotel maids were not up at the crack of dawn polishing teapots.

The mini-birthday cake was all present and correct, complete with candle. The system had worked here too. We celebrated with a rendering of the song which we use on such occasions. My singing voice can still hold out for a short while, even managing a spot of harmony!

Nicely appointed cloakrooms for gentlemen, including tasteful erotic prints, from where I associated to the not so tasteful erotic photographs offered at the Langham Hotel, on the other side of town, as noticed at reference 9.

On exit, we admired the floral display around the door. I assumed that the flowers were fake, commonly enough used for such purposes in central London, but BH assures me that they were the real thing.

Hard to tell from a snap, even under zoom. I need to touch them - and even then, one is not always sure.

Wound down with a beverage or so back at Wetherspoon's, in company with people who were even more dressed up than we were. It turned out that they were military men with their ladies, fresh out of a garden party at Buckingham Palace. I guessed Falklands, but it seems that they were not old enough for that; rather Gulf War. Thinking about it now, the naval uncle almost got caught up in the Falklands War and he would he well over a hundred if he were still alive now, so my guess was well off!

I also had occasion to wonder why there were not trains to Tunbridge Wells from Victoria, which did serve places like Dover and Brighton. I work out from the map above that this is probably some relic of the old days of railway companies, with the company serving the middle of Kent running into London Bridge, rather than Victoria.

With a rather complicated junction a little to the south of New Cross Gate, rather like the one at Clapham Junction, there for much the same sort of reason.

While reference 10 meets other needs and it rather too complicated for this one.

A fine outing. The Goring had done us well.

PS 1: the Regent Palace cropped up at reference 5. I don't seem to have returned to the subject since, but the start of Gemini's offering at the time is offered above.

PS 2: not now convinced that I have read the opening snap properly. Is the white rectangle a temporary tent, rather than the tea room behind?

The images turned up by Bing are not completely conclusive, although that just above is very much the sort of thing I remember from the inside. A third visit is clearly indicated, and this time I must join the others on a stroll around the garden, including, I understand, a discrete statue, tucked away in a corner, of Mr. Goring himself.

PS 3: Google does not seem to know about the statue but he did turn up some history at reference 11. Still, it seems, a family hotel, still owned by the Gorings'.

But Gemini knows all about it. All is well.

PS 4: one of the party has kindly supplied a picture of the statue. Which is all well and good, but I see no flower in the buttonhole. The best the image can do is a pink splodge between the feet which might or might not be a flower of some kind.

To which Gemini's response is that there are actually two statues, one in the garden and one in the foyer of the hotel. It is the indoor one which gets the flower each morning. He also suggests that the pink splodge is petals from nearby bedding plants, which does not look very likely.

I wonder this (Saturday) afternoon whether Gemini would have made the same error had I (expensively) upgraded my subscription, as noticed back in April at reference 12. Maybe I ought to go back to more systematic checking of his replies?

I close by noting that it took me several goes to locate reference 12, before lighting on 'upgrade', which did the trick.

References

Reference 1: https://www.thegoring.com/.

Reference 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goring_Hotel.

Reference 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watney_Combe_%26_Reid.

Reference 4: https://thethorneyislandsociety.org.uk/ttis/index.php/events/29-blog/221-the-stag-brewery-palace-street-collection-of-photographs-held-at-the-westminster-archives.

Reference 5: https://psmv6.blogspot.com/2026/02/to-cheese.html.

Reference 6: https://railway200.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/railway-200-brand-guidelines.pdf.

Reference 7: https://www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk/news/new-railway-timepiece-marks-new-beginning-for-britains-railway-and-celebrates-200-years-of-trains.

Reference 8: https://psmv6.blogspot.com/2026/05/cedar.html.

Reference 9: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/02/another-brasserie.html.

Reference 10: https://railmap.nationalrail.co.uk/#/mapview?layers=%7B%22map-colors%22:%22toc-colours%22,%22disruption%22:false,%22engineering-works%22:false,%22diversionary-routes%22:false,%22tube%22:true,%22operator-labels%22:true,%22unknown%22:false,%22stepFree%22:false%7D&viewport=%5B%5B-0.35130213311023795,51.42434957679498%5D,%5B0.08775073056548877,51.559891303493856%5D%5D&focus=%5B19710,20609,20622%5D.