Britsch!

Submitted by Douglas Wood November 1st, 2010
Certifikitsch Winner

Just spent a week in London working on a show for the BBC. Kitsch was surprisingly in short supply but I did manage to capture a few images to share with AWMoK. This is the BBC Television Centre building (in White City, in the London Borough of Hammersmith) which produced Monty Python, Fawlty Towers, Absolutely Fabulous and Doctor Who among many others. Sadly, it’s being shut down next year when the BBC makes its move to Manchester, England. Apparently there are plans to mark this building as a national landmark so it won’t be torn down.

Here’s a close-up of the building, featuring the iconic “Atomic Dots” which were considered very unusual and modern when the building opened in 1960.

Nearby is a huge new Westfield Mall that is depressingly similar to all the billions of Westfield Malls that have cropped up all over the world (including one near my house in Topanga Canyon, in Woodfield Hills.) Despite the bland conformity of the shops, I did manage to find a clothing store called All Saints in which the large windows were filled from floor to ceiling with vintage Singer sewing machines.

Here are a few close-ups:

Finally, at Heathrow airport I discovered a cheerful Sushi bar in which the sushi happily travels around the restaurant on a conveyor belt like a toy train set, so you can grab what you want without having to get up from the counter. It’s called Yo! Sushi.

Had a nice time, but I worked too much to be able to conclusively confirm Roger Miller’s assertion that “England swings like a pendulum do.”

8 Responses to “Britsch!”

  1. Allee Willis

    I know the BBC building. The last time I was in London was 1987 to write ‚ÄúWhat I Done to Deserve This?” with Pet Shop Boys. I can’t say that London is my favorite city because it was always raining, it was always dark and I miss modern 50’s/60’s and 70’s architecture. So it would always perk me up every time we would pass this building. Thank God they’re going to make it a national landmark. You know if it was here they’d knock it right down.

    I’m dying from the All Saints sewing machine window. SO FANTASTIC. What do they sell in the store?

    I love restaurants where food travels by conveyor belt. There was a famous sushi restaurant in some city I was in within the last couple of years though I’m blanking on the city not to mention the name of the restaurant. I know that’s not very helpful but thought I would mention it. They should be doing more of these. It seems like an absolutely perfect way to order sushi.

    Excellent trip-Tic, Doug!

  2. Lisa Rios

    There’s a similar sushi bar in Pasadena, CA. They float by on little boats. Absolutely adorable and very tasty.