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Gatwick Airport railway station upgrade reducing delays on the Brighton Main Line

ianVisits — Thu, 09 Nov 2023 07:00:59 +0000

Gatwick Airport railway station is about to get a new passenger entrance that will reduce train delays as far away as Cambridge, Bedford and Brighton — because the new entrance will fix a major bottleneck on the railway.

The new station concourse is nearly ready for passengers

The bottleneck is caused by Gatwick Airport station itself.

The station sits on the busy Brighton Main Line between London and Brighton. If there’s a problem at Gatwick, it can cause problems that cascade along the Thameslink and Southern services, and the effect can be surprisingly widespread.

Gatwick Airport station can cause delays because the station is busy and getting busier, but has narrow platforms and a limited way to get off the platforms. When trains arrive, disgorging luggage laden passengers, they can take a while to slowly funnel up the stairs and escalator to get off the platform. If the platforms are busy with passengers, then the train dispatch staff have to delay the train from leaving until there’s enough space on the platform for the train to be able to leave safely.

In addition, if a platform is busy, until recently, it’s been difficult to shift an approaching train onto another platform so the trains may have to queue to get into the station.

That’s the cause of the delays, and a minute or two delay at Gatwick can mean a train missing its slot on the approach to London and delayed even more until space is available, which can mean even longer delays in the busy Thameslink corridor through central London.

That’s why a delay at Gatwick can mean a late train at Cambridge.

The problem identified: how is Network Rail fixing it?

They will fix it by adding a new entrance to the station, although it’s a very big entrance, and will radically change how people use the station. Currently, there’s pretty much a conventional large station, with seven platforms and a concourse built above the station that connects to the airport. It’s a station that wouldn’t look out of place in any major city.

What has happened is that a second concourse has been built next to the old one above the station. When it opens, passengers will use the new concourse to leave trains, and the old concourse will be dedicated to people arriving to catch trains.

Previous layout – source: planning documents

New layout – source: planning documents

A new one-way traffic system splits the passenger flow and effectively doubles the space that can be used at the concourse levels. And to get people up and down to the trains, they’ve been building more lifts and escalators. A lot more lifts and escalators.

In total, eight new escalators, four new stairways and five new lifts.

The lifts are interesting as they have been custom built for the station. That’s because the standard large lift used by Network Rail holds 16 people, but at Gatwick Airport station, the lifts can hold 45 people.

The new concourse is adding two lifts per platform, so that’s 90 people per trip, compared to just 16 people per trip at other railway stations. They’re that large so that they can carry lots of people off the platforms quickly, but also because those people come with lots of luggage.

The lifts are also double-sided, so that people can gather on either side, and that’ll speed up how quickly they get on. Oh, and they have some of the fastest closing doors I have ever seen in a lift before. There’s no waiting to get passengers off the platform and up to the concourse.

Two 45-person lifts on platforms 5 & 6

Once the new entrance opens, it’s expected that the reduction in crowding will see the average person save nearly a minute in getting from the train to the ticket barrier on their journey. Per person, that’s not a lot, but thousands of people per day won’t be standing around on the platform struggling to leave the station.

The quicker the journey off the platform, the less crowding on the platform, and the quicker the trains can be cleared to leave the station.

And that’s why improving this station means fewer delays for train passengers elsewhere.

One of the busiest and most crowded parts of the station in platforms 5&6, which was quite narrow, so they’ve widened the platform to create space for people to wait, but also space for the new lifts and escalators. Fortunately, there was just about enough space in the station to move the railway tracks sideways to create space for the wider platforms.

The old platform width was within the two yellow lines

While moving the railway tracks, more work was carried out on either side of the station to improve the junctions and add flexibility to the station layout. Six of the seven platforms are now bi-directional, and if there’s a problem on one platform, it’s much easier to switch an approaching train to a spare platform instead of leaving it waiting outside.

At the same time, the new concourse was being built above a live railway that also doesn’t close at night, so it took a lot of planning to ensure that they could carry out work above some tracks while leaving others working through the night. Once the steel structure was assembled, they could start building the new arrivals space, which has been designed to be light and airy with lots of natural light.

Due to weight constraints, they didn’t use glass but inflated pillows made from Ethylene tetrafluoroethylene (ETFE) – the same material used at the Eden Project and more recently, the roof garden at Canary Wharf’s Elizabeth line station.

The pillows are kept inflated with a local air pump, which also has a modestly beneficial impact on drawing away heat on hot days.

One of the complications of the roof design is that it has a lot of joints, and each one needed four coats of fire cladding paint to be applied by hand, which can only be applied when humidity and temperature are within a set range. That reduced the time they could do the job to about six months.

But it was done at last.

At the moment, a lot of final finishes are being applied, snagging fixed, and tests carried out. This weekend, the new concourse will undergo an acoustic and lighting test to ensure that the public address system can be heard everywhere and that the lighting meets accessibility standards. The large curving beams that support the roof are also designed to reduce echoes in the station so that the tannoy announcements are clear and distinct.

There are a lot of accessibility adjustments, from braille signs to minimum widths on stairs and doors to ensure everyone can use the station. A nice touch is the use of blue lights on the platforms by the lifts, which are thought to help calm nervous people in disorientingly busy and crowded areas.

The wayfinding signs may surprise railway people, as they’re not standard railway signs. However, it was felt that maintaining a consistent appearance between the station and the airport was a better idea, and they’ve gone for lots of very large text in places that can be registered by people from a distance. That’s known to speed up how people pass through spaces as they spend less time looking for signs pointing where to go.

As the new concourse is for people getting off trains, it may at first glance seem odd to have departure time display screens here. However, a decent percentage of station users are swapping between services, so they will want to know when and where their connecting trains will leave.

Although the main project was always the new concourse and access to the platform, the upgrade is also a bit bigger than initially planned, as the pandemic both caused a lot of problems but also opened an opportunity.

The pandemic made working on a building site very difficult, but while the airport was very quiet during the lockdown, they could increase what they had planned to change on the old concourse space.

Away with the shops and the big staff office that sat to one side of the space, and a refurbishment that included retiling the entire floor and revamping the appearance. The most significant change for passengers is the wide row of ticket machines and an increase in how many ticket barriers they can fit into the space. As befits an airport where most passengers are expected to have luggage, all the ticket barriers are wide units rather than the standard narrow gates.

The revamped old concourse

As the old concourse lost the staff rooms, elsewhere, a new building next to the station is providing modern facilities for staff, and for the train controllers, they also get a window view across the tracks they never had before.

One of the hidden additions to the station is a large attenuation tank – for rainwater. All that new roof space needs lots more guttering, which is quite hard to spot because it’s been hidden fairly well. However, when you’re diverting rainwater from falling onto the ground into guttering, there’s a limit on how much the local drains can cope with, so the rainwater flows into a storage tank and will be released slowly into the drains to stop them from being overloaded.

Back at the station, some of the improvements are already open to passengers, with the revamped old concourse, currently shared by arriving and departing passengers, and the new track layout reducing delays on the railway. The reduced railway bottleneck is already improving reliability and shaving minutes off a journey between Brighton and London.

Right now though, the contractors are finishing off the building works, removing the cladding that protected finished surfaces and preparing to hand the station over the passengers.

The new concourse will open on Tuesday 21st November 2023.

There will still be a few minor details to finish off, but the main goal of substantially improving the station for passengers will be complete. And passengers on trains as far away as north of London who may never visit Gatwick will still benefit from an upgrade that’s reducing train delays across the whole network.

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Train companies and RMT breakthrough in rail strikes dispute

ianVisits — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 18:25:33 +0000

There appears to have been a breakthrough in the long running rail strikes, as the RMT union says that is putting a new offer to its members.

The strikes over pay and conditions have been ongoing for 18 months. In a carefully worded statement, the RMT says that it has an agreement with the Rail Delivery Group (RDG), which represents the train companies for a “mutually agreed way forward, including a backdated 2022 pay rise for staff and job security guarantees.”

However, the offer is not an end to the strikes but just a pause in the strikes over the Christmas period and into Spring next year, allowing more discussions to take place. The discussions that could then take place would be aimed at addressing the companies’ proposals on the changing needs and expectations of passengers as well as unlocking further increases for staff.

The RMT said that the offer would be put to its members in each Train Operating Company in a referendum vote.

In a recent ballot to renew the RMT’s strike mandate, 90% of those voting did so in favour of more strikes, although on a turnout of just 64%.

RMT general secretary Mick Lynch said: “This is a welcome development and our members will now decide in an e-referendum whether they want to accept this new offer from the RDG.”

The referenda across the 14 train operators in the national dispute will close on Thursday 30th November 2023.

The deal won’t stop strikes by the train drivers union, Aslef, which is in a different dispute with the train companies.

However, on the same day, the government confirmed that it will be pushing ahead with a consultation on plans to require a minimum level of service on the railways in times of strike action, which the RMT is strongly opposed to.

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Christmas jumpers from London’s venues

ianVisits — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 15:00:17 +0000

Tis fast approaching the season to sit in front of your computer on a video call wearing nothing except a Christmas Jumper. You might not be commuting to work as much these days, but there’s still no excuse not to terrify your work colleagues with your taste in garish clothing over the next couple of months.

The Christmas Jumper is increasingly a staple product of the museum shop, so a look around finds the following “delights” for you from London venues.

Science Museum

Very topical for the science museum with the elemental symbols in the centre, test tubes and molecule shaped snow flakes.

Available in five sizes for £40

Details here

Doctor Who Museum

A bright red jumper with a gift-wrapped TARDIS on the front and a label saying Merry Xmas to you from The Doctor.

Available in two sizes for £39.99

Details here

Natural History Museum

Layered in between snowflakes and nautilus shells, the festive red, green and white horizontal-striped pattern features skeletons of those prehistoric favourites: stegosaurs, tyrannosaurs and titanosaurs.

Available in four sizes for £40

Details here

London Transport Museum

This cosy jumper features a Routemaster bus wearing a Santa hat and a traditional Fair Isle design with snowflakes and tube trains.

Available in six sizes for £48

Details here

Imperial War Museum

A gun metal grey jumper with horizontal bands of festive decoration and numerous santas flying in a fleet of spitfire planes.

Available in five sizes for £45

Details here

Houses of Parliament

This year’s design features Nutcrackers in Parliament-inspired uniforms and Portcullis hats, with a green Nutcracker representing the House of Commons, red for the House of Lords, and black for the ceremonial uniform of Parliamentary clerks.

Available in seven sizes for £49

Details here

Tower Bridge

Not explicitly a Christmas themed jumper, but candidly, garish enough to qualify for a Christmas jumper competition.

Available in seven sizes for £46

Details here

RAF Museum

Tally Ho Ho Ho with a spitfire flying through the snow.

Available in five sizes for £25

Details here

If I’ve missed any London museums off, let me know in the comments below.

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Tickets Alert: Steam engines back in action at the London Museum of Water and Steam

ianVisits — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 12:00:28 +0000

For the first time in nearly two years, the steam engines at the London Museum of Water & Steam will be turned on again. The Museum’s 96-year-old Lancashire Boiler failed early last year, and the steam engines have been switched off ever since while repairs were carried out.

The repaired boiler is now ready to start powering the steam engines again, and just in time for the museum’s 50th anniversary.

To celebrate, the Museum will be hosting its first Steam Up in almost two years — over the New Year’s weekend — with a programme of activities and workshops to join.

The Association of 16mm Narrow Gauge Modellers will be demonstrating their model steam trains on a purpose-built track, a water Sommelier will be there to share the delicate art of water tasting, and their own steam locomotive Thomas Wicksteed will be running rides around the museum site all weekend.

The resumption of steaming will taken place on Sat 30th December 2023 until Monday 1st January 2024.

Tickets can be bought on the day, but likely best bought in advance from here.

Adults: £15 | Children (5-16): £4 | Children (<5): Free

The museum is a few minutes walk from Kew Bridge station, served by South Western Railway out of Waterloo, or about 20 minutes walk from Gunnersbury station for the London Underground’s District line.

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Strike action on the buses in west London for the next few weeks

ianVisits — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 11:40:40 +0000

A number of bus routes in west London will be hit by several strikes between now and Christmas in a dispute with the Unite union.

Photo by Jeremy Downes on Unsplash

Some bus drivers on eight bus routes plan to strike on:

Friday 10th November
Monday 13th November
Friday 1st December
Monday 4th December
Friday 22nd December
Saturday 23rd December

If the action goes ahead, little or no service is expected on the affected routes between approximately 5am on strike days and 6am the day after each strike. Other local bus, Tube and rail services in this part of London may also be busier than usual.

The bus routes affected by the strike include:

Route Number	Route description
13 (24hr)	North Finchley to/from Victoria Station
23 (24hr)	Great Western Road to/from Aldwych
28	Wandsworth to/from Harlesden
218	Hammersmith to/from North Acton
295 (24hr)	Ladbrooke Grove to/from Clapham Junction
414	Putney Bridge to/from Marble Arch
452	Ladbrook Grove to/from Vauxhall
N28	Wandsworth to/from Camden

A normal service is expected on all of London’s other bus routes.

Louise Cheeseman, TfL’s Director of Buses, said: “If this action goes ahead there will still be travel options for people in west London and other parts of the capital. Other routes may be busier than normal and we’re encouraging everyone who might be affected to plan ahead, allow extra time for their journeys and check before they travel using our website or the TfL Go app.

“We encourage both parties to find a solution to this dispute to avoid disruption to Londoners. We’re sorry for any disruption to people’s journeys.”

More details are on this TfL webpage.

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There’s been an overnight rehearsal for the Lord Mayor’s Show

ianVisits — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 11:00:45 +0000

Early this morning, while the City slept, a golden coach was pulled through the streets of London as they rehearsed the Lord Mayor’s Show ahead of the main event this Saturday.

Pulled by six horses and followed by members of the Show’s team, the ‘Early Morning Rehearsal’ allowed the Lord Mayor Elect to ride in the golden State Coach, which has been used in every Show since 1757.

The Lord Mayor’s Show is the largest, noisiest, and most colourful event in the City of London’s calendar and with three days until the Show, this was the only opportunity for Lord Mayor Elect Michael Mainelli and the members of the event’s team to run through the exact timings and choreography with Pageantmaster Dominic Reid.

Lord Mayor Elect Michael Mainelli said: “This Lord Mayor’s Show will be a celebration of the reign of His Majesty King Charles III, and the first to be held following his Coronation, ushering in a new era for this historic community spectacle.

“It will bring together 7,000 people, including charities, school children, community groups, the armed forces, 250 horses, and over 150 floats in a three-mile-long parade – so today’s Early Morning Rehearsal was an essential part of the arrangements for this huge event.”

As Lord Mayor of the City of London, Michael Mainelli acts as an international spokesperson for the City, leading business delegations overseas to key international markets on behalf of the UK’s financial and professional services industry.

Attending the Lord Mayor’s Show

The parade is in two halves, with the second half often quieter for spectators. Wherever you stand, the procession will take just over an hour to march past. Throughout, the Lord Mayor, riding in the state coach, will also be regularly leaning out to wave his tricorn hat for the crowds.

A map of the route is here.

OUTWARD – Mansion House to Royal Courts of Justice

10.45am – Lord Mayor travels from Guildhall to Mansion House
11:00am – Two-minute silence for Armistice Day
11.03am – Procession leaves Mansion House. Lord Mayor waves off the procession from Mansion House balcony
11.30am – Head of procession reaches Royal Courts of Justice
12.10pm – Lord Mayor leaves Mansion House to join the procession
12.20pm – Lord Mayor and Lady Mayoress arrive at St Paul’s Cathedral to be blessed by the Dean
12.40pm – Lord Mayor arrives at Royal Courts of Justice, to swear oath of allegiance before the Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales and Master of the Rolls

RETURN – Royal Courts of Justice to Mansion House

1.10pm – Head of procession sets off from Victoria Embankment
1.35pm – Head of the procession arrives back at Mansion House
2.10pm – Lord Mayor rejoins procession at Royal Courts of Justice
2.40pm – Lord Mayor arrives back at Mansion House and is greeted by City Aldermen and livery company Masters

A note for people visiting: there are closures on the Circle and District lines through the City on the day up to 3pm, so be aware of that when planning your journey.

A tip: The roads are closed all day, and once the show is over and the streets have been cleaned, you can wander the car-free streets, usually sometime after 4pm and 5pm.

Other events for the Lord Mayor’s Show

The State Coach

The Golden State Coach will be on display in Guildhall until Monday 13th November (except on Saturday), and you can see it next to the west wing of the Guildhall, near the church, and will be in the glass foyer space.

St Paul’s Cathedral

The ground floor of the cathedral will be open to the public for free all day on the day of the show, with an option to pay £10 to climb the Dome galleries. It’s best to book the Dome tickets in advance if you want to do the climb.

Bank of England Museum

The museum is usually only open Mon-Fri will be open on the Saturday from 11am to 4pm. It’s a large museum, is free to visit, and is worth visiting if you’ve not been able to see it during the week.

Guided tours

At 3pm the City of London Guides will be leading free guided walks from No1 Poultry, which is right opposite Mansion House.

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HS2’s Colne Valley railway viaduct reaches construction halfway point

ianVisits — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 10:00:50 +0000

Construction of HS2’s long Colne Valley railway viaduct in west London has reached the halfway mark, with the railway deck now assembled on 28 of the supporting piers.

Colne Valley viaduct (c) HS2

Construction of its 56 piers to carry the deck across land and water began in December 2021. For the past 18 months, a massive launching girder has been working its way south across the valley, one pier to the next, to lower and fix into place the viaduct’s deck segments.

Weighing up to 140 tonnes each, more than 500 of the Colne Valley Viaduct’s 1,000 deck segments have now been installed.

Each one is uniquely shaped to enable the structure to curve gently as it carries the railway for just over 2 miles over land, lakes and the Grand Union Canal.

To assemble the piers that the railway deck sits on, the team first had to construct over a kilometre of temporary jetties, with cofferdams to hold back the water around each set of foundations. The jetties also transport materials and equipment while constructing the piers and viaduct deck, keeping vehicles off local roads.

The main deck of the viaduct is being built in 1,000 separate segments at a temporary factory nearby and assembled using a bridge-building machine, which lifts each piece into position before shifting itself forward to the next pier. Once the piers are ready, deck segments are placed alternately on each side, using a cantilever approach to balance the structure, as two half-arches are constructed simultaneously. Steel tensioning cables are then threaded through the segments to strengthen the bridge.

Sir Jon Thompson, HS2’s Executive Chair, said: “HS2 is by far the biggest and most ambitious infrastructure project in the UK and it’s fantastic to see phenomenal feats of civil engineering like the Colne Valley Viaduct taking shape. The enormous progress made in the last three years along the length of the route between London and the West Midlands is testament to the skill and dedication of the thousands of people who work on this transformational project every day.”

The Colne Valley Viaduct construction is led by HS2’s main civil works contractor, Align JV – a team made up of Bouygues Travaux Publics, Sir Robert McAlpine and VolkerFitzpatrick.

CGI of the finished viaduct (c) HS2

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London’s Pocket Parks: Abbey Gardens, E15

ianVisits — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 07:00:31 +0000

Next to the DLR in east London is a large community garden that sits on a partially excavated ancient monument.

This is Abbey Gardens, which you will not be surprised to learn takes its name, as does the wider area, from the Stratford Langthorne Abbey. The abbey, one of the richest in England, was closed down by King Henry VIII in 1538, and the buildings were sold off for their stone. The land wasn’t heavily developed until the 1800s though as London expanded and the area became industrialised.

The Abbey was by now little more than a few small walls and a moat, and as factories needed people to work in them, new roads and houses were built, including where this pocket park now stands. The road, once with houses on both sides, now only has a small block of Railway Cottages on the south, and on the north, about half the road has been given over to the pocket park.

OS map 1867

OS map 1893

OS map 1914

The park is relatively new, as it was an urban wasteland until 2008, when two artists, Nina Pope and Karen Guthrie, secured funds to create a community garden — think of it as a very large shared allotment.

A shed at one end, decorated with an old photo, and a cafe (closed) at the other, but between them, running along most of the far wall, are vegetable plots and compost areas. On the back wall, almost covered over now, is the park’s original name, “What will the harvest be?” although it’s now known as Abbey Gardens.

However, sitting by the fence is a deep depression and you can see some bits of old wall in there, and my initial thought was that this was the remains of maybe a coal cellar or basement from the houses that lined the road.

A sign on the other side of the fence tells the truth – and this is a scheduled ancient monument — and the site of the main gatehouse entrance into the abbey. It had managed to survive until around the 1820s, until eventually it was torn down to make space for houses, which is a huge pity as the houses it replaced themselves lasted barely a century before being torn down as well.

So today, all that’s left are the foundations in the ground — but still, it’s a remarkable thing, that on a little side street in east London is an ancient monument in full view for anyone to visit.

So, if you’re passing Abbey Road DLR station, right next to the southbound platform is an ancient monument to look at and a vegetable garden to visit.

As a mild detour, up to about the 1890s, what is today Bakers Row was called Abbey Road, and what is today called Abbey Road was simply “viaduct”, built in the 1880s as a bypass to avoid the level crossing on the railway.

However, as the original Abbey Road lost most of the western half to the railways, at some point before 1914, they renamed the viaduct Abbey Road, and the original Abbey Road became Bakers Row.

Although there wasn’t a baker in the area when it was renamed, the name is appropriate because of the Abbey. The Abbey owned a lot of land and gained much of its wealth from supplying bread to the City of London. As it was outside the City, it was exempt from the rules governing breadmaking in the City. Eventually, the Worshipful Company of Bakers got fed up with cheap lower quality bread undercutting them and petitioned to tax bread imports from the Abbey.

The abbey was closed down by King Henry VIII, probably to the considerable pleasure of the City of London’s bakers.

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St Pancras station’s Christmas tree is a spiralling tower of books

ianVisits — Tue, 07 Nov 2023 18:00:36 +0000

Hatchards, London’s oldest bookshop, has provided the annual crafted Christmas tree for St. Pancras International Station, in the style of a ziggurat tower of books.

Standing at 12 metres tall it features a winding staircase, wrapping around 270 shelves with more than 3,800 books, but also around the base, nooks to sit in and rest, or if you prefer, listen to books being read out loud through some speakers in the cubby holes.

The station’s Christmas tree is always themed, and this year’s is one of the better ones. I quite like it – it reminds me of old bookshops the way you want them to look, all nooks and winding staircases and shelves full of leather-bound covers.

The books are worth a look as well, as some have handwritten titles on the sides – although I ended up using my camera as a handheld telescope to zoom in to read them.

The Chronicles of Narnia, The Hogfather, Christmas with the Tylers, Mog’s Christmas, The Nutcracker, A Christmas Carol, and The Polar Express are all suitable Christmas themed books. Locally relevant was Sam Lane’s St Pancras thru the lens, but naughty… someone snuck in a copy of Fifty Shades of Grey.

And do look inside the cubby holes, if the person sitting in them doesn’t mind you peering over their head, for some history posters from the railways and the bookseller. I must admit, it would have been marvellous to be able to walk up the stairs that wind around the “tree”, but I suspect the cost of making it suitable for climbing would have been prohibitive.

Some previous trees in the station have felt a bit overly commercial or trying too hard to be worthy — this one, just like Mary Poppins, is practically perfect in every way.

However, it could have waited a couple of weeks before going up. It’s just too early for Christmas trees.

St Pancras Christmas Trees Past

2022 – The Princes Trust

2021 – London Zoo

2020 – EL&N London

2019 – Lancôme

2018 – Tiffany

2017 – Moyses Stevens

2016 – Cirque du Soleil

2015 – Disney Junior

2014 – Eurostar

2013 – Fortnum & Mason

2012 – Olympics theme

2011 – LEGO

2010 – Lanson Champagne

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Garrison Chapel exhibition blends traditional art with baffling description

ianVisits — Tue, 07 Nov 2023 15:00:31 +0000

An exhibition of modern interpretations of religious art manages to be both really enjoyable to look at and utterly baffling if you read the description.

Hosted in Chelsea’s Garrison Chapel, the show is a display of traditional arts, so expect lots of icons painted using old techniques, bronze works, needlecraft and drawings.

However, the accompanying descriptive text in the small brochure is just baffling and doesn’t really tell you anything about the art, or the artists or the techniques, just something about “transformative experiences”. Which is annoying, as it’s quite frustrating when art exhibitions shy away from describing the art they are exhibiting.

I was particularly keen on the diptych of two wings, which maybe accidentally also forms a triptych with the tree between them — an angelic tree, maybe.

Elsewhere in the room, there are modern versions of Hindu and Islamic art, contrasting the animalistic of one next to the geometric shapes of the other. And there’s a lot of angelic art here, which wouldn’t look out of place in a collection of Victorian paintings.

Descriptive frustration aside, it’s an enjoyable exhibition to visit if you like religious art, and even this despicable heathen still likes seeing God in paintings.

The exhibition, Traditional Art as Living Practice is at the Garrison Chapel until 24th November.

It’s free to visit and open Mon-Fri 11am to 4pm and on Saturdays from noon to 5pm. The gallery, inside the former Chelsea Barracks is about a 10 minute walk from Sloane Square tube station.

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