Albany House, Petty France SW1

The figures of Man and Woman guarding the front door of Albany House, a dull government building in Petty France, were cast in bronze by Willi Soukop in 1963.

Soukop's story is a remarkable tale of triumph over adversity. His father was a Moravian shoemaker living in Vienna, who was wounded in the First World War and committed suicide as a result. As an apprentice engraver, Willi earned so little he had to work nights carving umbrella handles for a local trader. He eventually got in at the Vienna Academy of Fine Art in 1928. There, he met an Englishwoman who persuaded him to come over here in 1935. He started a studio in Dartington, home of lefty aspirational art. Unfortunately the idyll was interruped in 1940 when he was interned in Canada for nine months as an enemy alien.

Soukop taught Elizabeth Frink for a while, and you can see something of her in the strange mutilated human forms pinned onto the stonework like monster bronze insects.

London Road, Croydon CR0

Few shoppers seem to notice the Pizza Hut in Croydon's pedestrian precinct is set in an attractive but sadly decayed Victorian pub, with Gothic pointed windows, Romanesque arches and and some very ornate Tudor style chimneys (consistent style does not seem to have been a priority with the architect).
A pair of heads stick out of the walls. Who are they? The man's forked beard and the woman's ruff and earrings seem to indicate a specific couple was intended. The King and Queen?

Croydon is very much associated with Archbishops of Canterbury, who had a palace here for centuries, so perhaps it is Rowan Williams. A theory that is backed up by this head on Croydon parish church:

Victoria Station, Buckingham Palace Road SW1

I don't often do heraldic carving but this one over a side door to Victoria Station is very unusual as it is signed, by Gilbert Seale of the sculpting dynasty. It is one of a pair on the curtain wall of the train shed of 1905, said to have been designed by Vincent Harris of the LCC Architects Department, with input by the engineer Sir Charles Morgan.
The arms comprise (clockwise from top left) the St George's cross and sword of the City of London; the dolphins and martlets of Brighton; the star and crescent of Portsmouth; and the rather curious lionships of the Cinque Ports - 'three lions passant guardant conjoined with as many ships' hulls,' as the heralds put it.
Many years ago I went round Portsmouth Dockyard with David Lloyd, editor of the Hampshire Pevsner, and he bemoaned the fact that the City of Portsmouth was putting its new coat of arms on all its letterheads. "Just as every other council is junking their Victorian coats of arms and replacing them with trendy logos, Portsmouth, which has a genuinely medieval logo in the star and crescent, is replacing it with a Victorian coat of arms," he said.

Royal Society of Arts, John Adam Street WC2

When Robert and James Adam designed the home of the Royal Society of Arts in 1772, they drew the facade with statues on the pediment and decorative plaques on the walls but these got left off in an eighteenth century economy drive.
For more than two centuries the building looked like this ----->
To celebrate the bicentenary, the RSA decided to complete the decoration. I have to thank Rob Baker and Rebecca Short of the RSA's Archive and Library for the following information.
In 1980 two casts of an 18th century roundel depicting Priam's appeal to Achilles for the body of Hector were placed on the front wall. The King of Troy kneels before the iron-willed warrior, grasping his wrist as he pleads for the return of his son's body, while Achilles makes a gesture of refusal. Behind, an old man points to the heavens, reminding the hero that the Gods have approved Priam's request. It is an affecting scene.
It was not until later that the facade was finally completed by the addition of the statues. Rob Baker writes:

"The statues were commissioned by Sebastian de Ferranti, a former Vice President of the RSA. They were made by Plowden and Smith, and put up in 1994.
The figure of Minerva, representing arts, is holding a shield bearing the Gorgon's head and a spear. The figure of Ceres, representing agriculture, is holding a young oak tree, symbolising an early interest in agriculture by the Society. By her feet is a harpoon for catching whales, an invention and industry encouraged by the Society at that time. The other figure, representing manufactures and commerce, is carrying English broad cloth to rocky shores."

 For the RSA's Strand frontage, click here.

Supreme Court, Parliament Square SW1

The Supreme Court judges have sworn themselves in and have started work in the old Middlesex Guildhall, so here is one last curiosity from the building. Round the back is set a gateway from the old House of Correction or Bridewell in Tothill Fields, which was demolished to make way for Westminster Cathedral.
The stone above is inscribed with the date 1655 and states:

"Here are several Sorts of Work
For the Poor of this Parish...
and for such as will Beg and
Live Idle in this City and Liberty
of Westminster."

Bridewells, named after the original in the City of London, were places where the unemployed, unemployable and simply workshy were forced to pick oakum or walk a treadmill in grim, gloomy silence. They must have been unspeakable.
The old gateway was installed here by the GLC in 1969, hence the rather stuck-on appearance.

Croydon College, Park Lane CR0

It is difficult to believe that Fairfield Halls and Croydon College were built within ten years of each other by the same firm of architects. Fairfield Halls (1960) is entirely modernistic, the characteristic 1960s concrete frame with primary colour infills. Croydon College (1953) is classically-proportioned, in brick and stone under copper roofs. But both were designed by Robert Atkinson and Partners.
Pevsner (in the latest edition by Bridget Cherry) is harsh on the College building. "Depressingly conventional," she says. About the Fairfield Halls she writes: "Infinitely more acceptable than the same architects' technical college."
But time has dealt vastly differently with the two buildings. Fairfield Halls today looks tired and tawdry. The College looks smart and loved, its brickwork bright and its stonework crisp.
Perhaps Croydon spends more money on education than entertainment, but it certainly looks as though traditional materials wear better over the long term.
Unfortunately, the pair of sculptures on the wing on either side of the facade may be bright and crisp but they are distinctly second-rate. They even resort to labelling the subjects in letters a mile high: MINERVA and VULCAN, representing the college's twin foundations, Art and Technology.
Minerva is clad in full armour, as expected in the goddess of warriors, but her lower end is cased in a pair of slacks - very 1950s. She carries an olive branch.
Vulcan wears a warrior's helmet but is evidently hard at work at his forge, which makes him look as though he is wearing welder's mask. The flames seem to have got out of control too.

J. Wippell & Co, Tufton Street SW1

Wippell's wonderfully camp ecclesiastical requisites shop is at Anglican Central, right behind Church House and the Abbey. To a casual glance it looks as though it might be almost as old as Wippell's itself, which dates back to 1834 when Joseph Wippell bought a drapery business in Exeter. But look closer and the odd mix of Regency elegance and Arts and Crafts whimsy becomes clear, and indeed it was built in 1929 by architect SS Yeo.

On either side of the entrance are two delightful figures in low relief, carved into the wood, representing Wippell's twin businesses in church furnishings and priestly garments.
On the right is a Roman mason, carrying a Corinthian capital in one hand and his tools in the other. On the left is a spinster with her distaff and spindle.