Unseen influences at Canary Wharf

I went to Canary Wharf on the Isle of Dogs recently for a seasonal get-together with a former workmate.  I arranged for us to meet outside the tall obelisk at One Canada Square, otherwise known as the Canary Wharf Tower.

Things started badly: I became very confused and disoriented after coming out of Canary Wharf Station by the wrong exit. I waited outside the wrong building for a while. I had to send texts and find another meeting place, a big store that we could both see from where we were standing.

I know that many people have problems finding their way around the area, especially when visiting it for the first time. They rightly say that the signposting is inadequate and the multiplicity of levels and station exits makes navigation difficult. The tall corporate buildings and their huge entrance halls with all the plate glass and marble look much the same at ground level, which doesn’t help either.

Although I have been to Canary Wharf several times, I always have trouble finding my way around - even with a map. It is as if something inside me is reset and I go back to square one each time I go there; previous visits have done nothing to familiarise me with the area. My inner compass often goes haywire; I set off in the wrong direction and sometimes get so lost that it takes a while to get back on track.

Suicide or sacrifice at the Coq d’Argent?

Today, for the first time, a picture was published of the young man who ten days ago fell to his death from the terrace of a notorious rooftop restaurant in the City of London. 

He is the sixth person to have committed suicide by jumping from the roof. The first case was in 2007; the two most recent incidents happened despite the installation of high security barriers.

This tragic case has reminded me of some things I learned on the previous occasion.

The exclusive Coq d’Argent, address No. 1 Poultry, occupies part of a site bought by property developer Peter Palumbo, a friend of Princess Diana. 

The whole area was previously occupied by old buildings in the ‘Victorian Wedding Cake’ style, and Palumbo was obsessed with getting hold of the site and replacing "those wretched buildings" with something in the Post-modern style, designed by an architect of his choice.  

He had to fight a 25-year battle to get hold of the site and obtain planning permission for his new buildings. It seems a very strange obsession. He no longer owns the site.

The Coq d’Argent restaurant has been described as cursed. 

Two recent fires in Central London: areas with masonic connections

There have been two fires in Central London recently that are of great interest to people who study unseen influences: one was an underground electric cable fire in Kingsway, the other was in the lift motor room on the roof of a building in Great Portland Street. 

The second fire broke out this afternoon. Both fires caused black smoke to rise into the air over Central London.

Both areas have masonic connections: Freemasons’ Hall, the headquarters of the United Grand Lodge of England, is in Great Queen Street, just off Kingsway; Great Portland Street is close to Portland Place, where No. 33 has some interesting associations:

"The Holroyds were a very well connected family and often had influential guests to stay. For a period after 1835, for instance, Lord Charles Townsend, an immensely wealthy gentleman and Grand Master of the Freemasonic Lodges, inhabited the premises. Many residents have since chanced a glimpse of Lord Charles’ ghost drifting down the main staircase clad in Templar robes!"

Read more about No. 33 Portland Place here.