London Photos: London life in images by Kim Gilmour

Some images from Chapel St in Angel, where the traditional street market is held daily. When I first came to work in London ten years ago, my office was around the corner on Goswell Rd so I used to come here pretty much every day. A few years later, the offices moved to Clerkenwell, but Angel was still a relatively quick walk or bus ride away. The Superdrug on the street was there when I first came here and it’s still here today, as are a few other places such as the Indian vegetarian buffet right at the end of the street.

Here is the typical greengrocer stand.

Punch and Judy – before the show at the Finchley Community Festival.

A plane streaks through the London springtime air – for better or for worse – after a week of no flying due to the volcanic ash floating over Europe from Iceland.

The sign on the starburst in a variety/homewares shop in North Finchley reads: ‘Due to new EU regulations banning 100w and 150w light bulbs, wholesalers of light bulbs have doubled the price of 100w and 150w bulbs. We are sorry to have to increase the price of these items. We were allowed to purchase only limited stock of these items. Once the stock’s gone it’s gone.’

The other week I was walking down Kilburn High Road in North West London. So many shops have closed down due to the recession. This street was a bustling collection of cheap ‘pound stores’ and discount clothing boutiques. Granted, most of the time the merchandise was pretty shoddy, but the street did have a very interesting atmosphere. But now the street is depressingly empty. Poundland has the monopoly on cheap goods (there are two Poundlands within blocks of each other) and many shops are completely empty.

The discount store pictured in the gallery was once this store.

Is it almost spring?

After some light sleet last night, the skies opened up to reveal a beautiful, crisp afternoon. After lunch I wandered home through Regent’s Park and couldn’t resist taking a snap with my cameraphone… I wonder if this means the end of Winter?

Malls and me don’t mix. Artificial light, unoriginal shops, endless queues, rude people scurrying, screaming babies, and so on. Westfield London, which opened last week, isn’t as bad as the Westfields in Australia, but there’s nothing too original about it. All the shops are the same as you’d see elsewhere; it’s just that some of them are larger. So basically, any high street store you can think of is here, in the one place.

If you are after something then it is quite handy to get to, but I would definitely avoid going on a weekend. Luckily the ceilings are tall and the light does shine in through the glass roof during the day and bounces off the marble floors, so you don’t get that headachey feeling you normally do in other places.

The food court’s saving grace is Pho, the Vietnamese noodle restaurant that has two other London branches. It, and Yo Sushi, above, were clearly the busiest places in the entire 6-football-field-sized building, department stores included.

I’ve started taking a few photos of the imminent recession – you know, empty shops, closing down signs and such. One of them was picked up by the Guardian’s business blog, who’s collecting recession pictures. You can see my recession photo here, which was taken at the forlorn shopping centre at Elephant and Castle. Be sure to check out the other interesting contributions from people who’ve been documenting the economic crisis in their pool.

This afternoon, a group of zombies shambled down Oxford St in London… I was there to witness this terrifying event and record it in JPG format!

Many more zombie photos on my Flickr stream….

Great Britain has performed extremely well during these Olympic Games and is now third on the medal tally, ahead of Russia and Australia! If it wasn’t for that 8-gold-medal-winner Michael Phelps…

Spotted in the window of a trendy dentist’s.