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Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

The original Ally Pally

There is an image on the Alexandra Palace website of the original 1873 building taken of the main front aspect - link/image below. I cannot work out what or where the foreground buildings are. Logically they must be somewhere towards the eastern end of Hornsey High Street if we are looking face on to the palace building but in that area we should be able to see St Mary's Church. Can anyone shed any light on what these buildings are?

Tags for Forum Posts: alexandra palace

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Permalink Reply by Hugh on August 28, 2021 at 16:15

Here's two versions of how the Newland houses relate to the palace, Richard. I'm afarid I just can't see any way to position them so that they're in a relationship to the palace that's even almost equivalent to the 19th century photo.

Permalink Reply by Richard Woods on August 28, 2021 at 16:26

I agree the problem but I will bet those are the right houses. I have pulled up rafts of images of Ally Pally trying to see which end of the hill has the steepest drop as that will clarify orientation; so far no luck!

Permalink Reply by Ken Stevens on August 28, 2021 at 17:38

Forgot I had this distant view. It was filed under 'personal' as a reminder of the vista that I gazed at out of the Stationers' school window decades later, wishing that I was over there, not over here ;-)     Topography supports the flipping theory

Permalink Reply by Richard Woods on August 29, 2021 at 14:48

Hi Ken,

I recall that view from the physics and chem labs! I think we were contemporaries?

Permalink Reply by Ken Stevens on August 29, 2021 at 16:03

Hi Richard,

I was there 1956 -62. As a stock standard 'O' Level lad, it should have been 1961 but I had to retake Maths!   Bearing in mind I was the army cadet at the Drill Hall dinner and you were the Journal reporter, presumably you were a couple years or so ahead of me. Were you in the 1958 or 1961 school photos?

Permalink Reply by Ken Stevens on August 28, 2021 at 16:29

Whilst the building style is similar, I can't view these as the Newland Road terrace, as it's approx 90 degrees out of juxtaposition to the palace. Newland is more  parallel to the Pally frontage but not directly ascross from it.

I'm still slightly tempted to the idea of this being a montage. That midline of trees looks more suspicious as a backdrop break each time I look at it!

Permalink Reply by Ken Stevens on August 28, 2021 at 17:23

Montage suggestion 1:    The Victoria, taken from part way up Muswell Hill, looking along Park Road, with a lush backdrop of trees from some other photo

Permalink Reply by Gerry N on August 28, 2021 at 23:30

Does anyone know where the original glass plate negative is? My own opinion is that this is a single take photo. It appears that 2 different buildings are both being completed in this photo, 1/ is the pair of semis at an angle, already discussed &  2/  a single building of 3 floors pictured in front of 1. This building has its dividing wall facing directly at the camera. As soon as it has been sold, the builder will certainly then build a mirroring semi against this dividing wall ( or perhaps even a terrace) There could be some lettering showing on this ( soon to become) party wall ? or it could be the photographer writing on the plate? You have all fully convinced me that these houses survived to the 1960's in St Mary's Rd, St Annes Rd and Westfield rd ( Westfield rd is now gone) all as shown by Agabus on Thursday see Page 3 here.& I fully agree. Very similar houses to these shown in the photo still exist still in Middle lane just South of Grove end rd

Permalink Reply by John Shulver on August 29, 2021 at 13:55

I tend to agree with you Ken.   To me the original photo, flipped or not, looks superimposed, one photo on top of another.  The tree line looks far too dark for it to be a single composition.But I do realise a lot of "touching up" went on in photographic studios. But .......what a minefield is opened up from one query eh. Typical HoL detective work. Wonderful stuff.

Permalink Reply by man-thinking on August 28, 2021 at 10:56

Thanks everyone for all these musings.

Permalink Reply by EMC2 on August 31, 2021 at 18:20

If it's not flipped, could it be these houses from the 1894 map? Looks like a long wall/narrow building a little to the South of Pembroke Road.

Permalink Reply by Hugh on August 31, 2021 at 18:40

Below is an image of the Rectory followed by a flipped version of the large house in the photo. I’m pretty sure they’re not the same house. Also we need to account for the bends in the road

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