From a project I did in 2005 to document the then derelict Midland Grand Hotel, before the extensive renovation to become the St Pancras Renaissance Hotel.
This is the cantilevered Grand Staircase. It was designed to be wide enough to allow two ladies in bustles to pass each other, and famously appeared as the backdrop for the Spice Girls’ ‘Wannabe’ video and in the film ‘Batman Begins’. With no internal light source, and the windows and interior covered in decades-old layers of grime and ingrained soot from the old oil lamps, I had to rely on a small flash and my wits. The building was cold, dark, and allegedly haunted.
This one was exhibited widely, but I was most pleased when it was part of an exhibition in 2011 at the London Jewish Cultural Centre at Ivy House, Golders Green, the former home of Anna Pavlova who lived there with her pet swans.
