The London Minute ⏰ Thursday 13 June 2024
More trains for Overground, Pride funding row, New Yayoi Kusama sculpture at station + Streets Kitchen volunteers help homeless people to vote
🌞 Good morning London. There are now more than 600 of you signed up to this free newsletter. Thanks for giving it a go. If you’ve got thoughts on how it could be better, please just reply to let me know. You can send in your own local news here. Here’s Thursday’s London Minute.
🔥 Six people including three children are in hospital after a fire caused by ‘reflected sunlight’ at a home in Ealing. - Jacob Phillips, The Standard.
🚈 Overground lines are due to have more trains added, in an effort to make the service 'more even' during peak periods. - Adam Toms, MyLondon.
🗳️ Fifty local Labour members have quit the party over the deselection of Faiza Shaheen in northeast London. - Jacob Phillips, The Standard.
🏳️🌈 The owner of an LGBT-friendly bar has hit out at Southwark Council after it waited until a day before Pride month to tell them they had failed to win a single penny of £30,000 cash meant to support events for the community. The council said it had sought to let them know ‘as soon as possible’. The Rising pub owner now says he will foot the bill for the main event. - Robert Firth - Local Democracy Reporter, Southwark News.
⮑ A calendar of Pride events was published yesterday the the City of London Corporation.
🗳️ Volunteers from local grassroots homeless group Streets Kitchen are helping people experiencing homelessness to get registered to vote. Starting today, sessions will be run from hubs in Islington, Hackney and Dalston. They want to do more, so get in touch with Streets Kitchen if you can help. - All the details are on Twitter and their Instagram.
🎤 Singer Taylor Swift was spotted in Notting Hill with her friends, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Andrew Scott, Cara Delevingne and Kate Moss. - Sean O’Grady, Daily Mail.
⮑ They went to the Casa Cruz restaurant, Josh Barrie in The Standard: “Swift is in the UK for her Eras tour. She is the most famous person on the planet right now. And her restaurant in London is Casa Cruz.”
🇺🇸 The US election campaign came to London last night as pop star Holly Valance and Vogue editor Anna Wintour reportedly hosted rival fundraising events. - James FitzGerald and Nick Johnson, BBC London.
🎨 A shiny new Yayoi Kusama sculpture has appeared outside Liverpool Street station. - George Phillips, Time Out.
🎨 The Tate has just announced its 2025 exhibitions. - Eddy Frankel, Time Out.
🎹 A community piano for commuters and local residents to play has been installed at Waterloo Station. - London SE1.
⮑ A feasibility study is being planned to look at installing lifts at Kew Bridge Station. - ChiswickW4.
🏗️ Plans to build 1,200 homes on the site of Greenwich Ikea’s car park have been revived – just a year after the proposal was put on hold. - Darryl Chamberlain, The Greenwich Wire.
🏨 Virgin Hotels has announced its first London hotel will open at 45 Curtain Road in Shoreditch on 1 August. - David McManus, e-architect.
⚽️ A mural of Crystal Palace footballer Eberechi Eze has been unveiled at the Kirby estate in Bermondsey. - Josh Salisbury, The Standard.
🚔 A climate protester has been jailed for ten months for cracking windows at JPMorgan’s London office. - Financial Times.
🛜 More than 765,000 London homes and businesses will soon get a full fibre broadband upgrade. - The 41 locations are in India Lawrence’s report for Time Out.
🎬 Netflix has released the full trailer for its new London-based superhero show Supacell. - Joe Anderton, Digital Spy.
🎶 The first ever London Soundtrack Festival has been announced, celebrating the music of film, television and videogames during a brand new, week-long series of events festival taking place at venues across the capital in March. - The musical acts and venues taking part are listed in Classical Music mag.
🥖 One of the world’s most influential chefs, Nancy Silverton, shares her London tips for the ‘Where the Chefs Eat’ series in Conde Nast Traveller. There’s a sausage roll on her list, but it’s not from Greggs.
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