onionbagblog
BLU Day
Time for the Brockwell Lido Users AGM. And so bright eyed Saturday morning, I made my way across Brockwell Park and up to Brockwell Hall, the ancestral seat of, um, Brixton. The BLU membership money was worth it alone for another chance to enter the big house on the hill, looking down across The City on a South London sunny September morning. Shame the pool wasn't actually open afterwards...
But that's another story; an early Lido closing this season so that building work can be started to transform a 1930's art deco masterpiece into a money making 'leisure lifestyle' opportunity.
Most of the AGM was taken up debating issues arising out of the imminent arrival of the bulldozers. But it's a done deal - BLU backed Fusion in the beauty contest set up by the Lambeth Council knobbers five years ago to find a 'preferred partner' in thewashing of their hands handover.
But that was then, this is now. The BLU constituent is an ageing one, albeit rather radical. Well, radical in a carrot cake and coffee at the weekend kind of way. Saturday was a most civil affair. Questions from the floor were paraphrased with:
'I'm sorry to have to ask you, but... blah blah blah'
They break our legs, and we say thank you when they offer us crutches, etc. But I've come to quite like Fusion to be honest, after a very shaky start. I even presented the departing Fusion flunky (a very nice chap actually) with a poster size print of the above picture on his last day of the season this summer.
We were introduced to the new Fusion flag flyer in SE24 on Saturday. I don't think he's started shaving yet, and he reduced the average age of the meeting to somewhere around 84.
Talking of figures...
We were told that 42,000 swimmersswallowed kiddie piss procrastinated at the Lovely Lido this season. That's a figure that nearby Dulwich Hamlet would die for. 35,000 of these were not surprisingly July swims. I don't know if my three daily dives at the peak of the heat wave were rounded up to one dip.
3,100 people entered the Lido on the hottest day of July, a Brockwell record. I'm not sure of the exact date, but I reckon it was when Mr G-String and His Amazing Ball of Edam Trunks poked his todger in my face for most of the morning. Phew, what a scorcher, etc.
One hundred and eighty swimmers bought season tickets. That's a figure that the nearby Dulwich Hamlet... etc
Lido life is all about forgetting facts and figures and falling asleep. But they are important right now when you consider that Fusion is forecasting a further 2,000 'leisure lifestyle' customers in the gym this time next year.
After some questions from the floor, we approved the minutes from the meeting twelve months previous. Of particular importance to me was the noted question from a young upstart asking 'why hasn't Fusion signed the fucking lease yet?'
Thankfully I didn't have to make it a hat trick of asking the same question at the AGM this year. Pen was put to paper shortly before the start of the season, and this was recognised in Fusion taking the Lido seriously for the first time.
We had a short break to read and confirm the minutes of the previous meeting being an accurate record. I spent the time checking out the various end of season tans from the serious Lido hardcore, concluding that my bronzed beauty was the bollocks. Yep, they're even toasted to perfection as well.
'In twelve months time, the Nu Lido will be the old,' we were told by Fusion Chief Exec Peter Kay (seriously.) Where have we heard that before?
Housing a gym and a spa in a public space where people go to lose themselves is not natural. At the risk of sounding like a psychogeographer (!) the cultural organic legacy of the Lido (blimey) needs to be preserved. The resurrection of Brockwell Lido by two locals twelve summers ago has seen the pool establish itself through a series of organic events, rather than hard facts and figures from Fusion.
Whippersnappers was given space, and its continued presence and utilisation of the Lido by children is key to the future. The current Lido staff have grown to love the place and need to be retained. Even the graffiti from local VOP artists has come to give the pool a unique feel that you can't find anywhere else in London.
I can't help thinking that something has been lost forever with the closing of the Lido this summer. We will return in nine months time with one of the walls being shifted back six feet and some leisure lifestyle bollocks sitting there instead. Currency has entered into the equation and the pool MUST be profitable from now on.
But who will pay for all of this?
Who do you think...?
There's the farce of the Lambeth Council knobbers out-sourcing one of their facilities to Fusion, and then refusing to accept the Lambeth Leisure Card for a discounted swim in the local authority owned pool.
'Will the Lido be heated?' was rightfully booed down by the BLU massive. We swim in a freezing cold pool BECAUSE it is a freezing cold pool. Oh, and Brixton Rec is bloody closed once again.
These kind of details are important to the BLU blue rinse crowd, and thank fuck for that.
'Please can you stop marketing the Lido as Brixton Beach' (urghhh!) demanded one old bloke.
Hurrah! The Fusion marketing knobbers have been trying to re-brand the Lido as the beach of SW9 for sometime, something which the South London Press has lapped up. It's not even in bloody Brixton, it's based at Herne Hill. Plus google The Lido and you come up with OUR Lido.
Oh, and while we're at it, it's a Lido and not a Leeedo.
But all of these points become insignificant when we remember that we still have a Lido at Brockwell Park. Elsewhere around London and outdoor swimming is making something of a splash.
Hampton, Uxbridge and Parliament Hill Lidos have all been refurbished; London Fields is about to re-open, following in the footsteps of Charlton Lido; Tooting has just picked up the Golden Goggles award during its centenary celebrations.
'London life gets tougher, lido life gets better,' to borrow from a quote from a professional Lido lover from the floor.
See ya in nine months time.
technorati: brockwell lido
| Saturday 10 September, 2006 |
Time for the Brockwell Lido Users AGM. And so bright eyed Saturday morning, I made my way across Brockwell Park and up to Brockwell Hall, the ancestral seat of, um, Brixton. The BLU membership money was worth it alone for another chance to enter the big house on the hill, looking down across The City on a South London sunny September morning. Shame the pool wasn't actually open afterwards...
 Will the Lido be heated? |
Most of the AGM was taken up debating issues arising out of the imminent arrival of the bulldozers. But it's a done deal - BLU backed Fusion in the beauty contest set up by the Lambeth Council knobbers five years ago to find a 'preferred partner' in the
But that was then, this is now. The BLU constituent is an ageing one, albeit rather radical. Well, radical in a carrot cake and coffee at the weekend kind of way. Saturday was a most civil affair. Questions from the floor were paraphrased with:
'I'm sorry to have to ask you, but... blah blah blah'
They break our legs, and we say thank you when they offer us crutches, etc. But I've come to quite like Fusion to be honest, after a very shaky start. I even presented the departing Fusion flunky (a very nice chap actually) with a poster size print of the above picture on his last day of the season this summer.
We were introduced to the new Fusion flag flyer in SE24 on Saturday. I don't think he's started shaving yet, and he reduced the average age of the meeting to somewhere around 84.
Talking of figures...
We were told that 42,000 swimmers
3,100 people entered the Lido on the hottest day of July, a Brockwell record. I'm not sure of the exact date, but I reckon it was when Mr G-String and His Amazing Ball of Edam Trunks poked his todger in my face for most of the morning. Phew, what a scorcher, etc.
One hundred and eighty swimmers bought season tickets. That's a figure that the nearby Dulwich Hamlet... etc
Lido life is all about forgetting facts and figures and falling asleep. But they are important right now when you consider that Fusion is forecasting a further 2,000 'leisure lifestyle' customers in the gym this time next year.
After some questions from the floor, we approved the minutes from the meeting twelve months previous. Of particular importance to me was the noted question from a young upstart asking 'why hasn't Fusion signed the fucking lease yet?'
Thankfully I didn't have to make it a hat trick of asking the same question at the AGM this year. Pen was put to paper shortly before the start of the season, and this was recognised in Fusion taking the Lido seriously for the first time.
We had a short break to read and confirm the minutes of the previous meeting being an accurate record. I spent the time checking out the various end of season tans from the serious Lido hardcore, concluding that my bronzed beauty was the bollocks. Yep, they're even toasted to perfection as well.
'In twelve months time, the Nu Lido will be the old,' we were told by Fusion Chief Exec Peter Kay (seriously.) Where have we heard that before?
Housing a gym and a spa in a public space where people go to lose themselves is not natural. At the risk of sounding like a psychogeographer (!) the cultural organic legacy of the Lido (blimey) needs to be preserved. The resurrection of Brockwell Lido by two locals twelve summers ago has seen the pool establish itself through a series of organic events, rather than hard facts and figures from Fusion.
Whippersnappers was given space, and its continued presence and utilisation of the Lido by children is key to the future. The current Lido staff have grown to love the place and need to be retained. Even the graffiti from local VOP artists has come to give the pool a unique feel that you can't find anywhere else in London.
I can't help thinking that something has been lost forever with the closing of the Lido this summer. We will return in nine months time with one of the walls being shifted back six feet and some leisure lifestyle bollocks sitting there instead. Currency has entered into the equation and the pool MUST be profitable from now on.
But who will pay for all of this?
Who do you think...?
There's the farce of the Lambeth Council knobbers out-sourcing one of their facilities to Fusion, and then refusing to accept the Lambeth Leisure Card for a discounted swim in the local authority owned pool.
'Will the Lido be heated?' was rightfully booed down by the BLU massive. We swim in a freezing cold pool BECAUSE it is a freezing cold pool. Oh, and Brixton Rec is bloody closed once again.
These kind of details are important to the BLU blue rinse crowd, and thank fuck for that.
'Please can you stop marketing the Lido as Brixton Beach' (urghhh!) demanded one old bloke.
Hurrah! The Fusion marketing knobbers have been trying to re-brand the Lido as the beach of SW9 for sometime, something which the South London Press has lapped up. It's not even in bloody Brixton, it's based at Herne Hill. Plus google The Lido and you come up with OUR Lido.
Oh, and while we're at it, it's a Lido and not a Leeedo.
But all of these points become insignificant when we remember that we still have a Lido at Brockwell Park. Elsewhere around London and outdoor swimming is making something of a splash.
Hampton, Uxbridge and Parliament Hill Lidos have all been refurbished; London Fields is about to re-open, following in the footsteps of Charlton Lido; Tooting has just picked up the Golden Goggles award during its centenary celebrations.
'London life gets tougher, lido life gets better,' to borrow from a quote from a professional Lido lover from the floor.
See ya in nine months time.
technorati: brockwell lido
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