Olympic Way tile murals on display, 1st to 21st March

 Guest post by Philip Grant in a personal capacity

  1.The tile murals on the east wall of Olympic Way, March 2021. (Courtesy of Quintain)

 

On 14 February, I received an email from Brent Council to let me know that ‘the heritage tile murals outside Wembley Park station will be on display’ from 1^st to 21^st March 2022. This is the three weeks each year that we are currently allowed to see the mural scenes on the walls of Olympic Way, under the secret advertising lease deal which Council Officers made with Quintain’s Wembley Park subsidiary in 2019.

 

The same email must have been sent to the “Brent & Kilburn Times”, as they published the news online, and featured a picture of the murals on the front page of their 17 February edition. I was told that Brent would be issuing a proper press release about the murals being on display, but as I write this, it has yet to appear on the Council’s website. (Perhaps they are waiting until the murals are uncovered on 1^st March, so that a Cabinet member can be photographed in front of them, and featured in their publicity?)

 

 

2.The then Mayor, Cabinet members and guests at the tile murals “reveal” in January 2020.
(Courtesy of Brent Council)

 

I’m pleased to see that the Council are again recognising the heritage importance of the Bobby Moore Bridge tile murals, which they first seemed to accept at the start of Brent’s year as London Borough of Culture in 2020. The email included this “quote”:

 

‘Mayor of Brent Cllr Lia Colacicco said, “The tile murals are a part of Brent’s rich heritage so it is exciting to see more tiles revealed at the historic Bobby Moore Bridge. My hope is that when looking at the images we remember the historic and iconic moments that have happened in Wembley and I am looking forward to more memories being created at new events later this year.” ‘

 

Although the 2020 “reveal” of the Olympic Way mural scenes only involved the east wall, it appears that in 2022 they’ve remembered one on the opposite side! The email says: ‘The west wall features a scene of a drummer in concert at Wembley stadium to represent the Live Aid concert in July 1985.’ I have a photograph of that, which I took in 2009, before it was covered over with Quintain’s adverts from 2013.

 

3.The drummer mural, just outside the subway on the west side of Olympic Way.

 

If you look at the top left corner of my picture, you will notice that the mural has been patched up with some different tiles. That is because a much larger “Live Aid” mural scene was destroyed around 2006. Steps were built down to Olympic Way from the (then) bus stop on the bridge, in preparation for the opening of the new stadium. I’ve been told that TfL were responsible for this, but Brent Council must have given planning consent, and Quintain as owner of the land must also have agree to this work.

 

4.The original west wall mural celebrating popular music concerts at Wembley.

 

I don’t know who took the photograph above, but I’m very grateful to whoever shared it with me a few years ago, so that I at least have a record of what the mural scene on the west wall of Olympic Way originally looked like. We have “lost”, through neglect, murals of Mark Knopfler, Tina Turner and Freddie Mercury. I believe that the drummer, who you will be able to see this March, is probably meant to be Phil Collins.

 

For the moment, Brent residents and visitors will have the chance to see these ‘heritage tile murals’ on the walls of Olympic Way for just three weeks, from 1^st to 21^st March. We should be able to see them all of the time. Quintain’s consent to place their vinyl advertising sheets over these murals expires on 25 August 2022, and I wrote to their Chief Executive Officer on 1 January asking the company not to seek to renew it, so that these murals can be on permanent public display.

 

5.Back to black – adverts covering the east wall murals in March 2020, after the LBOC 2020 “reveal”.

 

I did receive an acknowledgement to my letter on 20 January, with an apology for the delay in replying. I was promised a full response ‘within the next few weeks’, after Quintain had consulted with ‘other Stakeholders’ (Brent Council?). At the time of writing, I have still to receive Quintain’s answer, but if they do decide to seek renewal of their advertisement consent, that will be strongly contested. Murals which are ‘part of Brent’s rich heritage’ should not be covered over and hidden from view.

Philip Grant.