Walk Thirty – Blackberry Jack Pub

I thought I’d make an attempt to draw the kind of thing that doesn’t appeal to me on any level, but to give a true flavour of all aspects of my environment. This pub was built by the developers in the centre of the nearby housing estate at the edge of St Albans. Every house in the estate, however small, probably has two bathrooms, immaculately decorated walls, and a garage, (unlike ours) . However no amount of victorian carriage lamps, wooden cladding, fake leaded windows or white plastic conservatory extensions can hide the fact that every single house has been built at the same time as all the other ones and has the same sort of history and interior. And however pleasant the houses are, it kind of gets you down having no genuine variety around you. I know because our previous house was one of hundreds of similar ones on a 1950s council housing estate. There’s probably a kind of economy in building estates like this, but wouldn’t it be good if the developers were compelled to leave gaps so that there could be the kind of varied environment that everyone craves – with different kinds of development occurring at different times.
The other reason I drew this building is that despite the fact that there’s probably a similar pub in every housing estate in the country, sadly the pub is now notorious because one of its regular customers – a young 35 year old man, Christian Noble – was murdered last week apparently trying to break up a pub brawl.