CORONATION DECORATIONS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23224, 23 June 1937, Page 15

CORONATION DECORATIONS

SMALL FORTUNE SPENT FLOWERS USED EXTENSIVELY ALL LONDON BEFLAGGED (From Our Own Correspondent) (By Air Mail) LONDON, May 12. A small fortune has been spent in decorating London's streets for the Coronation. Every borough council has made special allocations, some up to £20,000. all business areas in city and suburbs have added their own quota, and every residential area has made contributions with modest flags and bunting. Everywhere is colour and gaiety. Naturally the most lavish and aesthetically pleasing decorations are those along the royal route, the scene of the procession to and from Westminster Abbey. These have been carefully nlanned by eminent artists, with much care and consideration aforethought. But the East End of the city has not allowed the more fashionable West End to reap all the attention. In some of the streets where the poorest of the city live, surprising sums have been contributed voluntarily, and in some cases as much as £IOO has been realised. And what the inhabitants of these areas lack in the way of artistic appreciation they have compensated themselves and others with displays of exuberance and enthusiasm, and riots of colour. THE PICTURESQUE MALL Of all the decorations, none excell, fittingly enough, The Mall—that straight stretch of road running from Buckingham Palace to the Admiralty Arch—near Trafalgar square. At this time of the year, The Mall is always a picturesque sight, for the branches of the trees on either side of the road are recently adorned with their new leaves, and the delicate green sheen can be traced along the route. Fpr the Coronation, the Mall is one long avenue of 40-foot banners, white and blue and red and gold, streaming from a forest of white-painted masts topped with the golden Imperial Crown and Lion. On the footpath the official stands make a continuous line of colour in red and white and gold. It is indeed a royal route. Outside Buckingham Palace, the beginning and end of the route, in the great space around the Victoria Memorial, is a vast semi-circle of covered stands gay with trappings of gold and white and red. All round are the high painted masts and pendant banners which in Hyde Park, Constitution Hill, and the Mall replace the streamered standards of the streets. FLOWERS IN WHITEHALL

A great crown is in the centre of Admiralty Arch, which is draped with laurel leaves and banked with blue flowers. This is the first hint of the profusion of growing flowers used in the decorations. In Whitehall flowers are everywhere, and hydrangeas are the most popular. The Ministry of Health, with masses of blue hydrangeas framing the windows, is a blaze of colour, the hues of the flowers dimming the brilliance of the rows of flags hanging from the roof. Crimson blooms outside the Home Office, pale Mue and dark blue contrasting along the front of the Treasury, and, outside Gwvdvr House, the pale blue flag of the Royal Air Force, with its red, white .md blue concentric circles—all these combine with rows of stately masts and banners to make Whitehall one of the most spectacular sections of the entire route. The most conspicuous feature of the Treasury is the draping of the windows with gold cloth. Flowers play a prominent part in the decorations all over London. In addition to the official decorations, they arc used on an unprecedented scale by shows, clubs, hotels, business houses, and private householders. All the flower decorations for the National Gallery have been provided by the horticultural industry at the invitation of the Government. Six hundred plants, 120 feet of flower boxes, and 700 feet of laurel ropes have been used. White hydrangeas and red azaleas decorate the terraced edges of the portico, and the pillars, windows, and dome are draped with laurel. More than 70.000 leaves have gone to the making of the laurel ropes and festoons, and every leaf has been wired on by hand. At Hyde Park corner not only the three arches, but the top of the entire screen of pillars and the ledges below them are covered by ereat heaps of crim son hydrangeas. Rhododendrons have been skilfully employed to decorate the corners of the central stands in Parliament square. ANCIENT AND MODERN

But to return to the route: Four giant decorative masts form a gateway for the procession to pass through into Parliament square and on towards the

carefully-built and decorated annexe, which, with the seating in the Abbey, cost £55,000. Here the Westminster of 1937 joins hands with the Westminster of long ago. Modern steel scaffolding supports modern stands, but the awnings, the trappings, and the curiously naive, two-dimensional wooden crowns belong to the Golden rather than the Steel Age. Parliament square is bedecked as for some occasion of loyal rejoicing in the Middle Ages. From the Abbey the return route proceeds by Westminster bridge and along the Thames Embankment. Barges and pleasure steamers, painted and be* fiagged, and turned into floating grand stands for the occasion, are a pleasant and unusual sight on the river.

In Northumberland avenue the streamered standards point the way again, and islands in the roadway have been transformed into decorative pylons. From Trafalgar square the route continues to clubland of Pall Mall, past the Athenasum with its dignified Latin declaration of loyalty, the United Services with its red, white, and blue pillars entwined with golden laurel leaves, and the Marlborough with its great crystal crown weighing 2£cwt on high. Rich colour is added by the bright draperies which cover balconies and stands on many buildings.

The big hotels in Piccadilly are decorated with taste, and all the shops have individual displays of decorations that are more or less successful. A modern outfitter's is entirely covered with a trellis work of pink roses, and high up on its roof rises a giddy stand like a step ladder, with seats facing both up and down Piccadilly. Regent street presents one of the fine sights along the route. The uniformity of the architecture lends itself to a unified scheme of decoration, and from every building along its sweeping curve hang long streamers of royal blue, and from upper windows hang squares of scarlet cloth bordered with gold. Nearly every shop has its greenpainted window boxes aglow with the deep blue of cinerarias, the red of azaleas, and the white of marguerites and hydrangeas.

Oxford streets wins whatever honours are going for shop decorations. Vertical red banners stand out against the yellow of some shops on the north side; one shop is covered with vast historical panels depicting various monarchs; and Selfndge's has embarked on a remarkable display. There is a vast centre-piece. " Empire's Homage to the Throne, and bas-relief panels showing the pageant of the Empire since the times of the Druids. Another firm have completely covered, their premises with enormous, painted figures of past Kings and Queens of England.

Trophies of flags and flowers deck the Marble Arch and the gateway at Hyde Park Corner. Between these two points the route follows the East Carriage Drive through Hyde Park, and once again the decorations have a lovelier background than bricks and stones can give. Here the banners on the masts are scarlet and gold, and the Government stands backing on to Park lane are bordered with red and blue and gold. THE CITY The city, though not included in the Royal route, has one of the most striking of all the Coronation decorations. From Temple Bar, just above Fleet street, all the way to St. Paul's Cathedral, and then down through Cannon street, are suspended, at regular intervals, the City banner, a red cross on a white background, with a red sword in the top right-hand quarter. Stretched from the banner to the buildings are "swags" of red and white chevron bunting, or red and white ruffled garlands of weather-proof paper with a blue rubber effect between each section of red and white. Above each banner is a scroll bearing the words "God Save the King," surmounted by a crown. The whole of the material employed is of British manufacture. There are 250 banners suspended over the streets, about 9000 yards of "swags," and the same length of garlands. THE EAST END The East End, envious of its own achievements during the Silver Jubilee, determined to " go one better " for the Coronation. Districts often con-

sidered "Red" are showing that they are white and blue as well; but, jf the colour scheme is unoriginal, the designs are not. . . ... The rows of flat-faced houses which meet the pavement at the front door (in many streets all painted alike), lend themselves particularly well to decoration, and rarely is little allowed to spoil their orderliness. In Hoxion there is street after street of arches of flags and bunting, and between lamp posts gaily twined with coloured streamers or trees with tricolour trunks that look like great surar-sticKs. Other streets concentrate entirely on displays of Union Jacks stretched across the road, with "God Save the King" repeated 50 times In their length. Here and there a house has added its own suggestions to tne general display—a magnificent set-piece over the front door or a Niagara of small flags, poured from the top-storey windows to the railings below, Windows, too, are decorated with paper garlands and portraits of the King and Queen, supported by such inscriptions as "God grant long life to man and wife," and " They mean everything to us."