North Harrow to Pinner

This all started in Piccadilly, central London. Yesterday I was browsing the books in Waterstones, when I saw a picture of a clock in North Harrow in the book Metroburbia ("Metroburbia: The Anatomy of Greater London" by Paul l Knox). A quick trawl of the internet whilst having a cup of tea and apple pie soon tracked the location down, and as it was a nice day, off I went.

The nearest station is North Harrow on the Metropolitan Line. And very close to the station is this clock on (what was) Warner & Co estate agents.

The building is now occupied by Flint Insurance, and the freehold is up for sale. Whilst this side of the clock is worn but intact, the other face has been considerably damaged. My fear is that with new owners this clock will be lost for good. But let's hope that they decide to repair it.

And so to the actual target of my trip, the Wealdstone Motors clock on Pinner Road.

As you may have guessed, Wealdstone Motors are a used car dealer. as their website says that they were founded in 1976, they were clearly not the original occupiers of this premises, which forms the southern end of a parade of businesses and flats built in 1933. For the latter date I am indebted to the Modernism in Metroland website (www.modernism-in-metroland.co.uk) which I must check out in more detail. And we are indeed in Metroland, those London suburbs built in conjunction with the expansion of the Metropolitan Railway.

The need to hunt for further clocks is ever present, so I headed on northwards. But the dominant Wealdstone Motors clock has clearly seen off all others. By the time I had come to this conclusion I was halfway to the next station - do I retrace my steps or press onwards? Sunny weather, plenty of time, so onwards to Pinner it was.

Now Pinner has the 1930s suburbia, but it also has a much older High Street looked over by the St John the Baptist church.

The church building dates from the early 14th century, with the tower a modern addition erected in the 15th century.

Retracing my steps to the main road, I realised I had walked right past this Robsons clock - which is difficult to see if you rounded the corner on the building side of the street.

 Moving on to Love Lane, the location for Bradley & Jones funeral directors. As I have mentioned several times before, many funeral directors have clocks. This one is a freestanding example on a pole outside their premises.

This next clock was obscured by a parked scaffolding lorry.

This is in the window of the Post Office. Whilst the other pinner clocks were showing the right time, this one was several hours behind.

 And finally, on to Pinner station to catch the Metropolitan Line back to central London. The railway here seems to have the same problem as the post office - trains and mail clearly don't need to run to time.