A walk through St Giles in 2015 could move quickly from construction hoardings and the changing skyline around Centre Point to the quieter churchyard and guitar shops of Denmark Street. I filmed those contrasts on my way to meet Chloe for dinner at Byron in Central St Giles, where the B-Rex burger was the reason for our visit.
From the Roberts London archive. The original film was published on 26 April 2015. This article records that evening’s streets, restaurant and menu.
Disclosure: Byron invited us to try the relaunched B-Rex burger, as stated in the original film.
Arriving at St Giles Circus
I had just finished work and took the Tube into town. The film opens with my thoughts on travelling around London, before emerging at Tottenham Court Road into a neighbourhood in the middle of considerable change.
Construction around the station and St Giles Circus was a prominent part of the view. Centre Point stood over the junction, and the redevelopment work gave the opening walk a very particular place in time.
Looking back at the footage, even the temporary barriers and road layout become part of the record. The camera was meant to take me to dinner, but it also caught the everyday appearance of London between one version of a place and the next.
The churchyard and Denmark Street
The walk took me past St Giles-in-the-Fields, where the church and its surrounding streets offered a different scale from the large building projects nearby. In the original vlog I paused to reflect on the area’s past and the contrast with the London I was walking through.
Then came Denmark Street and its music shops. Guitar signs, instruments in windows and familiar names gave this short street a strong identity. The film lingers on the shopfronts rather than treating them simply as scenery on the way somewhere else.
I spoke about the pleasure, and occasional sadness, of recording a city that keeps changing. At the time I wondered whether somebody might eventually watch these streets to recover a memory of them. That is one reason I enjoy returning to these early films now.
Dinner at Byron in Central St Giles
I arrived at Byron ahead of Chloe and went inside to find a table. Root beer was my first thought: I liked it, associated it with trips to America, and was pleased to see it on the menu during this visit.
Once we were both there, we tried two small glasses of different wines before deciding what we preferred. It was a simple habit when a restaurant offered wine by both the glass and the bottle, and it became another small part of the evening’s conversation.
The invitation had come with a toy dinosaur and temporary tattoos. Both made their way into the film, with the little dinosaur standing on the bright B-Rex menu.
Trying the B-Rex burger
The B-Rex had returned after an earlier appearance as a special. In the film I also recalled briefly meeting Byron’s chef Fred at the Admiral Codrington before his move to Byron, and the impression his enthusiasm for burgers had made on me.
Our order was straightforward comfort food: B-Rex burgers, French fries, onion rings and macaroni cheese. When the burgers arrived, there was the familiar delay while we took photographs before eating.
The B-Rex combined beef, an onion ring, streaky bacon, American cheese, jalapeños, pickles, onion, barbecue sauce and mayonnaise in a soft bun. I added some hot sauce as well. My verdict that evening was enthusiastic: I thought it tasted as good as it looked.
Macaroni cheese and a shared blondie
The macaroni cheese was a particular favourite. Beneath its baked cheese surface it was rich, creamy and exactly what I wanted alongside the burger. With fries and onion rings on the table too, there was plenty to keep us occupied.
Afterwards we were both fairly full, so dessert became something to share: a caramel and honeycomb blondie with vanilla ice cream and caramel sauce. That earned another photograph before we divided it between us.
The evening ended with a short walk outside and a happy verdict on dinner. In the closing moments I pointed out that the most important part of the meal was the company, which is probably the detail that has aged best.
Watch the original St Giles vlog
The full film includes the journey, the streets around Centre Point and St Giles, Denmark Street’s music shops and our dinner at Byron. The restaurant menu and street scenes are preserved here as part of the 2015 archive.
