BANTER, BUTTIES AND BREWS AT SH Cabbie co ELTER FOR DRIVERS Daily Mirror given access to ‘home from home’ as well as.. nfessions
YOU’D be forgiven for walking straight past the wooden hut, with its pretty pitched roof, green-painted panels and potted plants because it seems to blend perfectly into its leafy surroundings.
But inside it is remarkable, a place untouched by the passing of time and cloaked in mystery for anyone who is not a certified taxi driver.
Only badge-wearing black cabbies, those who have passed the world’s toughest taxi test, The Knowledge, are allowed to sit inside this North London cabmen’s shelter, just like the other 12 distinctive green huts occupying a space on taxi ranks around the capital.
For more than 120 years it is where cabbies have found rest, a hearty meal and a place to share their stories.
Last week the last of the surviving shelters – on Wellington Place in St John’s Wood – was given grade II listed status. And, breaking a century-old rule, the Mirror was allowed to spend a morning inside to find out why these unique spaces are so worth protecting.
“The shelters are distinctive relics of the horse-drawn age,” explained Luke Jason, listing adviser to Historic England. “They’re full of intrigue, history, tea and bacon sarnies.”
But mostly cabbie gossip, it turns out. Maybe also the one place where the “what happens in the cab, stays in the cab” rule does not apply.
Over three hours we hear one fascinating tale after the other, from the shopping habits of former Beatles to the charm, or lack of it, of famous actors and politicians.
There were once more than 60 of the wooden green huts across London, built from 1875 by the Cabmen’s Shelter Fund when Victorian cabbies were prohibited from leaving their horse-drawn hansom cabs unattended in the rank.
With no protection from the elements, and with some cabbies ending up worse for wear after sheltering in pubs between fares, the huts – with a kitchen and space for 10 drivers to sit around a table – provided food and hot drinks, while drinking, gambling and swearing were forbidden.
After the last horse-drawn cab stopped operating in 1947, most of the shelters were shut or fell into disrepair.
They included this one in St John’s Wood, until 2005 when Croatian Lidija Armanda, who ran other cafes popular with taxi drivers in the city, asked if she could bring it back to life.
In return for renovating it, she could run it rent-free for a year. Her son Andre, who ran the shelter with Lidija, took over following her death last year.
He now also serves takeaways
Ringo was so chatty and funny going to the jewellers ANDREW WOOD ON ONE OF HIS FAMOUS FARES
It’s such a special place. It’s where I know I can find friendly, honest, genuine people WAYNE ELLIOT IS PLEASED THE SHELTER IS NOW PROTECTED
It’s a family, anyone with a problem can find a solution
OWNER ANDRE
through a hatch for the public, with tables on the pavement outside. Inside is still strictly black cabbies only.
He insists it is much more than just a cabbie’s cafe. “It’s a social club, a family. And we’re like a neighbourhood watch. If anyone has a problem they can come here and find a solution.
“I’m thrilled we’re now listed, the locals have a big love for this place.”
Constantly interrupted by passersby saying hello, he adds that the shelter also raises money for charity – €18,700 for Great Ormond Street Hospital last year.
And its regular cabbies, many of whom are musical, staged a massive concert and saved a youth centre from closure. Andre studied product design but says he preferred to give up an artistic career to serve cabbies at the shelter, something he has been doing for 18 years. “There’s nowhere better than inside here. Everyone’s welcome and everyone’s equal, from the megarich Arab to the street cleaner, there’s no difference in here.”
That includes some famous local residents, including Paul Mccartney – the only non-cabbie he allows to sit inside. Andre says: “His daughter used to love this place. She thought it was a big doll’s house, Paul would ask if they could go inside. How could I refuse?
“One time I was sat here writing a song, and he told me it sounded good. Robert Plant from Led Zeppelin sometimes comes round for a cup of tea.”
Sitting inside the shelter, you can’t help but feel its history, and imagine the banter that has gone on there since it first opened in
1914. Times may have changed but the stories are no less fascinating.
Andrew
Wood, 56, who dropped in for a rest and cup of tea, remembers stopping to pick up a welldressed woman. “She said her husband was coming but that he always takes a bit of time to come down, then when he appeared it was Ringo Starr.
“He was really chatty and funny. I dropped them off at Theo Fennell’s, the famous jewellery store, and waited for them. Ringo came out holding a bag, and pretended it was really heavy, dragging it on the ground like he couldn’t lift it, it was so funny.” It’s not
FARES FAIR Dame Judi Dench, Ringo Starr and Led Zep legend Robert Plant just London’s rich and famous that take them by surprise, he says. “Recently I had a woman in my cab. She had all her clothes on, then I looked round and she was completely naked. She didn’t have any money so wanted to settle the bill like that.
“I looked away and said, ‘Don’t worry about the fare, ma’am’.”
Cabbie, Romanian Dumitru Mona, 53, who ordered a sausage and egg
I t
sandwich, recalls: “One day two people got in my cab on Sloane Street, I heard a voice saying, ‘Can you take me to Kensington Palace?’ in Prince Charles’ voice. I said to myself, ‘Oh my God’, but it was actually Prince Michael of Kent.”
His favourite passenger, though, is Dame Judi Dench. “I couldn’t believe I had M from James Bond in my cab. She was with her daughter and another lady, and when we arrived in Covent Garden I said, ‘Ma’am, can I have a picture with you if you don’t mind, and don’t worry about the fare’.
“She said: ‘Don’t be silly, of course ’m going to pay the fare’. Her daughter took my phone and took lots of pictures of us. She even gave me a tip.” Politician Peter Mandelson, though, was less obliging. “I said to him, ‘I recognise you’ and he said, ‘Of course you do’. I asked him for a picture and he said, ‘No, I’m too busy’.
No tips, no nothing.”
The last politician he had in his car was then education secretary and multi-millionaire Nadhim
Zahawi, who tipped him just two pounds.
Dumitru Mona, 53, was a
London bus driver for 29 years and said doing The Knowledge over three-anda-half years was one the hardest things he had done in his life.
He says: “Every cabbie who comes in here has gone through the same thing. It’s one of the bonds between us.
“In here it always feels like we’re family, like sitting around your mum’s kitchen table.”
Council gardener Wayne Elliot, 53, knows he cannot come inside, but still pops his head through the door. He says: “It’s such a special place. I know I can find friendly, honest, genuine people. We’ve all come here to work and no one has any airs and graces.
“I forget all my stresses and leave feeling happy. Before I’d get home and couldn’t engage with my missus, I was wound up and had nothing to say. Now I tell her about all the stories I heard at Andre’s. This place is a gold mine. If there was anywhere in London that needed protecting, it was here.”