ImagesBrighton pictures of the week 23-2-2004

IMAGESBRIGHTON photography by david gray
	T H E S T R E E T S O F T U N B R I D G E W E L L S
	P I C T U R E S O F T H E W E E K 2 3 - 2 - 2 0 0 4

Tunbridge Wells has for many years been a bit of a joke. Pompous writers of letters to the national papers are cliched as "Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells". EM Forster, in his novel "A Room with a View", has a character saying "I am used to Tunbridge Wells, where we are all hopelessly behind the times". There is still some truth in the image of the place as old-fashioned, genteel and stuffy, but this is not the whole story. Places change and the streets of this spa town in Kent show plenty of evidence of life in contemporary England. The old opera house has become a super-pub, the main cinema has closed and is covered in music flyposters. There's a huge new shopping centre, complete with glass lifts and wilting plant tubs. You can get a tattoo just as easily as a cream tea and there's even an Islamic Cultural Centre, not to mention a restaurant run by a Chinese Elvis Presley impersonator. Tunbridge Wells still has its tea rooms and its old ladies, but nowadays there's a lot more besides. The pictures in this set were taken in February 2004.

There are still several corners of Tunbridge Wells that will be forever England (image 2489-72)

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