S+S: Time Below Our Feet

The most recent castle playground (circa 2024) in Bingfield Park is more than just a space for children; it is a living, breathing echo chamber of the past and present. Long before the metallic towers and slides settled there, this land bore witness to the passage of the dead, as funeral trains rattled through Rufford Street. It later became a place of struggle, where Beaconsfield council estate earned the name “The Crumbles,” a label that would live on in the first castle-like playground that was later built in its place.

As we recorded sounds using a contact microphone, we interacted with the space as we were meant to - swinging, sliding, running - letting the structure itself tell its story through the creaks of metal, the thuds of footsteps, or the scrape of gravel. We also listened to what lingers after dark. A discarded Red Bull can, perhaps left by those who claim the park when the children have gone home, became our instrument as we dragged it along the railings. In Kings Cross, where much of the land around our college is dealt with as privately owned public space, places like these are playgrounds of freedom, where history, play, and the presence of those before us collide. Here, the sound of today intertwines with the past, shaping a space that never truly stops speaking. And so, in the spirit of those who came before us - those who built, played, and reclaimed this land - we too left our mark, giving the structure a name of our own: the Three Stones Castle, a quiet assertion that this space belongs to all who move through it.

On a Monday afternoon, we met two women standing in this park.

They told us about how they care for the pigeons here. They said the birds recognise their faces - the pigeons and the ducks. They know when they’re coming and they wait for them.

They told us about a flock of pigeons under the bridge - only noticed by those who care to look and children. She said children notice everything. They see her holding the pigeons and teach them not to disturb them.

Squirrels, robins, a fox with three cubs. She stood really still to watch them.

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Ice melting, rhythmic canal boat engines and pigeons cooing. Sounds that appeared to us through chance encounters with three residents within King’s Cross: The man at the Canal Museum, and two women who feed the pigeons along the canal every day.

The Canal Museum is home to two ice wells, used for the production and trade of natural ice transported from Norway via the canals, until the introduction of artificial refrigeration in London in 1904. The fact that ice was once a scarcity that had to be housed deep underground, and its transportation via the canals speak to a time period where everything was much slower. Yet, the sounds of the canal boat engines, a repeated and rhythmic beat, bring to mind a more recent history: the raves that were held in the 1990s within the building that now holds Central Saint Martins. These easy misidentifications of sound - as canal boat motor or musical beat - speak to the fabric of the area as an ever-changing collage.

The two women we met who feed the pigeons spoke to us at length about how they care for the wildlife in King’s Cross. As we listened to their stories, the pigeons watched us from above. Two robins appeared in the hedgerow, and a squirrel scurried up a tree. We invite the listener to observe these inhabitants as they listen to this soundscape, considering not only the current living residents of the area, but also these histories that linger under the surface, within the canal that runs below this community garden, and onwards to the other sites on this walk.

In Visiting as an Indigenous Feminist Practice, Tuck et al. discuss a reciprocal way of being a part of a community: a giving and receiving of stories, knowledge and experiences, with close listening at its core. We would like to invite the listener to hear the sounds that emerged from these chance encounters, and to consider, in being present in a site off the beaten path, to invite a chance encounter of their own.

Our group explore fire as a natural energy source and its profound impact on history and the environment. Since the Industrial Revolution, King’s Cross has been a vital hub for coal transport, with generations of Londoners relying on coal—and later gas and electricity—for their daily lives. Fire, as a part of this history, has shaped landscapes and fostered new life, while the Regent’s Canal stands as a living ecosystem intertwined with both history and nature. By capturing sounds of crackling flames, rustling leaves, and flowing water, the aim is to reflect this delicate balance and remind us of nature’s cycles, urging respect for the interplay between historical and environmental changes.

The King’s Cross area holds significant historical weight, particularly the devastating fire at King’s Cross Station, which altered policies and regulations, leaving a lasting mark on the region. This audio piece blends ambient, material, and experimental sounds to create layered soundscapes that transport listeners back to the station’s pre-fire environment in the 20th century. Urban station background noises, electronic tones, vocal fragments, and other textures come together to form a multi-dimensional auditory experience. Rather than traditional music, it shapes an atmospheric journey, immersing listeners in a virtual world of soundscapes.