Illustration of Bermondsey Abbey.

Bermondsey Abbey archaeological dig, viewed from Tower Bridge Road, 5 March 2006.

Another view of the archaeological dig from Tower Bridge Road.

Details of the finds at the archaeological dig.

Some of the finds made available by the archeologists at the dig.

Bermondsey Abbey archaeological dig detailed view.

Bermondsey Abbey was an English Benedictine monastery. Most widely known as an 11th-century foundation, it had a precursor mentioned in the early 8th century, and was centred on what is now Bermondsey Square, the site of Bermondsey Market, Bermondsey in the London Borough of Southwark, southeast London, England.

Foundation[link]

A monastery is known to have existed at Bermondsey before 715 AD, when it was a Surrey colony of the important Mercian monastery of Medeshamstede, later known as Peterborough. Though surviving only in a copy written at Peterborough in the 12th century, a letter of Pope Constantine (708-715) grants privileges to a monastery at Vermundesei.^[1] It is likely that this monastery continued, probably as a secular minster, at least until the 9th-century Viking invasions.^[2]

Nothing more is heard of any church at Bermondsey until 1082, when, according to the "Annales Monasterii de Bermundeseia", a monastery was founded there by one Alwinus Child, with royal licence.^[3] It is highly likely, given the trend to continuity of sacred sites, that this church was founded on the site of the earlier monastery. It is also possible that this foundation was a direct successor to the church last mentioned in the early 8th century.^[4]

Alwinus Child's new monastery, dedicated to St Saviour, is presumably identical with the 'new and handsome church' which appears in the Domesday Book record for Bermondsey, in 1086. In effect, Domesday Book clarifies the "Annales"' mention of royal licence, since it records that the estate of Bermondsey was then held by King William the Conqueror, a small part being also in the hands of Robert, Count of Mortain, the king's half brother, and younger brother of Odo of Bayeux, then earl of Kent. Royal support for the new foundation continued with King William Rufus' gift of the royal estate at Bermondsey, in either 1089 or 1090, and through further grants made, for example, by King Henry I in the 1120s and 1130s. ^[5] It may be that the counts of Mortain also maintained an interest in the new monastery, since Count William of Mortain became a monk there in 1140. Alwinus Child's only recorded gift to the new monastery was 'various rents in the city of London', and these may be represented in Domesday Book by mention of 13 burgesses there paying 44d (£0.18) annually to the estate at Bermondsey.

The new monastery was established as an alien, Cluniac priory through the arrival in 1089 of four monks from St Mary's of La Charité-sur-Loire, apparently at the invitation of Archbishop Lanfranc of Canterbury.^[6] These were Peter, Richard, Osbert and Umbald, Peter becoming the first prior. The church remained a Cluniac priory until the late 14th century. In 1380 Richard Dunton, the first English prior, paid a fine of 200 marks (£133.33) to have Bermondsey's establishment naturalised: this protected it from actions taken against alien properties in time of war, but it also set the priory on the path to independent status as an abbey, divorced from both La Charité and Cluny, which it achieved in 1390.

Royal Connections[link]

At Christmas 1154, the newly crowned King Henry II and his Queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine held court at Bermondsey Priory.^[7] A few weeks later, on 28 February 1155, the royal couple's second child, Prince Henry was born there.^[8]

Both Catherine of Valois, wife of Henry V, and Elizabeth Woodville, wife of Edward IV, spent time at the Abbey following the deaths of their husbands. Catherine, also mother of Henry VI, was banished to the Abbey following her marriage to Owen Tudor in 1436; and, sometime around 12 February 1487, Elizabeth was forcibly registered as a boarder, receiving free hospitality as the widow of a descendant of the institution's founder.^{[citation needed]} She died there on 8 June 1492, having seen her two sons, Edward V and Richard of Shrewsbury, 4th Duke of York, disappear in the Tower of London around 1483, and her daughter Elizabeth of York marry Henry VII, a Tudor, three years later.

"King John's Palace"[link]

Possibly because of the royal events at Bermondsey, a legend asserted that King John had built a palace there. The 17th century antiquarian, John Aubrey, gave credance to this story. However, Richard Rawlinson, editing his Natural History and Antiquities of the County of Surrey in 1719 said: "Mr Aubrey tells us, that he was assured by one Mr Hawkins, that this Abbey of Bermondsey was King John's Palace, and converted into an abbey; but upon what Authority this information was grounded I cannot find."^[9]

Land and estates[link]

Bermondsey rapidly acquired a valuable estate, both temporal and spiritual.

In 1103 and 1104 it acquired from Henry I his interest in Southwark to the west of Borough High Street (Stane Street) just to the south of the ancient borough, stretching over to Lambeth and to the south to Walworth. This became known as the King's Manor, Southwark after its acquisition by the City of London in 1550. In 1122 it was given the church of St George the Martyr; Long Lane led northwest from the Abbey to the High Street by the church to connect the two estates.^[10]

In 1291, temporalities (such as landed estates) were valued at almost £229, and spiritualities (such as advowsons) at just over £50. The Valor Ecclesiasticus of 1535 put the abbey's clear annual value at a little over £474.^[6]

The estate ranged widely, including properties in Surrey, Leicestershire, Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Gloucestershire, Somerset and Kent.
The manor of Charlton, then in Kent, was given by Bishop Robert Bloet of Lincoln in 1093. In 1268, Bermondsey was granted a Monday market at Charlton, as well as an annual fair of three days, centred on Trinity Sunday, the eighth Sunday after Easter.
Land in Dulwich and elsewhere was given by Henry I in 1127.

Dissolution[link]

After the Dissolution of the Monasteries under Henry VIII, the abbey was handed over by the last abbot to the king. Henry granted the property and its lands to Sir Robert Southwell. Southwell sold the buildings to Sir Thomas Pope, founder of Trinity College, Oxford. Sir Thomas broke up the abbey, pulling down a number of buildings and erecting a house on the property. He then sold it back to Southwell who later sold it on to a London goldsmith.

Archaeology[link]

The site at Bermondsey Square is currently being redeveloped with the construction of buildings. This has provided PCA an opportunity to undertake a number of excavations on the site along Abbey Street, most recently in early 2006. Another part of the site is to be excavated along Tower Bridge Road.

Reports[link]

The report for the current dig is not online as of March 2006 but should be published here.

• TQ 3370 7936 Bermondsey Square, SE1; (David Divers & Kevin Wooldridge); evaluation; September – November 1998; London Borough of Southwark; BYQ98
• TQ 3330 7936 Bermondsey Square, SE1; (Chris Mayo); evaluation; 15 July – 16 August 2002; BYQ98

References[link]

External links[link]

• About Bermondsey Abbey, by London online
• Annales Monasterii de Bermundeseia (Rolls Series, 1888) online. Gallica. Retrieved 18 August 2010.
• Bermondsey Abbey in the Victoria County History series.
• Discussion about excavations
• Notes on the Abbey

Coordinates: 51°29′51″N 0°4′51″W / 51.4975°N 0.08083°W / 51.4975; -0.08083

Coordinates: 51°29′55″N 0°04′33″W / 51.4986°N 0.0757°W / 51.4986; -0.0757

Bermondsey
St Mary Magdalen Church, Bermondsey
Bermondsey  Bermondsey shown within Greater London
OS grid reference	TQ335795
- Charing Cross	2.5 mi (4.0 km)  WNW
London borough	Southwark
Ceremonial county	Greater London
Region	London
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	LONDON
Postcode district	SE1, SE16
Dialling code	020
Police	Metropolitan
Fire	London
Ambulance	London
EU Parliament	London
UK Parliament	Bermondsey and Old Southwark
London Assembly	Lambeth and Southwark
List of places: UK • England • London

Bermondsey ( /ˈbɜrməndziː/) is an area in London on the south bank of the river Thames, and is part of the London Borough of Southwark. To the west lies Southwark, to the east Rotherhithe, and to the south, Walworth and Peckham.

History[link]

Toponomy[link]

Bermondsey may be understood to mean 'Beornmund's island'; but, while "Beornmund" represents an Old English personal name, identifying an individual once associated with the place, the element "-ey" represents Old English "eg", for "island", "piece of firm land in a fen", or simply a "place by a stream or river". Thus Bermondsey need not have been an island as such in the Anglo-Saxon period, and is as likely to have been a higher, drier spot in an otherwise marshy area.^[1] Though Bermondsey's earliest written appearance is in the Domesday Book of 1086, it also appears in a source which, though surviving only in a copy written at Peterborough Abbey in the 12th century, reliably describes earlier events. This is a letter of Pope Constantine (708-715), in which he grants privileges to a monastery at Vermundesei, then in the hands of the abbot of Medeshamstede, as Peterborough was known at the time.^[2]

Anglo-Saxon and Norman period[link]

A Fête at Bermondsey by Joris Hoefnagel c. 1569, with the Tower of London in the distance.

Bermondsey appears in Domesday Book as Bermundesy and Bermundesye. It was then held by King William, though a small part was in the hands of Robert, Count of Mortain, the king's half brother, and younger brother of Odo of Bayeux, then earl of Kent. Its Domesday assets were recorded as including 13 hides, 'a new and handsome church', 5 ploughs, 20 acres (81,000 m²) of meadow, and woodland for 5 pigs. It rendered £15 in total. It also included interests in London, in respect of which 13 burgesses paid 44d (£0.18).^[3]

The church mentioned in Domesday Book was presumably the nascent Bermondsey Abbey, which was founded as a Cluniac priory in 1082, and was dedicated to St Saviour. Monks from the abbey began the development of the area, cultivating the land and embanking the riverside. They turned an adjacent tidal inlet at the mouth of the River Neckinger into a dock, named St Saviour's Dock after their abbey. But Bermondsey then was little more than a high street ribbon (the modern Bermondsey Street), leading from the southern bank of the Thames, at Tooley Street, up to the abbey close.

The Knights Templar also owned land here and gave their names to one of the most distinctive streets in London, Shad Thames (a corruption of "St John at Thames"). Other ecclesiastical properties stood nearby at Tooley (a corruption of "St Olave's") Street, located in the Archbishop of Canterbury's manor of Southwark, where wealthy citizens and clerics had their houses, including the priors of Lewes and St Augustine's, Canterbury, and the abbot of Battle.

14th century[link]

King Edward III built a manor house close to the Thames in Bermondsey in 1353. The excavated foundations are visible next to Bermondsey Wall East close to the Famous Angel public house.^[4]

17th century[link]

Former Alaska factory in Bermondsey

As it developed over the centuries, Bermondsey underwent some striking changes. After the Great Fire of London, it was settled by the well-to-do and took on the character of a garden suburb especially along the lines of Grange Road, as Bermondsey Street became more urbanised, and of Jamaica/ Lower Road. A pleasure garden was founded there in the 17th century, commemorated by the Cherry Garden Pier. Samuel Pepys visited "Jamaica House" at Cherry Gardens in 1664 and recorded in his diary that he had left it "singing finely".

Though not many buildings survive from this era, one notable exception is the church of St Mary Magdalen in Bermondsey Street, completed in 1690 (although a church has been recorded on this site from the 13th Century). This church came through both 19th-century redevelopment and The Blitz unscathed. It is not just an unusual survivor for Bermondsey; buildings of this era are relative rarities in Inner London in general.

18th century[link]

In the 18th century, the discovery of a spring in the area led to Bermondsey becoming a spa leisure resort, as the area between Grange and Jamaica Roads called Spa Road commemorates. A new church was built for the growing population of the area, and named St John Horsleydown.

19th century[link]

It was from the Bermondsey riverside that the painter J.M.W. Turner executed his famous painting of The Fighting "Temeraire" Tugged to her Last Berth to be Broken Up (1839), depicting the veteran warship being towed to Rotherhithe to be scrapped.

By the mid-19th century parts of Bermondsey, especially along the riverside had become a notorious slum — with the arrival of industrial plants, docks and immigrant housing. The area around St Saviour's Dock, known as Jacob's Island, was one of the worst in London. It was immortalised by Charles Dickens's novel Oliver Twist, in which the principal villain Bill Sikes meets a nasty end in the mud of 'Folly Ditch' an area which was known as Hickmans Folly — the scene of an attack by Spring Heeled Jack in 1845 — surrounding Jacob's Island. Dickens provides a vivid description of what it was like:

"... crazy wooden galleries common to the backs of half a dozen houses, with holes from which to look upon the slime beneath; windows, broken and patched, with poles thrust out, on which to dry the linen that is never there; rooms so small, so filthy, so confined, that the air would seem to be too tainted even for the dirt and squalor which they shelter; wooden chambers thrusting themselves out above the mud and threatening to fall into it — as some have done; dirt-besmeared walls and decaying foundations, every repulsive lineament of poverty, every loathsome indication of filth, rot, and garbage: all these ornament the banks of Jacob's Island."

Bermondsey Town Hall was built on Spa Road in 1881. The area was extensively redeveloped during the 19th century and early 20th century with the expansion of the river trade and the arrival of the railways. London's first passenger railway terminus was built by the London to Greenwich Railway in 1836 at London Bridge. The first section to be used was between the Spa Road Station and Deptford High Street. This local station had closed by 1915.

The industrial boom of the 19th century was an extension of Bermondsey's manufacturing role in earlier eras. As in the East End, industries that were deemed too noisome to be carried on within the narrow confines of the City of London had been located here — one such that came to dominate central Bermondsey, away from the riverfront, was the processing and trading of leather and hides. Many buildings from this era survive around Leathermarket Street including the huge Leather, Hide and Wool Exchange (now residential and small work spaces). Hepburn and Gale's tannery (disused as of early 2007) on Long Lane is also a substantial survivor of the leather trade.

Peek, Frean and Co was established in 1857 at Dockhead, Bermondsey by James Peek and George Hender Frean. They moved to a larger plant in Clements Road in 1866, leading to the nickname 'Biscuit Town' for Bermondsey, where they continued baking until the brand was discontinued in 1989.^[5][6][7]

20th century[link]

Bermondsey Fashion and Textiles Museum (March 2007)

Mandela Way T-34 Tank

To the east of Tower Bridge, Bermondsey's 3½ miles of riverside were lined with warehouses and wharves, of which the best known is Butler's Wharf. They suffered severe damage in World War II bombing and became redundant in the 1960s following the collapse of the river trade. After standing derelict for some years, many of the wharves were redeveloped under the aegis of the London Docklands Development Corporation during the 1980s. They have now been converted into a mixture of residential and commercial accommodations and have become some of the most upmarket and expensive properties in London. In 1997, US President Bill Clinton and Prime Minister Tony Blair visited the area to dine at the Pont de la Tour restaurant at Butler's Wharf.

Millwall F.C. moved to a new stadium on Coldblow Lane in 1910, having previously played in Millwall, but have kept their original name despite playing at the opposite side of the River Thames to the Millwall area. They played at The Den until 1993, when they relocated to the New Den nearby. A public sports centre is also included in their stadium.

Bermondsey had been host to London's first railway, from Spa Road, as part of the London Bridge to Greenwich line, and the junction of lines from Croydon and Kent at South Bermondsey, the Brunel's Rotherhithe foot-tunnel was converted into part of the East London Railway with original connections from Liverpool Street Station via Whitechapel to New Cross and New Cross Gate. However, reorganisation of lines and closure of stations left Bermondsey's transport links with the rest of London poorer in the late Twentieth Century. This was remedied in 2000 with the opening of Bermondsey tube station on the London Underground's Jubilee Line Extension and the East London Line forms part of the new London Overground system reopening direct links with the City and north London.

Local government[link]

Bermondsey Antiques Market

The first 'Bermondsey' is that known as the location of an Anglo-Saxon monastery, and known from later charters to be the area around the post-Conquest Bermondsey Abbey and its manor, which was in turn part of the medieval parish. References in the Parliamentary Rolls describe it as "in Southwark".[^[8]] A later, Victorian civil parish of Bermondsey did not include Rotherhithe or St Olave's; this was the arrangement under the Metropolis Management Act of 1855. The Southwark parishes of St Olave's and St John's Horsleydown (the latter a 'daughter' of the former) with St Thomas's formed a parish union ('District Board of Works') known as 'St Olave's' from that date. This was the arrangement within the London County from 1889. In 1899 St Olave and St Thomas's District was created as a single civil parish and the next year, following London government reorganisation, this was merged with Rotherhithe and part of Deptford to form, with Bermondsey civil parish, the Metropolitan Borough of Bermondsey. The Borough's first Mayor was Samuel Bourne Bevington (1832-1907), leather producer and one of the area's largest employers; his statue still stands in Tooley Street^[9]. This Borough disappeared into the London Borough of Southwark, in the Greater London reorganisation of 1964.

Governance[link]

Southwark London Borough Council has divided the borough into a number of community council areas. The wards of Grange, Riverside and South Bermondsey form the Bermondsey Community Council area.^[10]

Bermondsey's parliamentary representation has fluctuated with its population. Since at least the 13th century, it had formed part of the Southwark constituency. From 1885 to 1918, a separate Bermondsey constituency existed, which included part of the older Southwark constituency. 1918 saw the seat split between two new constituencies: Rotherhithe and Bermondsey West, both of which were in place until the 1950 general election when the old Bermondsey seat was recreated.

In 1983, the area played host to the famous Bermondsey by-election in which Labour's Peter Tatchell lost the previously safe Labour seat to the Liberal Simon Hughes on a swing of 44%. Hughes has represented the area ever since, although parliamentary boundaries (and constituency names) have changed since then. At the 1983 general election (which took place several months after the by-election), a new Southwark and Bermondsey constituency was created, becoming North Southwark and Bermondsey in 1997, and in 2010 Bermondsey and Old Southwark, (although a small part of south east Bermondsey is transferred to Camberwell and Peckham in the 2010 changes).

Sport[link]

Millwall F.C., who were formed in 1885 and played on the northern side of the River Thames before moving to New Cross in 1910, have been based in near South Bermondsey station since 1993, when they moved into their New Den stadium at Zampa Road, the team has a strong local following but has never been based anywhere other than in Deptford in the London Borough of Lewisham.^[11]

Geography[link]

Leather, Hide and Wool Exchange, Bermondsey

Places of interest[link]

• Bermondsey antiques market
• Tower Bridge
• HMS Belfast
• London Dungeon
• Fashion and Textile Museum
• Shad Thames
• Mandela Way T-34 Tank
• Miloco Studios
• Millwall F.C.
• Bermondsey Spa Gardens
• Haunch of Venison Gallery
• Soon to be completed tallest building in the EU - The Shard, London Bridge

Nearest places[link]

• City of London
• Canary Wharf
• Southwark (AKA The Borough)
• Peckham
• Wapping
• Whitechapel
• Rotherhithe
• New Cross
• Tower of London
• Newington
• Walworth

Transport[link]

Nearest stations[link]

• Bermondsey tube station
• South Bermondsey station
• London Bridge station
• Borough tube station

See also[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Bermondsey

• List of people from Southwark
• List of schools in Southwark

References[link]

External links[link]

• Southwark London Borough Council - Bermondsey

v t e London Borough of Southwark Districts Bankside Bermondsey Borough/Southwark Camberwell Crystal Palace Dulwich East Dulwich Elephant and Castle Herne Hill Nunhead Peckham Rotherhithe Surrey Quays Sydenham Hill Walworth Attractions Tower Bridge Design Museum Dulwich Picture Gallery Globe Theatre Imperial War Museum The Old Vic Tate Modern Markets Borough East Street Bridges Tower London Southwark Millennium Blackfriars Waterloo Constituencies Camberwell and Peckham North Southwark and Bermondsey Dulwich and West Norwood Other topics Parks and open spaces People Public art Schools Category Commons

Patrick Wolf
Background information
Birth name	Patrick Denis Apps
Born	(1983-06-30) 30 June 1983 (age 28)
Genres	Indietronica Folktronica Alternative rock Baroque pop
Occupations	Singer-songwriter
Years active	2002–present
Labels	Low Altitude Records Faith & Industry Tomlab Loog Bloody Chamber Music Mercury Records
Website	PatrickWolf.com

Patrick Wolf (born Patrick Denis Apps on 30 June 1983) is an English singer-songwriter from South London. Patrick utilises a wide variety of instruments in his music, most commonly the ukulele, piano and viola. Known for combining electronic sampling with classical instruments, Wolf's styles range from romantic folk to techno-pop.

Biography[link]

Patrick Wolf was born in St Thomas' Hospital,^[1] South London,^[2][3] into a creative family. He started his musical education with Piano lessons but soon got bored and progressed onto violin lessons and church choirs and made his first theremin at age eleven, and first began recording songs with his violin, voice, and car boot sale organs on a four-track tape recorder at age twelve. At fourteen, he joined and performed with pop art collective Minty. Two years later, he dropped his music A-Levels, which he was studying at Davies Laing and Dick Sixth Form College off Bond Street, and left home. During this period, as well as working in Super Lovers clothing store in Covent Garden, Wolf earned money from busking in a string quartet and formed a group called 'Maison Crimineaux', a noisy trio built on destructive ethics around white noise and pop music. He also continued to write and record his own material. A Maison Crimineaux gig in Paris was attended by electronic maestro Kristian Robinson (aka Capitol K), who would then go on to release Wolf's debut album Lycanthropy.

[edit] Lycanthropy and Wind in the Wires

Wolf's ongoing writing and recordings brought him to the attention of Fat Cat Records, who provided him with an Atari computer and a mixing console. During the recording of Lycanthropy, Wolf studied composition at Trinity College of Music for one year. Lycanthropy was released in the summer of 2003. He also made some guest appearances as a viola player with Chicks on Speed, Arcade Fire, Owen Pallett, CocoRosie and The Hidden Cameras. The Germany-based Tomlab later released the album in America and Europe. His second album of 2005, Wind in the Wires, which was inspired by Patrick's Cornish and Irish roots, was released on the same label and likewise met with critical acclaim. The single Tristan, based on the Cornish legend, Tristram of Lyonesse, received significant attention from critics and remains a fan favourite.

[edit] The Magic Position

Following the success of Wind in the Wires, Wolf signed a record deal with Loog in 2005 and began recording his third album, The Magic Position, which featured collaborations with Marianne Faithfull and Edward Larrikin of Larrikin Love.^[4] Its official release on 26 February met with critical acclaim, and gained a degree of commercial success due to the relative accessibility compared to his previous works.^{[citation needed]} The Magic Position was released in the United States on Low Altitude Records on 1 May 2007.^[5] A concept album on the theme of love, the majority of the album was written after the end of a long term intimate relationship. In January 2007, the first of six vodcasts was made available on iTunes. The series included live performances of old and new material and interviews. Wolf promoted the album with a concert tour in North America, Europe, Japan, and Australia, culminating in two sold out nights at London's Shepherds Bush Empire. Both of these shows, which were shot and directed by photographer Brantley Gutierrez, are in development to be shown on a Virgin channel and then released on DVD.

[edit] The Bachelor and Lupercalia

Wolf began work on his next album, initially titled Battle, immediately after The Magic Position tour ended. The album was originally conceived as a political album. The focus then shifted to the depression experienced by Wolf during the tour. However, before entering the studio, he fell in love, changing the direction of the album again, and eventually providing enough material for two releases. Wolf parted ways with Universal Records, and on 10 December 2008 announced to NME his plan to sell £10 shares of the album on bandstocks.com: "Basically, you can invest in the finishing of the album and the production of it, and you get a share in the album. So you almost become part of the record company, like a co-owner of the album."^[6] On 12 February 2009, Wolf announced that the two discs would be titled The Bachelor and The Conqueror (although the latter album title has subsequently been changed). The Bachelor's first single, "Vulture", was released on 2 April 2009, on vinyl and digital download. The B-sides include new song, "The Tinderbox", and remixes of the title track.

The Bachelor was released on 1 June 2009, while the second single from the album, "Hard Times", was released on 6 July 2009. The third and final single, "Damaris", was released on 14 December 2009.^[7]

In April 2010 it was announced that Wolf had signed a record deal with Hideout, a subsidiary of Mercury Records, who will release his fifth album, Lupercalia. The final title was announced via Twitter on 23 December 2010.^[8]

On 4 November 2010, Wolf announced that the first single from Lupercalia was to be "Time of My Life" and the song was posted on YouTube. Of the song, Wolf said: "'Time of My Life' is a song that I began writing at the end of a relationship in 2006 and then finished three years later during a temporary break-up in my current relationship. The new album has a direct narrative about love and optimism surviving through adversity and recession. I wanted to celebrate the love and hope I have found in the last few years." The song was released on 6 December 2010. He also announced that Lupercalia would be released in May 2011.

On 10 January 2011, Wolf announced on his official Twitter account that the second single from the album, "The City", would be released on 14 March 2011.^{[dated info][9][10]}

On 6 April 2011, Wolf released Lupercalia 20 June 2011 worldwide (excluding USA, where it was released 28 June 2011).^[11] In the same month, Wolf was featured on the cover of national UK publication Notion), which included an interview conducted by writer Alex Lee Thomson, clothes by James Long, and photos by James Moriarty.

Next Project[link]

On 18 May 2012 Wolf announced that he was working on his next album, to be released later in the year: "I'm going back to the studio and recording my jubilee record... The album will be totally, totally, totally stripped down. It's time for me to be retrospective about the last ten years before I move onto the next ten. I'm 28 and I think it's quite fun to sing the songs you wrote as a teenager." ^[12]

Personal life[link]

Wolf reflects that as a teenager, he was bullied at school for his perceived eccentricity and effeminacy. At the time, he was unsure whether he was gay or bisexual. Mentors at school treated him with disdain when he came to them for support on the issue. The bullying problem was only rectified after his mother changed schools. Wolf comments, "With gay or bi people, I think education still wonders if it's a nature-versus-nurture thing. If you were black, they'd know they couldn't change you, and racist bullying would never be condoned, but if someone is quite feminine or knows they might be gay at 13, they think they can change you with a bit of rugby."^[13]

On 27 February 2007, in an interview with thelondonpaper, Wolf raised questions about his sexuality: "In the same way I don’t know if my sixth album is going to be a death-metal record or children's pop, I don’t know whether I’m destined to live my life with a horse, a woman or a man. It makes life easier."^[14] In a 5 July 2007 interview with the Sydney Star Observer, he confirmed his sexuality: "My sexuality is kind of liberal. I fall in love with men and women. I guess you would call me bisexual. I like to have sex and fall in love—I don't like giving terminology for my sexuality."^[15][16][17] Later, in 2009, Wolf told The Guardian that though in the past he has had relationships with women, he now identifies himself as gay. As an artist, Wolf reflects that he doesn't like to worry about whether he makes a record "too gay or too straight or too this or too that."^[13]

In September 2008, Wolf claimed that he was beaten up by security guards for kissing his boyfriend at a Madonna concert in London. Wolf told Electroqueer: "We were beaten up outside Wembley [Stadium], handcuffed. [...] The police came and it just went on and on and on. My man's face covered in blood. [...] They totally twisted my arm and my legs - it was just mad. They are currently researching the CCTV - it just really nuts. [— sic] We basically got beaten up by the police."^[18][19]

On 31 December 2010, Patrick Wolf announced via Twitter that he was set to enter a civil partnership with his boyfriend William Pollock.^[20] He confirmed in an interview at Bestival 2011 that this will take place in summer 2012 due to touring commitments.

Modeling[link]

Wolf, along with The Paddingtons, Edward Larrikin, and The View, was featured in a series of photographs by Mario Testino as a part of a campaign for Burberry in August 2007.^[21]

Wolf has also worked with a variety of designers at London Fashion Week 2009.

Discography[link]

• Lycanthropy (2003)
• Wind in the Wires (2005)
• The Magic Position (2007)
• The Bachelor (2009)
• Lupercalia (2011)

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official site
• Interview in Virgin Red Room
• Interview in Exberliner Magazine