Holborn Circus, London 1978

A vibrant late-1970s view looking west from Holborn Viaduct toward Holborn Circus, capturing a streetscape undergoing major transformation. On the left stands the striking office block with red horizontal banding — the Daily Mirror building, opened in 1960 and once home to the newspaper’s editorial and administrative operations. It dominated this stretch of Holborn until its demolition in the late 1990s, when the site was completely redeveloped as the new Sainsbury’s headquarters.

On the right, wrapped in scaffolding, is the Gamages redevelopment, built on the former site of Gamages department store. Once one of London’s best-loved and most eccentric general stores — famed for toys, hobbies, model railways, tools and Christmas grottos — Gamages closed in March 1972 following a takeover and years of financial trouble. Its demolition cleared the way for a modern commercial complex that became offices for British Telecom for many years. At street level, the new scheme included a mix of shops stretching along both Holborn and Hatton Garden.

The traffic — black cabs, 1970s saloons and vans — fills the roadway beneath a hot summer sky, while the pointed Gothic turrets of Holborn’s Victorian buildings rise behind the construction. The photograph freezes a moment when Holborn was shifting from its post-war commercial identity into the corporate and retail landscape that would define it through the 1980s and beyond.