George Skeggs

Time for some local trivia again. In August I was at an exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery and unfortunately I did not have my camera in my hand when I saw this gentleman rushing up the stairs in my direction – I only saw the crown of his hat, the shoulders of his suit and his cream chrysanthemum (I think) buttonhole. I managed to get a shot of him shortly afterwards but he was moving very fast so I could not imagine getting him to set up the photo again. Not many people make a good photo from the bird’s eye view.

George Skeggs, as I later discovered

More recently, I have learnt (from the Web) that this is George Skeggs and so I may see him again at more leisure.

George Skeggs, more commonly known – although there’s nothing even remotely common about him – as ‘Soho George’ is one of the last true Soho legends. Self-described as a ‘heterosexual Cockney artist, Hogarthian rake loves individuality,style, sleeps in front of a mirror, ex-gigolo old man held together with polygrip & rubber bands’, George has more style in his big toe than most of us will ever have in our entire lifetimes. Not only possessed of a unique and sophisticated elegance, he’s also a brilliant surrealist artist and chronicler of the history of Soho on twitter @SohoGeorge.

Photos

Some photos from the South Bank.

German tent offering allergens.
Laurence Olivier: Is this a bottle of milk that I see before me?
Trump protest: Welcome not walls, with hair.

Leytonstone

Café de Montmartre, Leytonstone

I should have known that Alfred Hitchcock was born in Leytonstone.

However, I went there to see the Singing Organgrinder at the new market.

He can be heard again at 13.00 next Saturday, but I am not sure if the market will still be in the Church Lane car park.

Anti-terror laws hit street art

In Sclater Street:

WARNING
STREET ART TOURS ARE ILLEGAL
YOU COULD BE ARRESTED FINED & OR IMPRISONED
UNDER ANTI-TERROR LAWS*

*OR OUR GENERAL MODUS OPERANDI THAT
IF WE DON’T UNDERSTAND IT WE’LL SHUT IT DOWN ANYWAY
JUST IN CASE

(UNLESS YOU’RE A MEDIA MOGUL OR HAVE SOMETHING ON US OR BOTH)

METROPOLITAN POLICE
Because you just can’t be trusted

Frankfurt eyes London’s commercial litigation crown

An article in the Solicitors Journal:
Frankfurt eyes London’s commercial litigation crown
Brexit uncertainty, an underfunded civil justice system, and a less diverse judiciary are causes for concern, by John van der Luit-Drummond

The article reports that ‘moves are afoot to dethrone London as the preeminent dispute resolution hub.’ We’ve been here before – attempts to set up English-language courts in Germany were linked to a German campaign to sell German courts to international litigants. But Brexit was not part of the mix then. It is reported in the SJ earlier:

The Rolls Building is to be rebranded the ‘Business and Property Courts of England and Wales’ from June of this year in a move to shore up the jurisdiction’s reputation post-Brexit and to enhance the connection between the regions and the capital.

(Here’s the Rolls Building.)

On 30 March, ‘Justice Initiative Frankfurt’ was presented to German lawyers, judges, and business leaders with one aim: to attract more financial disputes to Frankfurt at the expense of London. The initiative launched by law professors Burkhard Hess, Thomas Pfeiffer, Christian Duve, a partner at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, and Roman Poseck, the president of the Frankfurt Court of Appeal, is backed by the federal state of Hessen’s minister for justice, Eva Kühne-Hörmann, and will look to take advantage of the uncertainty surrounding the UK’s legal services market post-Brexit.

The link to Justice Initiative Frankfurt is to an English translation of the position paper.

The SJ has a Simmons & Simmons partner, Ed Crosse, who thinks English courts will continue to be preferred internationally.

‘When designing new procedures, the Frankfurt courts, like many others such as the Singapore International Commercial Court, will undoubtedly select what they perceive to be the most attractive procedures used by other jurisdictions and avoid those that are receiving criticism,’ explains Crosse. ‘We cannot be complacent about such matters.’

I have no idea how flexible the Frankfurt courts can be in choosing their procedures. The position paper quotes the German Code of Civil Procedure in the ‘official’ version not always popular with me.

There’s something about this on a blog new to me but which I intend to follow, Dispute Resolution Germany, by Peter Bert. He wrote about the subject on March 15 but perhaps he will return to it:

As much as I would like to see more banking litigation moving to Frankfurt, in my opinion, one very important factor will be the governing law: Unless the underlying contracts and financial instruments are governed by German law, it will make little sense to agree on Frankfurt as the venue. Parties, on the other hand, will only agree on German law if they have confidence in the courts. In my opinion, an effort must be made to align Justizinitiative Frankfurt, the Law Made in Germany project and the English language in German courts legislative initiative. So let’s see what is going to be proposed on March 30, 2017.