Arriving at SpecSavers early meant finding something to do. From the other side of Bishopsgate, Liverpool Street beckoned, with its milling travellers and safe retail. I chose instead to trip down New Street, which is, of course, terribly old, and to explore Devonshire Square, which is terribly old too, but nowadays makes a modernity pitch by calling itself DSQ.
What does the “Q” there signify? Is it initialising “quarter”, thereby rebranding the square and its re-fashioned, mixed-use environs as a characterful, hang-out urban niche? Is it recruiting the time-honoured abbreviation of “square” to add an enigmatic lustre, the letter “q” being among the English alphabet’s exotics and with a 007 dash about it too?
The truth is out there, though not, so far as I can see, on the DSQ website. That’s quite a blow, but I’m spoiling the fun by overthinking. The DSQ footprint, assuming that’s the proper word, is entertaining in several ways and more than filled my spare half an hour.
Devonshire Square itself, ensconced between New Street and Houndsditch, was laid out between 1678 and 1708 by Nicholas Barbon, the voracious property developer son of Praise-God Barbone, religious fanatic and cusp-of-Cromwell parliamentarian. It was laid out on the garden of Devonshire House, home of assorted nobs called Cavendish.
You enter its domain through a neon-lit, covered stone alley. Beyond this, on the day of my mid-morning visit, I was engulfed by work-in-progress sensations as security personnel, nicely turned out and possibly at loose ends, looked on.
To my left, a massive banner heralded a DSQ-branded Diversity Inclusion Festival, though no festivities were detectable at that stage.
To my right, a soft, wraparound hoarding concealed the creation of something I couldn’t see. A box-fresh, unopened building called DSQUBE (I don’t know why) welcomed me to a “free exhibition”, although I saw no exhibits within and the doors seemed to be locked, a supposition I didn’t test for fear of giving those security guards something to do.
And then…deckchairs! Yellow and green on astroturf. A few of them were occupied. A few of the occupiers might have been paying attention to the elderly Rod Stewart as he rocked out on a DSQ-logoed big screen. In the stage wings, a WeWork office looked on at people who appeared not to be working.
It was all a bit unreal, a concept awaiting proof and activation. My inner smartarse savoured the juxtaposition of a restaurant setting up for fairly plush City fringe lunchtime trade and construction workers snacking al fresco on sandwiches and cola beyond a gracious double arch, a throwback to the Nineties.
Further discordances lurk at the development’s edges: an old stone sheep continues to preside above a meeting point of New Street and the engagingly titled Cock Hill; a plaque marks a spot near where three City of London police officers were fatally wounded while foiling a robbery on Houndsditch.
I could have hung around all day, but with demand for earwax removal services often outstripping ready supply, my SpecSavers appointment wouldn’t wait. Goodbye, DSQ, and good luck.
John Vane’s London novel, a political satire called Frightgeist, can be bought here.