The Fence Magazine

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One! More! Song!

1 week ago | the-fence.com | Lotte Brundle

Does Battersea host the most basic night out in London? We sent our intrepid Gen-Z correspondent to find out. ‘The most basic night out in London’, my editor told me, showing me an Instagram video of an un-diverse crowd of 20-somethings unironically enjoying a one-man acoustic Maroon 5 cover in the sun. They were at the Pear Tree Cafe in Battersea’s green and pleasant parkland, sunglasses on, phones out to capture the moment. Friends sung the lyrics to each other, this was a moment to remember.
Diamonds in the Rough

2 weeks ago | the-fence.com | Nick Thompson

Hanging out with some creative crims. I am sitting in a former public toilet in Spitalfields, rain pelting the pavement overhead. Around a narrow table draped in black velvet, some of Britain’s most notorious criminals – now artists – have gathered to launch their initiative for former inmates, Rogues Gallery. By dint of the weather (and the DIY approach to launch PR), it’s just me, alone in the basement, with the rogues.
I Write Eulogies, Not Tragedies

2 weeks ago | the-fence.com | Alex Taylor

When he was a student, this writer peddled paeans from his dorm room. Nan was dead. Of that, no confirmation was needed – mouth hanging open in one final gasp; eyes short of a destination, ceasing to wander. I was 19 at the time, and in that moment, I kissed her cold forehead goodbye. I’d loved my nan – well, great-nan – but this wasn’t her. This was a body, a retired vehicle of tea and toast production, and nobody quite knew what to say next.
Ersatz G.B.

3 weeks ago | the-fence.com | Louis Staples

How do Lidl and Aldi get away with their imitation brands? We unpick the Cuthbert & Colin caterpillar wars. ‘I spent my first 18 months there firefighting,’ remembers Paul Stainton. ‘They were trying to stop us in our tracks.’ After responding to an advert in the local paper, Stainton got a job as a buyer at Aldi in 1989 – a year before the supermarket opened its first store in the UK. When Aldi’s super-low prices started making headlines, the British supermarket establishment threw a hissy fit.
On Minge Lane

1 month ago | the-fence.com | Emma Magnus

A dispatch from Worcestershire, famous for its sauce – and saucy street names. Charlotte Shepherd and her family had found the perfect new house in Upton-upon-Severn, a town in Worcestershire on the banks of the river. The house was well-situated, with a garden, plenty of space and kerb appeal. She’d seen it listed for six months, but, until now, had hesitated about booking a viewing.
Roots Manoeuvres

1 month ago | the-fence.com | Ciaran Thapar

A dispatch from one of the most singular club nights in Britain, right next to Heathrow Airport. For the last three years, the revival of a very British musical subculture has been gaining momentum among the suburbs around Heathrow Airport. On a Friday evening once a month, a cohort of skanking revellers gather at a clubhouse sandwiched between two parks beside the trickling waters of Yeading Brook in Hayes, and listen and move to the layered sounds of dub reggae. ‘Come.
The Boys

1 month ago | the-fence.com | Leo Robson

An extract from Leo Robson’s forthcoming novel. Johnny, 30 and bored, recalls the appearance of his half-brother and his half-brother’s girlfriend. In the mornings Lawrence and Emily would cross the hall and tickle me awake, then he would disappear to make breakfast – a full English, adapted to accommodate the household rule about pork products. ‘Has to be full English,’ he would say, ‘what else?’ It seemed not to be a rhetorical question.
Borstal Boys

2 months ago | the-fence.com | Georgia Brown

A personal history of the borstal in Britain: a century of incarcerated children. The last time I saw my dad, we were looking through old photographs. In one sits a small, dark-haired boy staring gleefully at the camera. His smile is cheeky and wide, his little hands folded neatly over one another. Four years after this photo was captured, in 1973, my dad was taken from his parents and siblings and forced to live in a dark, stark building near the banks of the River Medway.
Gaming the System

Feb 20, 2025 | the-fence.com | Michael Holden

If irony – of a kind – is the layering of comedy and tragedy, there are some places in London where it becomes fully three-dimensional. I arrived early, because Monopoly Lifesized tickets come by email with a stern warning about lateness. As I walked toward Tottenham Court Road, I passed the furniture store, Heal’s – beds costing £10,089 – and the myriad of tents outside it – £40 from Argos – a few doors down, and considered the changing and recurring fortunes of this patch of London.
Day 1,509 in the Big Brother House

Jan 29, 2025 | the-fence.com | Gary Grimes

Our writer, a lonely tweenager in rural Ireland, took to his computer and found new galaxies of possibilities – on a Big Brother forum. Walking through central London in early October, I was stopped in my tracks by a billboard that read, ‘Big Brother – The Ultimate Social Experiment’.