Peckish in Peckham | Frank's Cafe
Frank's Cafe
With its slotted scaffold boards and billowing red PVC roof, Frank’s Cafe makes for an arresting sight on top a Peckham car park.
Welcomed back in 2013, the temporary summer bar is part of arts project Bold Tendencies which imagines and establishes spaces for contemporary sculpture, performance and music in South London. Since its inception in 2007 the project has welcomed 500,000 visitors and is revered by locals, tourists and critics.
Curated by Joe Balfour, Bold Tendencies’ new site-specific commissions are free to all and include works by an international mix of artists and practitioners. The 2013 Architecture Programme also sees a collaboration between Keith Collins, partner of the late Derek Jarman, and landscape designer Dan Bristow which captures the windswept magic and colour of Jarman’s Prospect Cottage garden, Dungeness.
The Derek Jarman Garden For Peckham, 2013 © K. Collins and Propagating Dan
In creating Frank’s Cafe, east-end firm Practice Architects have once again harnessed Peckham’s rooftop climate with a self-made, build it and re-assemble it philosophy.
The can-do attitude is there in the drinks and food too. You can start the day with a Bloody Mary or toast a Peckham sunset with a glass of Prosecco as you chow down on barbecued plantain and hot pepper sauce or ox-heart kebab.
Frank's Cafe is now open again for Summer 2017.
Photo of Frank's Cafe by Richard Bryant © Bold Tendencies
Total Vitality © Laura McLean-Ferris and Leslie Kulesh. Image courtesy Bold Tendencies.
Steven Claydon, It in transit (is the thing in itself), 2013 © Steven Claydon. Image courtesy Bold Tendencies and Sadie Coles HQ