Seventeen years in the past I used to be lucky to have the ability to go on a tour of the Sri Guru Singh Sabha Gurdwara, opened in 2003 and stated to be the most important Sikh temple (Gurdwara) in Europe and the fourth largest on this planet, led by one of many Sikh volunteer guides and the architect, Richard Adams of Architects Co-Partnership.
The tour had been organised by artwork and concrete historian Mireille Galinou for the group London Arts Café, and was one in every of a sequence of attention-grabbing occasions and exhibitions between 1996 and 2007, which you’ll be able to nonetheless examine on the reasonably messy London Arts Café website online that I used to be answerable for, although the entrance web page of this makes very clear that the London Arts Café is not any extra. The positioning stays on line as a report of its actions.
Architects Co-Partnership had gained an open competitors to design the constructing, and Adams had labored absolutely with the Sikh neighborhood to supply a constructing suited to their wants. It does so impressively: clear easy surfaces, highly effective color within the home windows and lightweight streaming into the central stairway and foyer from the massive window and glass roof areas.
The Gurdwara has an enormous prayer corridor formally able to seating as much as 3,000 individuals, a positive marriage room (and two years later I photographed one in every of my spouse’s colleagues getting married right here), and varied different services together with a Langar (eating corridor). This free neighborhood kitchen can serve over 20,000 vegetarian meals on a competition weekend.
The constructing had a powerfully spiritual environment, and on getting into we eliminated our footwear, lined our heads with scarves offered and washed our palms earlier than persevering with into the temple.
As we went round each our Sikh information and the architect defined how the constructing served the fundamental Sikh tenets of service, humility and equality. The information defined the religious steering from the Sri Guru Granth Sahib, spiritual writings which have been appointed as religious head of the Sikh faith by Guru Gobind Singh round 300 years in the past.
The constructing was extraordinarily spectacular, and there was an incredible environment to locally kitchen the place volunteers, primarily ladies, have been working collectively to arrange the free vegetarian meals. Though usually I might have sat to eat on the ground within the conventional method, a reasonably painful knee made it simpler for me to face and eat at one of many tables together with most of our group.
The meals is free, however in return persons are anticipated or welcomed to carry out some service to the temple in thanks or give an donation which we gladly did. The meal was scrumptious and made a superb finish to a most attention-grabbing go to.
I ended my account on My London Diary:
Southall is now Britain’s Holy Metropolis, apparently with locations of worship for over 50 religions or denominations. Brother Daniel Faivre’s ‘Glimpses Of A Holy Metropolis’ revealed in 2001 after greater than 20 years of residing in Southall provides a superb perception into a few of this range.
We didn’t on this event go to any of those others, however did go for a brief stroll earlier than catching our bus residence, going into the Christian cemetery reverse the Gurdwara and a few streets round for some views of the constructing’s exterior, in addition to some native views.
I’d visited Southall earlier than to {photograph} a number of the spiritual festivals – each Sikh and Hindu – within the city and there are photos of a few of these on My London Diary, in addition to photos from Vaisakhi celebrations right here and in Hounslow, Slough, Woolwich, East Ham, Gravesend and Sikh protests in central London. You could find these by looking on My London Diary.
Extra photos on My London Diary.
Tags: Architects Co-Partnership, neighborhood kitchen, eating corridor, equality, free meals, free meals, Gurdwara, humility, langar, London, London Arts Café, London Pictures, marriage room, Mireille Galinou, peter Marshall, prayer corridor, Richard Adams, service, Sikh temple, Sikhs, Southall, Sri Guru Singh Sabha, Sri Guru Singh Sabha Gurdwara, teamwork, vegetarian meals
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