To celebrate the opening of the film adaptation of Where the Wild Things Are at the Clapham Picture House, the cinema has given us some fantastic prizes to give away. We’ve got two sets of prizes for you to win, both containing a fantastic Where the Wild Things Are t-shirt and kite (we’ll see you flying it on Clapham Common!) All you have to do is email with the answer to this question: who was the author of the original Where the Wild Things Are book?

This is the list of local businesses abusing Clapham residents’ homes by ignoring people’s no junk mail stickers – which is completely unacceptable. All the businesses have to do is ask their leaflet delivery person to stop. Until then, the businesses will be listed here on LoveClapham, a site that has thousands of local residents reading it each week. And this is just the beginning of our Name & Shame Junk Mail Campaign, our messaging will get stronger. We recommend Clapham residents boycott these businesses completely until they stop.  Read more »

The Clapham Venn Street Market is back for its second weekend this Friday, Saturday and Sunday (11th, 12th, 13th December). Don’t forget, on Friday and Saturday it’s a high class food market with hot food stalls and on Sunday it’s the flower market but still with some food. It’s down by the Clapham Picture House Cinema and apparently Father Christmas will be there too! The good news is that the market will be monthly in 2010 – yippee! Full info below. Read more »

I’m sure I’m not the only one to have noticed this*, but if you skip 3min 25sec into Lady Gaga’s new song Monster I’m 91% sure** she’s singing “Clapham-Clapham-Clapham-Clapham-Clapham.” Conclusive proof*** that Gaga loves Clapham and has been on a night out in either Infernos or the Two Brewers.

* No one else would have noticed this
** Not at all sure
*** Not proof at all

This weekend saw the introduction of the Clapham Venn Street Market with locally sourced, seasonal produce piled high for Clappers to enjoy. As a local resident of Clapham, I have to say that this is probably the best thing to happen to the Clapham High Street area in years (it’s on Venn Street, outside the cinema). With a variety of hot and cold food, fresh veg, breads, cakes and even handmade Christmas decorations, it was a genuine treat, but it requires your support if you want to keep it. Read more »

As no one else has done anything about this, Love Clapham has created a three step pro-active plan to tackling Clapham’s junk mail problem including printing ‘NO JUNK MAIL’ stickers out of our own pocket, and they aren’t cheap! If you would like a free sticker, email in with your name and address. Otherwise we’ll be giving the stickers out for free in Clapham over the coming weeks, so follow us on twitter @loveclapham to receive alerts of where and when this will be (they look better in real life… I stuck mine on slightly wonky).

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Simply marvellous news Clappers! Word has reached LoveClapham that we have a major new piece of amazing coming our way from the end of the month; an all new monthly food and flower market on Venn Street (behind Clapham Highstreet, by the post office depot). Yes, Love Clapham is totally over-the-moon. The first market, by Sourced Market, will be on Friday 27th – Sunday 29th November. Read on for more information. Read more »

OK! You got me, I give into Christmas! I’ve been avoiding Christmas at all costs. The IN YER FACE Christmas adverts on TV at the moment have been making me anti-Christmas – they keep filling me with the overwhelming urge to stick needles in my eyes instead of Christmas cheer. So thank heavens for the lovely little leaflet popped into my letter box this week that reminded me of what Christmas is all about: a fun ol’ get together! Tomorrow, Saturday 21st November from 2 – 4pm at St Peter’s Halls, Prescott Place off of the Highstreet is Clapham’s first Christmas Market of 2009. I love everything about the leaflet that promises “bargains galore” for the price of a mere fifty pence piece entry charge. There will be a tombola, gifts, toys, preserves, books and other goodies. Do the organisers a favour and nip in for a cup of tea and a look around.

Every now and then something comes along that makes Love Clapham go “holy crap” and this picture is one of them, found in a book by Clapper Christopher Anderson. During World War II, Clapham Common was used for more than buff posturing joggers, it was the location of four large anti-aircraft guns (pictured above). In the picture you can also see trenches, huts and possibly soldiers doing exercises. This is so far removed from the Clapham Common of today it’s hard to comprehend what it was like. Thankfully, the BBC has a report from a lady called Jean Vines who lived in the area at the time. Jean talks about cycling across Clapham Common to get to school with a very real “danger of being hit by shrapnel from the four big guns on Clapham Common”. Fascinating!

As you can probably tell, Love Clapham loves a bit of artistic flair, so imagine our delight when Clapham resident artist Katy Jackson got in touch to tell us about this month’s Open Studios Art Show.  The Open Studios Art Show is on from Thursday 26 – Sunday 29 November in Wimbledon and features a number of local Clapham artists, including Katy. Read more »

If you went to the Clapham Common Fireworks yesterday, why not add some of your own photos to our gallery from the event? What a day yesterday was. If you’re following LoveClapham on Twitter you’ll know that not only were there fireworks on Clapham Common, but loads of free pasta too. Not to mention the Windmill being turned into a mini-rave and then the roads being overrun by people. Just one of the annual wonders of the area. Lambeth Council did us all proud yesterday with London’s best free fireworks display. The Mayor of Lambeth even went so far as to film the finale and upload it to YouTube.

Follow @loveclapham on Twitter for regular updates, tips and news about the Clapham area. On top of these blog posts, Love Clapham tweets regularly to offer you a more instant news service. If you have anything to tell us or if you want an answer to a question, feel free to tweet us and we’ll get back to you as soon as possible!