Diane Gould: Pearly Queen of St Pancras and Guardian of Nature

From The Pluriverse

Diane Gould: Pearly Queen of St Pancras and Guardian of Nature

The majesty of generosity and togetherness: London's Pearlies reclaim royalty to convey their working class values

By Caroline Garland & Sara Arnold

Photos & Video by Immo Klink

Jumping off the train at Stonebridge, East Sussex, we see an arm shoot up at the end of the platform. Our host for the day, Diane, has kindly offered to collect us from the station. We drive along the winding country roads, past sun drenched meadows and idyllic villages chatting about her craft beer brewery until we reach Furnace Brook, an Arts, Ecology and Micro Enterprise hub and home to Diane and Al Gould. A lively chicken welcomes us across the front garden and we are straight inside for a round of tea.

This place is a lifelong project. The grounds have been cultivated “in response to the climate and ecological emergency and the disconnect with nature”. The regenerative systems in place are to inspire anyone that visits to think ahead of the present and lay foundations for future generations.

But the reason we have come to visit Diane is primarily because she is the Pearly Queen of St Pancras. You may have seen Pealies out and about, wearing their distinct suits covered in Mother of Pearl buttons, whilst collecting money for charity. The Pearly Kings and Queens form a working class cockney tradition of London dating back to the 19th century.

Diane is a direct descendent of the original Pearly ‘King of Kings of St Pancras’, George Dole. Her father, George’s grandson, Alf Dole, inherited the title. We have come to learn about the Pearlies and how Diane continues to embody their cockney spirit.

Diane explains that the tradition can be traced back to Pearly founder and King of all Pearly Kings, Henry Croft (1861 - 1930). As an orphan rat catcher and road sweeper from Somers Town, the area of inner-city North London around Euston and St Pancras, he befriended the local street traders, the costermongers (costard is a type of apple and monger means seller), or coster for short. He admired their communitarian and generous sentiment, always helping someone when they were down on their luck and having a ‘whip round’ (a collection of money) to help them back on their feet. Henry Croft became famous for covering his suit in Mother of Pearl buttons, which he used, to much success, to aid his fund-raising efforts. He persuaded his friend, George Dole to join his endeavours.

However, the roots of this tradition can be traced back further. In the late 1800’s each borough of London had a market with a so-called Coster King and Queen, elected to look after the interests of their local costermongers. The Pearly Kings and Queens evolved out of this tradition. In Henry Croft’s time, costermongers were already decorating the seams of their knackered clothes with mother of pearl buttons found discarded in the markets.

Diane tells us about her youth, spent in the markets of London. The costermongers were more than food sellers. They provided an essential service for the working class and they looked out for the community, especially those falling on hard times. Dating back as far as the 11th century, they were a distinct sector of society, with their own distinct culture. They were a tight knit and self-organised community, valuing autonomy and known to have a disregard for the police. They had both their own dress codes and language - both back slang, with words said backwards, and the famous cockney rhyming slang. At the markets, they bellowed out melodic chants to sell their wares, creating a distinct sound of London street life. Itinerant and unlicensed, costermongers were under constant threat by authorities who wanted to clear up London’s streets. In the end, the authorities got their way, but the traditions lived on.

The superfluous embellishment with Mother of Pearl buttons has become the trademark of the Pearlies. But self-made and in today’s lingo, ‘upcycled’ - often decorating weathered hand-me-downs - no Pearly outfit is the same. As Diane walked us around the grounds of Furnace Brook, she wore her pearly suit complete with white ostrich feather hat. Her silhouette evokes Victorian West End society which the look originally intended to imitate. Wealthy Londoners had developed a fashion for wearing pearls and impressive hats, parading around parks on a Sunday afternoon. In their tongue in cheek way, the Pearlies mimicked this by sewing pearl buttons on their trousers and waistcoats, a subversion of cultures, taking it as their own. The authenticity of their DIY swagger and charisma could not be appropriated by the rich. Representing London’s proud working class communities, Pearlies create their own idea of what nobility is.

Like OurCommon.Market, the costermonger values are that of reciprocity, togetherness and a make-do-and-mend mentality. Diane may be the Pearly Queen of St Pancras but she is also qualified in permaculture design and can be seen at Extinction Rebellion marches in full regalia supporting activists, keeping the peace and raising spirits. She fundraises for Great Ormond Street children's hospital but is also involved in community and ecology projects. Today, Pearlies exist split into several associations, some original and other newer groups, covering titles for the districts of London. Each group is connected to a central London church and raises money for charity. Some take on new members worthy enough to be crowned but costermonger lineage is still paramount.

It is clear to us that Diane has a charm and confidence that comes from belonging to a tight knit community. Although she has lived at Furnace Brook for 24 years, she is still a proud Londoner. The cockney connection to this corner of England goes way back. Diane recounts with a smile, the reason she moved to East Sussex. She first started to love and appreciate countryside life through ‘hop picking’, a London working class tradition of picking hops for the farmers to make beer. Her family participated every summer in a mass exodus to Kent. This was also a time to live in nature, swim in lakes and cook on open fire. Families united in the fields to create a micro community that would last 6 weeks.

Diane is a great storyteller, warm, funny and generous. It is the Pearly way to make everyone welcome. Pizzas are popped in the oven as she pulls out her dad’s full ‘smother’ suit, the most ornate of Pearly suits, every inch covered in buttons with meaning throughout the design - fish for being in the navy, horseshoes as respect for their working horses, circles for friendship, hearts for love. The designs are personal to each Pearly. The weight of it is staggering. A day out in that singing, collecting money for charity and entertaining the crowds, must be like running a marathon.

The conversation turns back to community. Where Diane grew up, her family and the local community looked out for each other. Those who had the least, were most willing to help. Working class families have been leaving the city for decades, pushed out by gentrification and rising living costs. London has become a city in which native Londoners are few and far between, and many in the city aren’t there to stay. This has eroded community structures.

Although communities have become fractured there is still connection and those left in the city are finding each other. There is a feeling of warmth and solidarity in the rejection of the status quo. Diane’s farewell words of wisdom confirm she is most certainly a Queen: “Always have a sense of gratitude for each day as one never knows. Spend it (life) with love and fun”. Well, I will raise a glass to that!