Stink pipe, St Julian's Farm Road
Introduction
The photograph on this page of Stink pipe, St Julian's Farm Road by Stephen Richards as part of the Geograph project.
The Geograph project started in 2005 with the aim of publishing, organising and preserving representative images for every square kilometre of Great Britain, Ireland and the Isle of Man.
There are currently over 7.5m images from over 14,400 individuals and you can help contribute to the project by visiting https://www.geograph.org.uk

Image: © Stephen Richards Taken: Unknown
If I'd thought about this at all, I'd vaguely assumed it was an old street lamp, albeit without the lamp part. That is, until an internet search elicited the fact that this is probably one of the better surviving examples of a stink pipe, used to carry away noxious gases from the sewers. Despite its utterly unromantic function it is highly decorative with a crown at the top and a number of gilded bands. A plate at the bottom indicates that it was built by "J. Stone & Co, Engineers, Deptford, London SE". A close-up of the base can be seen here: Image