Burglar Alarm Britain

“Intervene Security Ltd” burglar alarm, Tower Hamlets • A piece of Land art I have always wanted to see is Walter de Maria’s The Lightning Field (1977), a square kilometre of remote New Mexico desert bristling with 400 steel poles, designed to channel both occasional lightning storms and the sun’s daily passage. But since it’s around 5,000 miles away, and you have to pay $250 to stay there overnight (and aren’t even allowed to take photos), I shall have to make do instead with a few burglar alarms bearing lightning flashes, aka thunderbolts. Once popular, it’s rather a low-tech symbol these days, so is found mainly on vintage sounders such as this one. Note to completists: I’ve already featured a few thunderbolts – on Aegis, Enright, Haven and X Ray – in other categories. • Spotted: Fairfield Road, Tower Hamlets, London, E3, England, 2010 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Bethnal Green and Bow