Marc Bolan's Rock Shrine Marc Bolan's Rock Shrine Marc Bolan's Rock Shrine is a memorial to Marc Bolan, of glam-rock band T-Rex, on the site where he died in a car crash in Barnes, London, on 16 September 1977. Bolan was a passenger in a car which hit a sycamore tree on Queen's Ride (part of the B306, close to Gipsy Lane). A memorial stone and bust of Bolan was unveiled at the site in 1997. Marc Bolan died, aged 29, from injuries sustained when his purple , driven by his girlfriend Gloria Jones, crashed. Jones lost control of the car and it struck
T. Rex (band) 15 September 1977 drinking at the Speakeasy and then dining at Morton's club on Berkeley Square, in Mayfair, Central London. While driving home early in the morning of 16 September, Jones crashed Bolan's purple Mini 1275GT into a tree (now the site of Bolan's Rock Shrine), after failing to negotiate a small humpback bridge near Gipsy Lane on Queens Ride, Barnes, southwest London, a few miles from his home at 142 Upper Richmond Road West in East Sheen. While Jones was severely injured, Bolan was killed in the crash, two weeks before his 30th birthday. Bolan's death ended the band.