Tagged: condominium
Long Bemmie Wander with Lisa
11 Apr 2021
My friend Lisa joined me again, this time for a long wander through "Bemmie". In fact, I tweeted recently using "Bedmo" as my abbreviation for Bedminster, and apparently there's something of a culture war going on. From what I can glean, the longer-term residents call it "Bemmie" and consider "Bedmo" a name made up by hipster gentrifiers.
I had no idea, but then I didn't grow up around here, and I don't live in Bedminster, and I'm not a hipster. I'm not sure I've ever gentrified anywhere, either; Hotwells was already quite gentrified by the time I arrived. I probably just lowered the tone a bit.
Anyway. Lisa and I entered Bemmie by the traditional toll gate (though actually you'd only have paid if you were coming from the Long Ashton direction, not merely nipping across from Hotwells) and then almost literally combed the streets to knock several new roads off my list of targets. Along the way we saw lots of street art, as you'd expect, and admired the area's panoply of gorgeous knockers.
I continue to be fascinated by the GP's surgery at the back of Gaywood House. Did there just happen to be a Palladian temple sitting there in Bedmo when they put up the tower block, so they figured they'd build around it?
This is a tweet that seems to have taken off, after it was retweeted by Shit Planning, but nobody's come forward to enlighten me on exactly what this neoclassical portico is doing on an NHS GP's surgery at the back of a tower block.
Later: A confidential informant tells me that this dates from the 1990s and is basically an architect's little joke. I will reveal neither the architect nor my source, though it's possible they may come forward at some point...
Man on a Mission
17 Apr 2021
I went rather outside my area today, as I went to pick something up from the Warhammer shop on Wine Street (Games Workshop as-was, and before that I think perhaps a rare retail outlet for Her Majesty's Stationery Office? I may be mis-remembering...) Anyway, a friend of mine wanted something picking up and posting to him, so I figured I'd knock some streets off my list along the way.
I first headed for the St George's Road area, walking down the narrow Brandon Steps and finding some strange wall art on Brandon Steep, then headed to the Old City via Zed Alley. The Warhammer shop visit was friendly and efficient, and, mission accomplished, I treated myself to a sausage roll and a flat white from Spicer + Cole, to take away and eat in Queen Square with its current decoration of hearts. I finished off with a detour up Park Street, looking out for St John's Conduit markers, before finally crossing Brandon Hill on the way home.
Quite a long wander, all told, and I'm a bit knackered today...
The problem with doing a little circuit anywhere in this bit of Bristol is that you typically travel further vertically than horizontally.
I'd never realised that St George's Road runs from the roundabout at the bottom of Jacobs Wells Road all the way to Park Street, taking a surprising left turn onto something that looks like a different street and then crossing this roundabout.
A New Wander, a New Cafe
21 Apr 2021
Obviously, I was trying to connect to the industrial history of the Canon's Marsh area, to the old gasworks, the docks railway, the warehouses they blew up to make way for all the rather soulless modern stuff (though I do like the Lloyds building, at least.) But what I mostly got out of today's walk is a new cafe to go to for my lunchtime outings. It's perhaps a little closer than both Imagine That and Hopper Coffee; not quite as close as Foliage and Twelve up in Clifton Village, but also not at the top of a steep hill.
No, not the mediocre Costa, but only a little way away from there: Rod and Ruby's, which opened in 2018 and which I've seen in passing several times but never popped into until today. What can I say? I was foolish. Great flat white, lovely interior, astoundingly good cannoli.
Sometimes you just have to get your head out of history and enjoy a pastry.
I actually quite like this one, especially the pointed fronts of the living spaces. Decent size balconies, too.
This is probably my least-favourite bit of the harbourside, and there's a mediocre Costa there as if to celebrate the fact.
Canons Marsh Coffee Trip
29 Apr 2021
Another quick excursion to Canon's Marsh, tempted back by Rod & Ruby's cannoli and flat white. This time I poked around some bits of the modern flats I'd not really experienced before, mused on the old gasworks, and headed back down the Hotwell Road, spotting a re-opening gallery and finishing off at the Adam & Eve, for which some locals are currently rushing to launch a bid to turn it into a community business rather than have a developer turn it into yet-more flats.
I was in a bouncy, positive mood, helped out by Life Without Buildings' Live at the Annandale Hotel album1. Note to self, though: the album is nearly an hour long, so if you hear the encore starting and you're still halfway down the Hotwell Road, you'll probably be late back from lunch...
1 That review's well worth a read. Music journalists tend to go extra-dreamy when trying to describe Sue Tompkins. See what I mean:
She circles her limber tongue-twisters, feints, and attacks from unexpected angles, dicing and rearranging them with the superhuman brio of an anime ninja and a telegraphic sense of lexical rhythm.
So new it doesn't seem to be on Google or Bing Maps yet, at least on the actual map bit, this is the one new build that stands alongside the two historic-building-conversion jobs (Purifier House and Engine House) at Brandon Yard, basically the site of the old gasworks.
They were one of the last sites to be regenerated, after some failed attempts to turn them into offices, including by the Soil Association. I don't know much about what they do in a gasworks, but I heard that the ground was highly polluted and needed a lot of remedial work before anything new could be put there.
Leftovers with Lisa
01 May 2021
I didn't get to all the little leftover streets around the northeastern part of my area in today's wander, but I definitely knocked a few off the list, plus Lisa and I enjoyed the walk, and didn't get rained on too badly. We spotted the hotting-up of Wisteria season, checked out Birdcage Walk (both old and new), ventured onto the wrong side of the tracks1 and generally enjoyed the architecture.
1 Well, technically we probably shouldn't have been on the grounds of those retirement flats, but nobody started chasing us around the garden with a Zimmer frame
A peek through the building site railings at the back of Worcester House, the grand house at the end of Worcester Terrace.
We couldn't quite figure out this building. The front door seemed oddly offset on the frontage. We guess that perhaps the front door used to be on Cotham Hill but got moved to this side at some point.
Sequel Injection
07 May 2021
I saw this tweet the other day and started thinking of my second Covid-19 vaccination as my "Sequel Injection" (to a geek, it's funny. You'll have to take my word for it.) Whatever you call it, this morning I went and got it.
It was in the same place I got my initial injection—my left arm! No, okay, it was at the Clifton College Prep School. I didn't take any photos of the event itself; the NHS production line is so efficient you barely have time to do anything else, even if the privacy of other patients wasn't a factor.
Along the way I mused at all the road resurfacing going on in Clifton, and also discovered a secret (okay, not-well-known and possibly slightly trespassey) way into Canynge Square, and on the way back I knocked off a few streets from my "leftovers list" of north-east Clifton. I've got much of Clifton done now, with the only obvious "to dos" on the east side of Whiteladies Road...
It was quite a long walk, and I'm feeling pretty tired now, though that might be the effects of the jab too, I suppose. Anyway. Tomorrow and Monday I'm walking outside Bristol, I think, and I imagine my feet will need some recovery time on Sunday, so it might be a while before I post another Wander.
Whistle Stop Tour Via a Hansom
12 May 2021
I wanted to take another snap of an interesting Gothic Revival place in Clifton, having found out a bit more about the owner. On the way I walked through the Clifton Vale Close estate, idly wondering again whether it might've been the site of Bristol's Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens (I've not researched further yet.) On the way back I knocked off the last remaining bit of Queens Road I had yet to walk and tried to find the bit of communal land that Sarah Guppy bought so as not to have her view built on...
Bocye's Avenue Windows
19 May 2021
I just nipped up to Clifton Village to get a coffee, though I did manage to walk down a little alleyway I'd not really noticed before. Or perhaps I had noticed it and it looked private, but today I felt like wandering up its twenty or so feet anyway... The reflections in the shop windows on Boyce's Avenue gave me the idea to take a few snaps of them, so that's the majority of my small amount of snapping today.
Shop Fronts of Regent Street
22 May 2021
I didn't even think I'd manage to get out today, such was the weather forecast. As it turned out, it's been quite a nice day, and I managed to nip up to Clifton Village to pop to the Post Office. As with my last outing, I decided after snapping one shop-front on Regent Street that I might as well snap the whole row, and muse on a few of them, the only service I really offer over and above Google Street View for a lot of my pictures 😀
The End of One Terrace and the Middle of Another
26 May 2021
Just a quick trip up to Clifton Village to enjoy a bit of sunshine and grab a coffee. No new roads, and only two pictures, but I did at least snap a plaque I'd missed related to some recent reading, and enjoy a quirky Clifton Village house.
I love this quirky little quarter-cylinder of house, with what looks like a sliver of wedge-shaped top floor behind it and the little below-pavement cellar space behind. I have no idea if the big black door on the right is also related to it, though on reflection it's probably more likely to lead to the under-stairs basement of 1 Royal York Crescent, up and to the right.
It and number two are clearly converted shops or pubs—number three remains The Portcullis pub, of course, and they all get a listing together. "Early C19. Render with limestone ashlar, party wall stacks and pantile hipped roof..."