Tagged: urban-design
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.
Alma Court, this time from my normal viewpoint, above the railway tracks on St John's Road.
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.
We spotted this alley, decided to explore, and found a delightful little urban back garden at the end, behind a house on Aberdeen Road.
I guess we'll see how well my website copes with non-English characters. It should be okay; most things default to UTF-8 these days, though I'll admit I didn't pay too much attention when setting things up.
This is the entrance to the BBC complex behind the Whiteladies Road Broadcasting House frontage. I've been inside on a few different occastions. There's editing suites, studios (including the Points West studio), a canteen, the works.
Victoria Square Underpass
06 May 2021
I'm meant to be taking a little break from this project, but in my Victoria Square researches after my last walk I noticed a curiosity I wanted to investigate. The community layer on Know Your Place has a single photograph captioned, "The remains of an 'underpass' in Victoria Square".
Looking back through the maps, I could see that there really did used to be an underpass across what used to be Birdcage Walk. I can only guess that it was there to join the two halves of the square's private garden that used to be separated by tall railings that were taken away during WWII. Maybe it was a landscaping curiosity, maybe it was just to save them having to un-lock and re-lock two gates and risk mixing with the hoi polloi on the public path in the middle...
Anyway. Intrigued, I popped up to Clifton Village this lunchtime for a post-voting coffee, and on the way examined the remains of the underpass—still there, but only if you know what you're looking for, I'd say—and also visited a tiny little road with a cottage and a townhouse I'd never seen before, just off Clifton Hill, and got distracted by wandering the little garden with the war memorial in St Andrew's churchyard just because the gate happened to be open.
EDIT: Aha! Found this snippet when I was researching something completely different, of course. From the ever-helpful CHIS website:
When there were railings all round the garden and down the central path, in order that the children could play together in either garden there was a tunnel for them to go through. This was filled in during the 1970s but almost at the south east end of the path if one looks over the low wall the top of the arches can still be seen.
And opposite Prospect Cottage, as if to give some direct contrast, the modern and anything-but-quaint goods entrance to the Nuffield Hospital.
It's resurfacing season in Clifton, it seems. Certainly there've been a lot of cones and warning signs around the place.
Another bit of Clifton that a lot of people miss: the gardens at the back of the Kings Road shops.
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.
Looking at the old OS maps, it seems this must have been where all the local cabbies hung out. The Cabmen's Rest has a urinal, drinking fountain, and horse trough, all on this little corner. Perhaps the little wall marks the edge of an old shelter; there's a box on the map there but it doesn't give much away.
Ther's a little shelter/bandstand-looking thing in the background of a few historic photos from the area like this one of a horsedrawn omnibus but it's hard to tell what's where.
Map source: 1894-1903 OS 25” 2nd Edition, Know Your Place Bristol
There were a lot of closed roads in Clifton this morning. I watched the white van at the end make its way carefully around the ROAD CLOSED signs at the village end of Observatory Road, drive past me, and get to where you can see it in the distance here before the driver was sent back with a flea in his ear from the workman on "stop the idiots driving through the newly-laid tarmac" duty.
I vaguely remembered having "get better picture of Worcester Terrace" on my "to-do" list, so of course it's got scaffolding up now.
This is where I got the "ohhh, I know where we are..." moment: this is the other side of the weird bit around the back of Clifton Down shops, overlooking the oddly-placed private car park, adjacent to the little path with steps that people use to cut through to the shops from Alma Vale Road.
It's just off the main drag, but having a little garden that separates it from Oakfield Road makes it seem a little more private.
I couldn't really do them justice, but each garden was really nicely kept, in its own way. I wonder if they have a gardening committee?
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...
I foolishly didn't leave time to pop in and pick up a coffee on my way back from my outing.
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.
Well, not now it isn't. The church was demolished (after spending some post-war time deconsecrated as St Andrew's Hall) to make way for flats in 1975. There are some photos of how it used to look on ChurchCrawler.
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 😀
One of those places where if you go in and ask for some fly spray, a socket set and some tachyon conduit for a Type 40 TARDIS they'll just start rummaging in the back room and ask you whether you want the socket set in metric or Imperial.
And the pedestrian and vehicle entrances to Regent House, the offices above. Looks like someone's managed to smash Knight Frank's window; maybe it's a protest against the house prices in the area.
I've not been in since it changed from a Boston Tea Party, but I may have to try it just to sit upstairs and watch the world go by like I used to...
So the Paragon kids play football? I'd sort of assumed there would be miniature Rugby posts, or perhaps a fives court.
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..."
Coffee, Coronation and Clift House Road
28 May 2021
Another dash to Greville Smyth Park for a coffee from Rich at Hopper, but at least this time I managed to divert a bit and knock off a small section of Cumberland Road I'd managed to miss on previous excursions. Along the way I muse on a strange residence in between a warehouse and a tannery, and wonder if the Mayor might be deliberately letting the Cumberland Road Flyover area go to seed...
This is the bit of Coronation Road I came to wander down specifically, one of the little bits of road I'd missed on previous walks. It features the same nice Victorian terraces as much of the rest of Bedminster, including individual house names. I imagine the constant traffic reduces the appeal of this stretch, though.
I managed to knock off a reasonable chunk of the roads I had left to walk around the University at the north-eastern extremity of my mile on this nice sunny walk. As well as being impressed by the number of big townhouses now occupied by various departments, I took some time on my way there to check out a war memorial, and some time on the way back to do a little extra wandering of Berkeley Square.
This used to be a big hotel, starting off as a single villa and gradually expanding to a 250-bedroom giant by the 1950s. Currently it's student accommodation. It was run by John Dingle, an English chef who dreamed of being as well-regarded as his French counterparts.
The University is planning on knocking it down and putting up a very modern-looking library. I rather like it.
Bank Holiday Street Art
31 May 2021
A nice warm Bank Holiday Monday saw me walk back over to Bedminster to do justice to something we glimpsed on my last wander. Along the way I spotted a couple of new pieces of street art tucked away on the south side of the Cumberland Basin Flyover system, so this turned into a micro-graffiti walk.
