Thursday Doors

Door 40

I saw this door yesterday, while on a short walkabout looking for (yes…predictably) street art. The door is situated at the bottom end of a walled garden belonging to a house called Field House – the words can just about be seen engraved into the keystone at the top of the arch. That was all I knew about the place, so I set to work…thank you Interweb.

The House, which is Grade II listed, was built in the early part of the 19th century, and when it was first built, there was not much in the way of other buildings in the immediate vacinity.

You can see Field House in the map above appearing as a square in the centre of the picture – the garden is still intact today.

Not an awful lot has changed by 1855, but the map is a little bit more detailed. There is a small outbuilding in the bottom corner of the garden.

By the 1880s there is a major change and many new houses have appeared, especially to the north of Field House. Urbanisation, population growth and the impacts of the industrial revolution will all have contributed to the spread of housing in the city.

By the 1900s the area had become swamped by the growth of the city, however, the walled garden has remained and is a small oasis and time capsule of how things were.

I took a peek through the door and the garden is no longer a grand garden with organised flowerbeds, but is laid out as a split level lawn…looking very yellow due to the lack of rain with one or two trees. The outbuilding is no longer there.

Great to understand a little more about what lies behind a door.

by Scooj

More doors at: Thursday Doors – Norm 2.0

Thursday doors

Door 39

This is the prefect double-take door. Something is so very wrong.

What I like most is that even though the steps have been removed, the decorations hanging from the doorknob are still there.

I guess this has happened to make space for a car. This space was probably needed because street parking in the road is particularly conjested. Parking is bad here because it is one road away from the controlled parking zone (where I live). What this means is that commuters into Bristol park in this road and leave their cars here all day. This is an unintended consequence for those residents who voted against residents parking (for which you have to pay to park outside your own home). I think the residents would give anything now to have a controlled parking zone. They might not have to convert their front gardens and remove steps to their front doors if there were one.

The domino effect.

by Scooj

More doors at: Thursday Doors – Norm 2.0

Thursday doors

Door 38

This week I thought I’d take you on a little tour to one of the very special places in Bristol, Cabot Tower on Brandon Hill. The Thursday door is a bit of an excuse really to share something that lies behind the door, so door specialists had better lower their expectations. To all those who are keen to know who discovered the coast of North America in 1497, read on…

Cabot Tower was built in 1897/98 to commemorate the fourth centenary of John Cabot’s (Giovanni Caboto) discovery of the coast of North America under the commission of Henry VII of England. John Cabot set out from Bristol on the 2 May 1497 on The Matthew with 18 crew members and made landfall in Newfoundland on 24 June that same yesy. What a voyage that must have been on this tiny ship.

There are several plaques on the outside of the tower that offer some historuical context.

This is the foundation stone.

Ok, so here are some doors… this is the rather underwhelming door immediately inside the tower – I expect it was once the kiosk, but now the tower is un-manned and permanently open to the public. The steep spiral staircase starts to the left.

Another door, this one without glass, opens out at the first stage with three balconies looking out to the South, West and East.

The reason for climbing the stairs is to take in the breathtaking views of Bristol. This is looking south and the building with the green roof immediately after the park is where I work.

Zooming in a little to the South West you can see I. K. Brunel’s SS Great Britain in its permanent dry dock. The little cottage just at the stern of the ship is the building that Brunel worked from.

Another of Brunel’s extraordinary landmarks, the Clifton Suspension Bridge, can be seen to the West and spans across the Avon Gorge, through which Cabot would have sailed all those centuries ago.

Serendipitously, the modern replica of Cabot’s Matthew was motoring around the floating Harbour, just as I reached the top of the tower. It is a very small boat to be crossing the Atlantic in.

Then to the door back down…

And the slightly tatty and scary stairwell.

by Scooj

More doors at: Thursday Doors – Norm 2.0

Thursday Doors

Door 37

I like these kind of composite doors, doors within doors that are rather shabbily finished. This one has a slot cut out of it for a letterbox and locks on both sides, so where are the hinges?

The most observant among you might have noticed a little blue plaque on the right of the door which is one of Will Coles’ bees that he installed during Upfest 2017 last July. In fact I realise that is it one that I haven’t photographed before, so of course I have to go back to snap it up.

The building is what we used to call a junk shop when I was a kid, but I’m not sure it is terribly polite to call it that. A trader of second hand goods, house clearance and antiques might be more appropriate.

There is also something rather appealing about the angry face graffiti too. A nice grey door – something quite ordinary transformed into the extraordinary by simply stopping to take a look at it.

by Scooj

More doors at: Thursday Doors – Norm 2.0

Thursday doors

Door 36

I missed my first Thursday doors last week since I began 37 weeks ago. Just a little too much on my plate.

This week I was sifting through my archives when I found this door, which I have been looking for for a long time. I knew I had it, but I just didn’t know where.

The door in question, Number 5, has undergone many facelifts over the last few years of which I think this was the best. Currently it is free from graffiti and I think the owner is trying to keep the door and walls clean. It will be an uphill struggle, but I genuinely wish them luck. I don’t much favour graffiti on private property.

I think the owner at the time might have painted these pineapples as a way of discouraging graffiti, and it certainly worked for a while. Some (many) taggers have no respect though. The pineapples made me smile though. I am glad I found them again.

by Scooj

More doors at: Thursday Doors – Norm 2.0

Thursday doors

Door(s) 35

For the second week running I am stretching slightly the definition of doors, but in my view these do qualify.

Bristol has been a significant port in the development of European and world trade through the centuries and brought great wealth to the nation. As shipping traffic increased there were significant challanges to be faced, the most important of which was navigation and berthing in a port with the second largest tidal range in the world. At Avonmouth in the Severn Estuary the tidal range is 14m and in Bristol itself it is 12m.

This meant that the larger vessels navigating the river Avon would have to wait for spring tides, causing congestion. Additionally, any vessels in the harbour would be left high and dry every day, some would tilt and some would get stuck. What I’m trying to say is that although a significant trading centre, Bristol was not an easy place to sail to.

The solution was to dam off the city stretch of water, creating a ‘floating’ harbour and to divert the course of the tidal river around the city in what is called the New Cut. This all happened in the early 19th century and at the time was the largest civil engineering project of its type anywhere in the world. The impoundment allowed ships to tie up alongside the docks and keys without the hassle of rising or falling tides. Entry into the harbour was via one of two locks in what is known as the Cumberland Basin.

The doors (lock gates) are huge and very impressive, and although they don’t see much use these days (the port closed as a commercial venture in 1975) they are still operational.

So here are the doors:

Cumberland Basin upper lock gate, Bristol

Cumberland Basin lower lock gate, Bristol

The Beady eyed among you will notice Brunel’s Clifton Suspension Bridge spanning the Avon Gorge

Colliter's Brook inlet into the New Cut, Bristol — Colliter’s Brook inlet into the New Cut, Bristol

More doors, this time managing the flow of one of Bristol’s brooks into the New Cut.

Bristol's floating harbour and SS Great Britain — Bristol’s floating harbour and SS Great Britain

This is one part of the extensive (28.3 hectares) floating harbour which is now a major leisure attraction and waterside housing asset in Bristol. Another of Brunel’s astounding achievements, the SS Great Britain permanently rests here.

Maybe back to some rather more conventional doors next week.

by Scooj

More doors at: Thursday Doors – Norm 2.0

Thursday doors

Door 34

This week I thought I’d go for something a little different.

It was my father’s funeral last Friday, and family and friends gathered in Penzance where he spent a very happy last few years of his life. We hired an Airbnb property for a couple of nights in a village just outside Penzance. The property was nothing flashy, nothing out of the ordinary. It was definitely a case of function over form, but comfortable enough and set in 16 acres of hillside woodland – perfect for the dog.

When we were choosing bedrooms, my daughter said she didn’t want the scary room, and my son, who arrived with my wife a day later (courtesy of sitting a GCSE exam) said exactly the same thing.

It turns out that the room was indeed scary with a full wall oak wardrobe door that was wholly out of place in the room. It looked like the doors had been harvested from some other piece of furniture and subsequently worked into this space. Something of ‘the Sixth Sense’ about it…

Needless to say, nobody slept in this room.

by Scooj

More doors at: Thursday Doors – Norm 2.0

	thearticleblogger54 on 1609. M32 Spot (22)
	Poet Rummager on Blackberrying
	scribeforlove on Blackberrying
	scribeforlove on Downside summer
	scribeforlove on 1609. M32 Spot (22)

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this: