Brentford: grey scale # 3 - # 08/57

Sometimes "Grey" can look nice (as indeed we discovered when Mrs Sarkozy came to meet the Queen. Never has Grey looked so good on anybody!)

Brentford: grey scale # 2 - # 08/56

"The colour of Grey". The Golden Mile under cloud.

The old canal passes under the road beside the building with the blue glass. Go down the steps and walk along the canal into the old docks and muse over the contrast.

Firestone non resurget - # 185

Here's what started the fuss. The remnants of the great, magnificent Firestone Building on the Great West Rd: what's left of it, and what replaced it.

It signifies the move from the manufacturing economy towards the "knowledge" economy, the passing of the 20th Century and the move towards the 21st. It reminds us of how a major fault in a product can bring down a huge company (the Firestone radial tyre catastrophe).

The demolition of the Firestone building caused outrage, and thanks to that the other fine buildings have been preserved.

Open your search engine and key in "Firestone building, demolition, Great West Road" and you'll find a wealth of history and emotion.

The Pyrene Building - re-igniting the fires of the Golden Mile- # 184

Pyrene was a "big name" in fire extinguishers. Today the building stands, preserved but currently awaiting a tenant to use the huge space, in the company of its companions on the "Golden Mile". I had considered showing a detail of the "ram's horn" decoration on the tower, or even using colour to show the detail on the coloured tile doorway, but decided that it's worth seeing the whole thing.

Those who want to see more pictures and get more detailed information on the illustrious past of the "the Golden Mile" on the Great West Rd, might like to start at the comprehensive URL link below. Yesterday, Riz also helped out by mentioning the magnificent Hoover Building, up on the A40, near Hanger Lane.

The "Great Names" that originally occupied these buildings on the Golden Mile have passed into history, often because of unforeseeable commercial disasters or management blunders. This gives us an interesting insight into Power, Glory, Time and Tide. (In the case of Gillette, the production has been moved to Poland, and the "great icon" awaits a new tenant. "Perhaps a hotel?" some say.)

This leads me neatly towards the last image of this mini-series set for tomorrow.


http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rls=RNWE,RNWE:2006-02,RNWE:en&q=firestone+building+demolished+great+west+rd

Nostalgia on the Great West Road - # 183

I mentioned the Gillette building earlier:
http://richmonduponthamesdailyphoto.blogspot.com/2007/07/british-highways-are-fantastic-karl.html

Today I'm showing a detail of another of the buildings in the "iconic cluster" of art deco offices and factories. It is currently occupied by J C Decaux, the advetising group.

They are all clustered around Brentford Railway Station, close to the Grand Union Canal (itself a piece of industrial history) and were joined recently by the gigantic modern glass, concrete and steel HQ building of Glaxo Smith Kline. For a while, in the late 1960s & 70s, these relics 1930s "art deco" were decayed and unloved, but fortunately they are now preserved.

Photographs that speak 1 million words - # 182

Yesterday was me exercising a wicked irony and sense of the absurd.

Today's picture will probably be equally obscure to many, but it's about economics (little fish feeding off big fish) urban renewal, contrasts in styles, evocation of mood, the "urban landscape", modern Britain, immigration (the Polish girl sitting out front waiting for the mid-day customers) and much more.

It's about nostalgia, and it's about how sometimes just standing and looking at a scene provokes all kinds of thoughts to flood in.

This picture was taken close to the HQ building of Glaxo Smith Kline, the Bio-Tech giant.

Are thoughts, emotions and spiritual experiences purely the result chemical reactions processed in the miracle that is the human brain? Why do some people have a stronger tendency to one direction rather than another? What is talent?

Industrial Economy meets Knowledge Economy - # 178

We are staying with the waterborne theme up at Brentford, immediately north of Richmond.

Here is the Grand Union Canal, completed in 1805, to bring industrial goods by canal from Birmingham to London. This was a very important stepping stone in the advance of the economy. Within about 40 years it was struggling to compete with the new railway. Today it makes a pleasant recreational area at the foot of the huge Glaxo Smith Kline HQ complex, but the canal is still an active and well used resource.

"British highways are fantastic!": Karl Moritz 1782 - # 159

The "Oxford Road" from Isleworth to Hounslow is no longer photogenic, nor recognisable - except for the traffic. Karl's road still exists, and has also been supplemented by two more: the dual lane express road A4 Great West Rd built in the 1930s and in the 1960s the M4 Motorway. All three of these are stunningly busy, somewhat as Karl describes in his description of the main road to the West. They are also a difficult photographic challenge, because of the siting and the dangers involved.

On the Great West Rd at "Gillette Corner" there is a fine collection of iconic 1930s factory and headquarters buildings - and indeed some brand new ones are appearing nearby e.g. the Glaxo Smith Kline HQ. Alas, the Firestone Tyre building was cunningly and wickedly demolished by developers only a matter of hours before a preservation order was issued. Today, the various sites are better appreciated. It's worth seeing. This is the "Gillette Building".

Karl Moritz wrote................" I was now on the road to Oxford. It is a charming fine broad road, and I met on it carriages without number, which, however, on account of the heat, occasioned a dust that was extremely troublesome and disagreeable..........I was tired... I sat down in the shade under one of these hedges and read Milton....... those who rode or drove past me, stared at me with astonishment, and made many significant gestures as if they thought my head deranged..........many of the coachmen who drove by called out to me, ever and anon, and asked if I would not ride on the outside........every now and then, a farmer on horseback met me, he said, and seemingly with an air of pity for me, "'Tis warm walking, sir;" and when I passed through a village, every old woman testified her pity by an exclamation of - "Good God!"

The journey will continue tomorrow.

Readers please note: I intend to clear up an error I have found (thanks to more research on a doubt in my mind) and also to produce a mini series "The Making of Karl Moritz". In that I will try to take up the suggestion of pinpointing the sites on a map. I will also give you a few URLs so that you can see some sources for yourselves. This needs a little more time to prepare.