The railway viaduct at Knaresborough carries the line to Harrogate across the deep valley containing the River Nidd. It opened in 1851 and cost £9,803 (which equates to around £1.4m today – a figure that seems nonetheless quite low. I wonder how much labour and other costs would otherwise inflate a modern day similar construction?). The viaduct had originally been intended to open three years earlier but it collapsed shortly before completion necessitating a complete re-build.
Across the river Carrying passengers to Harrogate and on
A couple more frames of the expired Fuji Sensia, these made during a trip to the Yorkshire market town of Knaresborough. It’s a lovely town to visit, but the weather was less than great on the day we visited, with scatterings of rain and dull overcast skies most of the time we were there, although – wouldn’t you know it – it brightened up as soon as it was time to leave!
Anyway, there wil be quite a few more photos from Knaresborough appearing over the coming days, but most of them are black and white (which better suited the conditions, to be honest).
Red and green ladies Lined up on the riverside Waiting for oarsmen
While most of the photos I made on my walk around the Tideswell area were black and white images shot on HP5+, I also took a couple of colour photographs too. These were courtesy of my Canon Sure Shot Supreme, which I’d tossed into my coat pocket before I’d left the house. I kinda wished I hadn’t taken it along as it continually banged, worryingly and annoyingly, into limestone rocks every time I climbed a stile. Luckily it didn’t seem to take any critical knocks though.
The two photos were shot on a roll of expired Fuji Sensia 100 reversal film. After successfully shooting my previous roll of expired slide film (some Kodak Elite Chrome) with the Sure Shot Supreme, I decided to use it again with the Sensia and shoot it at box speed. As with the Elite Chrome I have some more rolls of this same film so this was essentially a test to see how it fared. Most of the roll was shot over the following couple of days on trips out with my wife, but these two pictures of a farm on the hillside above Miller’s Dale were the first ones I made.
As withe my previous rolls of 35mm expired slide film, I seem to have lucked out with some decent results. Although a little bright in places (the white painted farmhouse was in full sunlight), nothing has been blown out and the colours are pleasing.
More expired slide film To be well tried and tested And prove it still works
New Era Square is a recently completed development to the south of the city centre, just the other side of the ring-road that circles the middle of town. It consists of three building surrounding a pedestrian plaza and has been dubbed in the local press as “Sheffield’s Chinatown”, and “Sheffield’s very own version of New York’s Times Square” apparently, although the latter would seem a little on the ambitious side.
One of the features of the development is a family of three eye-catching panda statues. A public campaign sought names for each of the trio from the readers of the local paper, The Star. The final names chosen were Little Mester, who sits on a bench – named in reference to the small cutlery workshops which used to be numerous in the city; Coe Coe, a small panda climbing one of the building columns – named after Sebastian Coe, the Olympic athlete who lived in Sheffield as a boy; and Hendo, the largest of the three pandas which was mounted on the roof of one of the buildings for a while, but who now sits in the plaza, and is named after Sheffield’s much-loved local delicacy, Henderson’s Relish (or Hendo’s as it is generally known).
I don’t have a close-up photo of Coe Coe, but he can be spotted in one of the images featuring Hendo and Little Mester if you look carefully.
Not Winnie the Pooh Nor Baloo. But pandas are A type of bear too
Even the Women of Steel statues in Sheffield city centre are taking precautions. Well, one of them is at least. The one on the left is showing blatant disregard for social distancing guidelines while not wearing a mask. Perhaps the anti-vaxxer movement has even found a hold in the staue community…
Finding some humour In a public health crisis You have to laugh, eh?
I’ve been very impressed with the quality of the images from the tiny Olympus XA3. Given the zone focus system I wondered if they might not have the sharpness I might expect in comparison with a camera that allows full focusing and control of aperture, but it makes tack-sharp photos.
I’ve often heard said That you might find some good things In small packages
The branch of Debenhams shown in today’s post has been in Sheffield since 1973 when it replaced Paulden’s department store. It closed for good (along withe every other branch of the store) in May 2021, the mandated closure of non-essential retail businesses due to the Covid-19 pandemic hammering the final nail into its coffin.
It marked a double-whammy for Sheffield as there were not just one, but two seperate branches of Debenhams in the city. The one shown here at the top of The Moor, and another, more recent branch, in the Meadowhall shopping mall.
There are not many Department stores left in town I hope some survive
The John Lewis department store in Sheffield can trace it’s history back to 1847. It was originally a silk mercer and hosier founded by brothers John, Thomas and Skelton Cole and traded under the name Cole Brothers. The Cole Brothers business was sold to Selfridge Provincial Stores in 1920 which was itself then bought by John Lewis during the Second World War.
The store continued to trade under the Cole Brothers name in Sheffield and moved to new premises in Barker’s Pool in 1963. The store expanded further when the former primitive methodist chapel, Bethel Chapel, which sits across the road from the main building on Cambridge Street, was purchased to house the offices. Later, these secondary premises would house the toy and sports departments. The store branding has now been removed, but the upper floors of this building can be seen in the image below.
In 2002 the store was formally re-branded to John Lewis. In 2021 it was announced that the store would be closing permanently. The main entrance to the building is covered with messages from staff, customers, and Sheffielders recounting memories of working in and visiting the store and lamenting its loss.
Hearts on store window A lament to memories past Working and shopping
A quick post today as it’s almost time for our Saturday-night movie – we’ve been watching the whole MCU series in release order for the past few months, one movie per week, and are now almost at the end – just Avengers: Endgame tonight, and then Spider Man: Far From Home next week and that’s all twenty-two viewed in sequence. Then we’re done until Black Widow gets it’s belated release in a couple of months. We’ve also had a Chinese takeaway and I’m feeling stuffed to the gills with all manner of dishes.
Anyway, here’s a photo of a small passageway in the centre of Sheffield that I’ve never noticed before. I always presumed it was an entrance to the office building beneath which it passes, but it’s actually a thoroughfare!
Lots of Chinese food Now I’m ready for Thanos And his comeuppance
I’m still in my “don’t feel like posting” mood today, although not so much as before. I didn’t have an extra-long day at work today, as with the previous two, plus the report I had to deliver has now been sorted and presented, so that’s out of the way and off my mind to a large degree (although there’s still further work to be done as an outcome). I don’t think the warm weather we’re having at the moment is helping much either, even though it’s not unseasonably hot or anything, rather we’ve had a run of colder-than-expected temeratures and now it’s bounced back to normal it feels like a heatwave in comparison.
The weekend beckons though, and while the usual chores are waiting to rob me of my time (the grass needs cutting again) I should have enough time to at least try and relax and do something I enjoy. This weekend, if the sunshine holds, that will hopefully include a walk to try out some expired Velvia 50 that I have four rolls of. This will be my test roll and give me a good idea of how the film performs given it’s age and give me confidence (or not) as to it being useable. I have some Sensia 100 received from the same person and the first roll of that looks fine (although I haven’t scanned it yet).
Anyway, I’m supposed to be averse to posting at the moment, so I’d better bring things to a close with some photographs. A couple more from my XA3 test roll.
The first photo is looking up to the large block of concrete that is the O2 Academy, but which will always be the Roxy nightclub to people of a certain age. It sits atop a large NCP car park and, while not to everyone’s taste, is quite a distinctive structure.
The second shows a much older building in the shape of the NSPCC building. It’s surrounded by more modern structures, but the curve of the block-paved roadway leading up to and around the building makes for a nice image.
Drinking and dancing Loud music and toilet floods That allright f’yers?
