Now Andy Robertson has begun a new project, which like all the others promises to be a wonderful record of how a derelict industrial site is redeveloped.
Some may not agree with that new development, but all of us can admire the meticulous way Andy returns month after month to the same site, chronicling, first the demolition of the old buildings, and then later after the area has been cleared, the point at which the builders break the ground and the slow rise of something knew.
Andy is not alone in photographing old buildings past their sell by date, but what makes his work unique is the collection of a large number of pictures of one site, which in the future will be an invaluable resource to historians.
And so, to this project which is on Skirton Road at the Old Trafford end.
I must confess to looking across at this building down Tennis Street, from Seymour Grove and barely giving it a glance, and once in the 1970s visiting friends who lived opposite the building in a terrace of houses on what is now the car park of Iceland.
From memory the building was part of the Arkady Soya Mill, and that much was confirmed by a trawl of internet, which offered up one site full of pictures of the interior after it had closed.*
For once I have resolved not to dig into the history of the building, because I am fully confident someone will supply chapter and verse.
Suffice to say that back in 1894 the site was the ground of the Northern Lawn Tennis Club which had been founded in 1881, and behind Skirton House which fronted Seymour Grove, which explains the origin of the names of Skirton Road and Tennis Street.
Sometime in the early 20th century the club moved to Didsbury, leaving the site open for industrial development.
And now that appears to have come full circle, leaving me just to say, watch this space.
Location; Old Trafford
Pictures; Skirton Road, 2014, and 2019, from the collection of Andy Robertson
* 28DaysLater.co.uk - 28DL , https://www.28dayslater.co.uk/threads/british-arkady-industrial-bakery-old-trafford-january-2019.118716/
 |
| 2014 |
Andy is not alone in photographing old buildings past their sell by date, but what makes his work unique is the collection of a large number of pictures of one site, which in the future will be an invaluable resource to historians.
And so, to this project which is on Skirton Road at the Old Trafford end.
I must confess to looking across at this building down Tennis Street, from Seymour Grove and barely giving it a glance, and once in the 1970s visiting friends who lived opposite the building in a terrace of houses on what is now the car park of Iceland.
 |
| 2019 |
For once I have resolved not to dig into the history of the building, because I am fully confident someone will supply chapter and verse.
Suffice to say that back in 1894 the site was the ground of the Northern Lawn Tennis Club which had been founded in 1881, and behind Skirton House which fronted Seymour Grove, which explains the origin of the names of Skirton Road and Tennis Street.
Sometime in the early 20th century the club moved to Didsbury, leaving the site open for industrial development.
And now that appears to have come full circle, leaving me just to say, watch this space.
Location; Old Trafford
Pictures; Skirton Road, 2014, and 2019, from the collection of Andy Robertson
* 28DaysLater.co.uk - 28DL , https://www.28dayslater.co.uk/threads/british-arkady-industrial-bakery-old-trafford-january-2019.118716/
No comments:
Post a Comment