The White Hart

This is not to be confused with Ye Olde White Harte, I suppose by rights it should be called the Not So Old White Hart. It's on Alfred Gelder Street and not too far from the ancient pub. Give it full marks for trying to at least look old.

Since we're on this street I suppose I should mention Alfred Gelder, an architect who seems to have designed most of Hull, from Queens Gardens to numerous methodist chapels even a local chain of shops and several pubs. On just about every main road you'll find something this guy has had a hand in. I don't think he built this one though.

Alfred Gelder Street

So here's the Guildhall, on the right, stretching all the way down Alfred Gelder Street. It's a large piece of Edwardian civic preening, seemingly big was beautiful in those days. At the far end there used to be a magistrates' court where petty crooks and poor unfortunates got tried for breaking the law (just being poor was, of course, a crime, still is it seems) whilst at this end the big time crooks were running the council for their own benefit. Of course those days are long gone, the small time crooks and the poor now have their own specially built high tech court buildings (there's money to be made out of the crime business) and the councillors have no powers other than to sack council workers and rip off folk with extortionate fees and stupid regulations. And the big time boys? Well, they seem to be running the country ...

There's more monochrome merriment at the Weekend in Black and White here.

Maritime Buildings

Maritime buildings are on Alfred Gelder Street close by the Guildhall and were actually designed by our old friends Gelder & Kitchen in 1900. The doorway is impressive but could do with some tlc and a good coat of paint. A nearby blue plaque informs us that a goodly portion of Finland's huddled masses went through Hull on their way to the land of the free and the home of the whatever ...

The White Hart Hotel, again

I've shown this pub/hotel a couple of times now. The last time was back in March last year with a hopeful note that the place would reopen in Spring. Well two Springs have passed and a Summer and now Autumn and it's still not open. The economic climate has clearly not changed much, at least not for the better. This is a rear view, as it were, from Salthouse Lane and shows the full extent of this really quite large establishment. I guessing from the cosy way it agrees with the streets that at some point this was rebuilt to fit in with the 'new' layout of Alfred Gelder Street.

100 Alfred Gelder Street

Next door to Essex House is a completely different building, turn-of-the-century Queen Anne revivalish offices with art nouveau trimmings. Did I mention eclectic? 

The upper dormer windows are described , somewhere or other, as a tasteful addition. Hmmm.

That old insipid feeling

I sometimes wonder if there was once a competition to see who could commission the most uninspiring buildings with the winners getting to see their visions of banality in bricks and mortar at the eastern end of Alfred Gelder Street. So bleak is the architectural canvas is that any little gimmick will temporarily dazzle. Here it's the glass rotunda (if that's the correct term) and silvered cupola of the Combined Courts building poking up above the skyline. It flatters to deceive however as the rest of the building is a mish-mash of styles designed to portray the majesty of the Law and failing. 

Sign of authority

Tucked away in a little brick hut and behind steel grills the harbour master's office near Drypool bridge is a reminder that, from the Humber to the northern boundary of the city of Hull, the navigation authority on the river Hull is Hull City Council. HCC's website informs us that "A harbour master is on duty from three hours before high water (HW) Hull (Albert Dock) until HW or later if required, except Sundays" and that the HM is responsible for the operation of the movable bridges that link both halves of this fair city. Actually I don't think the harbour master works from this building any more as his/her address is the Guildhall, Alfred Gelder Street, and given that hardly any navigating seems to go on nowadays the post must almost be a sinecure. 

The Guildhall, Hull

 

When Hull became a city in 1897 obviously it would have a new town hall, so the old one was pulled down and this cathedral to municipal might was erected in 1913 or thereabouts. It's a massive edifice stretching all the way down Alfred Gelder street (see below). The law courts used to be at the far end with Council business being carried out at the front. Now there's two new courts and the Council has little to do except collect the bins and do what central government tells it to do. Local democratic control simply doesn't exist in this country anymore.

You can tell what a busy place it is by the milling crowds thronging its doors. 

 

The Real Sea of Hull

It's been estimated that over 63,400 tonnes of sediment are deposited in the Humber every year. These range from gravels and sand through to fine clays and it these clays that give the Humber its characteristic brown soup appearance. Now a talentless American attention seeking photographer, on a commission from the fools and knaves who run the Ferens, wanted people to strip naked, be painted as the colours of the sea and spread themselves on the streets of the town. I suppose a wall of shitty brown humanity pouring down Alfred Gelder Street would have been such a drag and something of a public relations disaster. No wonder then that green-blue was the chosen colour. But when the North Sea eventually does flow down the streets of Hull (as it will, again) I doubt it will be turquoise or stop to pose for photographs.  'Humankind cannot bear very much reality' as someone other American once said.

A Piece of Advice

I got a bit of a shock when I saw this place closed. Surely, I thought, they can't have abolished Citizens Advice along with the rest of public services but a small notice by the door informs me that the Citizens Advice Bureau has moved from Charlotte Street Mews to the Wilson Building on Alfred Gelder Street. So at least for the time being we still have this small mercy.

Essex House

Essex House is a late sixties/early seventies addition to Hull's eclectic architecture, a substantial office block squeezed into the corner of Manor Street and Alfred Gelder Street that, as you pass gives little sense of its height due to the narrowness of the streets. It houses a range of businesses, solicitors, a call-centre, local government departments and last but not least the Coroner's Office. At one time it used to be the place where countless thousands signed on for their unemployment benefit but that's all been moved elsewhere.

Why not try teaching?

Alfred Gelder Street, Hull

This colourful bicycle advert is for teacher training in Hull (School Centred Initial Teacher Training!) and was one of several around town while the student degrees were being doled out the other week. I suppose if you can make it in Hull then you can make it anywhere. Teaching is not for everyone, and my experience, admittedly many years ago, is that really good teachers are rarer than hen's teeth. I know I couldn't do it, at least not without facing manslaughter charges after each lesson! Now I come to look at that bike again it does look a bit bloody ...

Poor old George

It's not much of a road more a cut through from Alfred Gelder Street to High Street but even so I bet old George was a bit miffed to have his yard renamed. How could he possibly compete with the 'sainted' Gandhi? It curls round the back of the Crown Court and brings you out near this.

A road by any other name ...

You know how towns like to honour folk by naming streets after them: so this town has a Larkin Close; an appropriately dull cul-de-sac, Alfred Gelder Street, Jameson Street, and Ferensway , of course; that local turncoat John Hotham from the civil war times gets a road along with Sir Thomas, Lord Fairfax who gets an avenue; there must be dozens more: Raich Carter Way, Blundell's Corner spring to mind as I write... just outside Hull, across the road from me, there's a short avenue named after a guy who wanted to be Lord Glencoe but somehow the connotations of bloody massacre made him change to Lord Strathcona ... so, anyway,  the other year they decided to rename Garrison Road as Roger Millward Way. I'm not sure that this is any kind of honour since Garrison Road as was is really just an extension of the dreaded A63/Castle Street, the bane of motorists' lives and a right pain in the nethers to cross at times... and I wonder how many even know about this or whether the name will catch on ... when they finally get home, will the motorists of this fair town put their feet up, wrap their hands round a well deserved hot brew and say "oh that *beeeep* traffic on Roger Millward Way was such a *beeeep* disgrace" ... nah not going to happen, ever.
I won't pretend to know anything about who or what Roger Millward was, some sporty bloke, so I've heard,  rugby league, really, really not my scene ...

I mentioned today and several times before that this road is  a pain to cross and that young men have been seen to turn into grey beard loons waiting, funeral directors have been spotted lurking for falling stock ... well some concerned person has put up a plaque to let the world know that those who wait may be gone but are not forgotten, not lost just gone before ...

County Court

I've never really looked at this entrance before. It's on Alfred Gelder Street and is part of the Guildhall. It's no longer in use as the County Court has moved on to pastures new. What intrigued me is the little pile of Edwardian baroque nonsense above the door (you might like to click on the image to enlarge it). Amongst the usual symbols of power, a lion head, sword, axe, keys, royal sceptre and the scrolls of law there are numerous overflowing cornucopias of poppy heads. Now, aren't poppies symbols of sleep and death? Is this some ironic comment on the process of civil litigation? Or could it be that whoever paid for this was in the opium trade? Your guess is as good as mine.

Did Britannia waive the rules?

This building on the corner of Whitefriargate and Land of Green Ginger was built in 1886 to house the Colonial and United States Mortgage Company. The architects were one Mr Clamp and our old friend Alfred Gelder. I know nothing of the Colonial and US Mortgage Company, Google refuses to enlighten me. I can tell you that many years after it was built it housed another mortgage company, the Britannia Building Society, later to become the Britannia Bank. Why isn't it still a branch of Britannia? Well you know it's just the old, old story ....

The Britannia Building Society, was caught up in the dying embers of the 2008 crash. It was  formed in the mid 19th century and was the second largest building society until it merged with the Cooperative Bank in 2009. Now I'm not going to say there was a criminal enterprise involved because no-one has been charged with anything but  the Britannia  had a boat load of bad debts (sub-prime garbage) on its books. The merged concern had to be 'distanced' from the mutual Co-op and in effect bought out. Expect a huge legal brouhaha over all this. Meanwhile if you know anyone who wants a Victorian French renaissance style office and erstwhile bank, here's one going spare.

Here's how it looked when new and yes it was enlarged at a later date. And quite how, despite being a listed building, that ornate frontage was replaced with  plate glass dreck is probably a story too murky for sensitive souls.

The House on Salthouse Lane

... and while we're on Salthouse Lane I must show you this grade 2 listed Georgian dolls' house that completely dominates what's left of the lane. This was built in the 1780's as a merchant's home, later became a branch of the Bank of England then a home for sailors. It's now part of a housing association. Although facing onto Salthouse Lane for some reason this is officially 105 Alfred Gelder Street. Ah well ... Someone with a lot of time on their hands has researched the whole history of this place and put their findings online here, so, many thanks to that person.

152 & 154 Hessle Road

In the late 19^th century a businessman by the name of William Henry Franklin seeing the need for shoes and boots in the boom town of Hull set up the fabulously named Public Benefit Boot and Shoe Company to go with this glorious moniker the company's logo was a horse drawn boot. This building designed by our old friend Alfred Gelder's company in 1896 was one of several stores in Hull in what had become a national chain. For what was effectively just a shoe shop it is a tad grand in the Flemish Renaissance Revival style. I note the ornate decoration above the first floor windows is only on one side which I find rather pleasing, can't be having too much frippery. It is, of course, grade 2 listed. It still sells boots though not for the public benefit needless to say.

I took me a walk down Hessle Road and along the way took a shed load of pictures so the next few days, possibly weeks, will feature this  part of town which was the centre of the fishing community in Hull, unless something better crops up or I get bored.

The old gas works

This is an early example of developing a brown field site, re-using a former industrial area. In this case the Broadley Street gas works, close by Queen's dock, were removed, the Guildhall and law courts built over them and the street renamed Alfred Gelder Street. The old Kingston Gaslight Company, using an inefficient and wasteful process, supplied a poisonous product that gave very poor illumination so not much has really changed over the years.

White Hart Blues

A sad little note in the window of the White Hart on Alfred Gelder Street informs the world that it is closed "due to the current economic climate". Optimistically it expects to reopen in the Spring. We shall see. Quite a few pubs have closed in recent years only to "reopen" as apartments.