Finishing touch

Up above the shoppers on Whitefriargate this neat little boat and dolphins nicely finishes off the Marks and Spencer's building. M&S are the last remaining major chain on Whitefriargate which is rapidly declining into a mix of pawnbrokers, betting shops and charity shops. It used to be the main shopping area in the city and with competition from the glass and steel monsters down the road it looks doomed.

Shark infested pavement

Regular readers will be aware of the Hull fish trail. Well here's another one for the collection, a rather sad looking shark, and I think it's the biggest on the trail. It's on Whitefriargate near the ugly brute I posted a while back. This shark is carved from slate and was originally in the middle of Whitefriargate but was damaged by a heavy truck. It's now repaired and out of harm's way, appropriately outside the HSBC building.

In what used to be Woolies ...

The old  Woolwoth's store on Whitefriargate has got a new occupant, Boyes. Well it opened in September last year but I've only just round to noticing it. After Woolies went bust in '08 the store was a Peacock's shop but that didn't last too long. There didn't seem to be throngs of eager customers in the place but then Whitefriargate doesn't attract to passing trade it used to. I suppose Boyes know what they've taken on.

And while we're on Whitefriargate ...

And while we're on Whitefriargate, a short mediaeval street just 200 yards or so in length and once the flourishing bustling heart of town, I thought I'd count the empties as it were, the shops that serve no customers. I made it thirteen as of the end of last month. Even the charity shops have closed. I read recently that the death of the high street had been exaggerated, that people would not forgo the experience of real shopping for online purchasing. Well not here it seems.You expect to see tumble weed and hear coyotes howling.  Must make all those culture vultures wonder what kind of a place they've come to. Still the paving's new if a bit uneven in parts and there's a brand new phone box to call the Samaritans.

This 'joke shop' was opened at the beginning of the year of culture for one week only but seems to have survived. Click on it to enlarge and read the 'amusing' posters; the humour may not travel well.

I counted this as one but it could be two, so make that fourteen empty shops.

This one has been empty since at least 2014.

Fill Your Boots

The news earlier this year that the town centre was to lose a pair of Boots¹ (here on Prospect Street and later on Whitefriargate, yes poor old Whitefriargate is to lose yet another store!) was tempered somewhat by the announcement that a brand new, size 16, mega Boots was to arrive in St Stephens. The new store duly opened a few days ago with "huge queues" (who queues for the opening of a new chemists shop? Do they pay them like opera claqueuers to wait from dawn with bated breath for the doors to open? Do they put off buying their Germaloids until the big day? Just what is it that makes these people tick?). So ... anyway, in this town,  the score is two lost and one found ...


¹ Boots, or Boots Alliance, formerly a large and well liked UK pharmacy and retail company bought by Swiss private equity and later sold to Walgreens of the USA. Now just another retailer with too many stores and not enough customers. And, after some atrociously poor customer service, at another Boots, I never go in this place ... I'm sure they miss me.

The large cool store is closed ...

Last Saturday (May 4^th) Marks and Spencer on Whitefriargate closed after nearly ninety years of selling "cheap clothes/ Set out in simple sizes plainly/ (Knitwear, Summer Casuals, Hose,/ In Browns and greys, maroons and navy)". Truth is that M&S has been on its way out since well before old Larkin went to the inevitable. There were rumours that the store was somehow bribed not to leave Whitefriargate when St Stephens was built a decade ago. Whatever the truth the customers no longer "leave at dawn low terraced houses/ Timed for factory, yard and site" and haven't done so for generations. I haven't bought anything from M&S this century, certainly no clothing ever. Their food store became pretentious and much parodied (This is not just tosh; this is M&S  tosh ...)

 

Perhaps, though, it's not too late for a blue plaque commemorating Larkin buying his kecks at Markies ...oh,  and writing "a silly poem about nighties" .

The building with its classical columns and bronzed shop front was designed by Jones & Rigby in 1931~ish when M&S were in competition with Woolworths not only for sales but in shop design. Woolies (always a much cheaper store in price and attitude than M&S) went to that great administrator in the sky eleven years ago during the 2008 evenements. There's a wee Viking boat on the top which I've shown before but a second look won't kill you.

Those who seek more about the architectural history of Marks and Spencer's  stores could do worse than take a peek at this link.

I have a little list

That's the long list of empty buildings on Whitefriargate, poor Demon Trading has been added, closed because of high business rates (well done Hull City Council) and fall in passing trade due the recent year long city works (again take a bow HCC!). Even the website no longer works. But all is not doom and gloom, no sir, because we can take one off the list. A charity shop will be taking over in the store next door but one to this. 

This art deco style building was, I recently found out, the original BHS store built in 1934 and stands on the site of the original frontage of the George Hotel which in turn stood on the site of the residence of an Elizabethan businessman. (Did I mention Whitefriargate goes way back?). The current BHS store is on the larger list of empty buildings in Hull but disappointingly not on the list of nine buildings given listed status in an announcement today, the campaign to save the BHS mural continues.

Rainbow-Friargate

Whitefriargate is the scene of a colourful installation by  Hsiao-Chi Tsai & Kimiya Yoshikawa inspired by "the seaport character of Hull". It's the latest in a series of exhibits using the empty shops and spaces of the street; really it's an effort to get people to visit this end of town. There's a bit more information here.

If you do fancy visiting Hull (and who wouldn't?) then be warned that Whitefriargate is pronounced as something like "Witfregit". For more helpful advice on meeting and greeting the natives I can recommend this site.

Summer in the City

Six years ago, almost to the day, I posted a collection from a trip round town on a Saturday afternoon. I thought maybe it could be time for a sequel, update, repeat call it what you will. There was plenty to see, as last time, but later, when I got home and watched to local news on ITV, I realised that I'd 'missed' a 'party' in Whitefriargate celebrating the birthday of murdered MP Jo Cox ( I'd noticed the seats and folk sitting around but ignored it ...had I known I would still have ignored it anyway, there's a creepy and creeping use of this woman's death as a weapon to try to silence dissent. She is portrayed a some kind of saint whereas she was in fact just another Labour/Remain MP whose politics I do not support and never will.). I also missed a gathering in Queen's Gardens by trade unionists still trying to get folk to think that unity is strength and passing on the age old messages of the labour movement... good luck with that on the first warm Saturday of the summer ... and Summer in the City was what the really quite talented young busker above was singing, he must really like the old tunes from last century ...

Mickey™ was posing for selfies and trying to sell twisted balloons

The youngsters' steel band was playing Johann Pachelbel's Canon in D which goes surprisingly well on steel drums; it does however go on and on and on and on ... and then stops for no apparent reason, a relief to all concerned.

A wee bit of faintly ridiculous quasi phoney Scottish cultural tosh was ignored by the oh so discerning passers-by ... they know their Culture when they see it.

The indoor market that two years ago I posted as being empty and deserted was heaving, it seems every pitch or stall has been filled with large variety of enterprising businesses. It was good to see  and a bit like old times.Let's hope it can continue.

Quite a lot of places had little yellow elephants displayed and outside a pub on Trinity House Lane a lady was wearing a plastic yellow elephant on her head, (out of respect for her privacy/sanity I did not photograph it). Seems it was Yellow Day in Hull and that's as much as I know or indeed want to know. 

And finally, before I go, there's this ...

Does your local news get read by someone who makes you want to throw yourself under a passing train or bus just for shits and giggles? Mr Levy... what can I say after watching this one-time 'actor' and disc-jockey read the news on the local BBC for what seems like a lifetime? ... he ums, he ahs, ums and ahs, ums and ahs ... he speaks with his mouth shut, he mutters, he mumbles, he puts accentuation in all the wrong places...  he thanks us for being there each evening,  and, ever so politely, thanks us again for "tuning in" (tuning in? Poor old soul, probably thinks he's still on the wireless.); he looks like he's lost a pound and found a penny ... and thanks to the iniquity of the British television licence, the vile regressive TV Tax,( soon to be reimposed on 75 year old pensioners), we all pay his wages whether we watch him or not ... and do you know what? Hundreds if not thousands like him and think he's doing a grand job... de gustibus and all that jazz.

Trinity House Lane, Hull

 Trinity House Lane runs from Trinity Square to Whitefriargate. The building on the left is Trinity House, the organisation runs the lighthouses around Britain's shores as well as other nautical affairs. In Hull there is a Trinity House School associated with this building. The pub in the centre is the Kingston, here showing the flags of England's less than exciting World Cup effort. The tower on the left is the indoor market, quite why it needed a tower I don't know. The market is becoming more run down as stallholders can't make a living. This picture was taken from what used to be Hull's open market place, sadly Hull no longer has an open market. The development of Princes Quay and more recently the St Stephen's Mall means that fewer people come to this older part of town, you can see it's hardly crowded out. 

... do not sound a trumpet before you ...

If one could earn even ten pounds a week at begging, it would become a respectable profession immediately. A beggar, looked at realistically, is simply a businessman, getting his living, like other businessmen, in the way that comes to hand. He has not, more than most modern people, sold his honour; he has merely made the mistake of choosing a trade at which it is impossible to grow rich.

 George Orwell

"Do not feed the troll" is the lesson instilled in every child from the first gift of the internet at whatever early age is thought suitable these days... to which has now been added the age old edict "Do not give to the beggar" the mot du jour of the local Council. Your left hand seems to have discovered that your right hand has been doing good works to those deemed to be living an "at risk" lifestyle and your left hand is most unhappy. Your spare change might be helping buy that guy's next fix of whatever nice chemical he chooses to escape from the drudge of living in the city of culture, your scruffy little beggar may well be in fact a con artist (who isn't these days? Is it not written that all will be fake and all manner of things shall be fake...) with a nice flat paid for by housing benefit; your beggar is a smack head, a spiced out zombie, the scum of the earth, a drag on the social budget, a filthy stinking rotten nuisance ... that is your beggar so don't you go giving the beggar your precious pennies. No, give it instead to a Council approved list of charities who will see to it that your money goes to all the right places, the acceptable places, the 'deserving' places, ... all of course via the charities' very reasonable expense accounts, they have to live after all, they have rent to pay, managers to pay, they aren't a charity ... erm ... and somewhat like Orwell I see little difference between the beggars on  Jameson Street and Whitefriargate and the charities set up to do "good works": they just cut out the middle man. 

And I won't lie; I don't give to either.

The Erstwhile Bank

In what estate agents might call a prime location on the junction of Hallgate and King Street here is the building formerly known as HSBC. If this does not become a trendy wine bar and/or  restaurant in the next few months I'll be very surprised. It seems the big boys are closing branches up and down the country. HSBC are closing two branches in town including the Whitefriargate one. While Cottingham still has three other banks that folks can use some villages and even small towns have no banks at all which I imagine is a right pain if you're a pensioner with limited mobility and no understanding the web or if you're trying to run a shop and run out of change. 

Mea maxima culpa

                 
                           "The Philistines were Wrong: Culture can bring a city back to life"
                                                                                       Richard Morrison, The Times

I noticed how vibrant Whitefriargate had become as I wandered down there on a rainy day last week. It was like the old times, only seen in those black and white films of smiling folk in fifties coats and suits all wearing hats trying not to look at the camera but somehow failing ... and the sun always shining. The sound of thousands of happy shoppers thronging the revitalised stores and small shops near deafened me and I had to struggle through the milling crowds as they ambled slowly along to the rattle of filling tills ... I was wrong, I thought, I lacked faith, with a little bit of imagination, Culture really can bring a city back to life.

And this, this is just fake news, I wouldn't pay it any mind.

Kapow!

Here's a sign that really makes an impact on Whitefriargate. The shop sells the kind of tacky gadgets and gizmos that modern life finds indispensible. The building was part of  a redevelopment in 1795 of Trinity House property and is Grade 2 listed. Older Hull residents may remember this as the Kardomah coffee house. The old sign was uncovered during recent redecoration (see here)

A room with a view

Sneaking through the new Zebedee's Yard car park the other day I came across this odd thing. It's some kind of observation platform stuck on top of a building behind the old Neptune Hotel aka Boots the chemist on Whitefriargate. I'll tempt fate and say it wouldn't be sticking my neck out too far to say that, as the building was part of the Customs and Excise extortion racket until 1912, it has some nautical connection since from up there you would have been able to see all the comings and goings on Hull's docks and the river traffic as well. A low tech version of Big Brother is watching you ... the 'security' camera is the modern version.

The weekend in black and white has crept up on us again and it's here.

Monkfish

It's been a while since I mentioned Hull's fish trail so I thought it might be safe to venture back into the water, as it were, that is until I came face to face with this gurning brute. This monkfish was made in 1992 or thereabouts by Gordon Young out of black carboniferous Belgian limestone. I think that's just about all you need to know about it. Oh yeah it's lurking at the end Whitefriargate , you have been warned.

Silver Street

Here with its seasonal decoration dimly glittering in the late afternoon light is Silver Street. It continues eastwards from Whitefriargate to Lowgate in the distance. It has a mixture of businesses mainly connected with the legal and financial side of life. At each end there are former clearing banks, splendid buildings, that now are taken over with coffee bars and similar. Running off the street is Hepworth's Arcade on the right and a mediaeval passage way to Ye Olde White Hart pub on the left.

Saturday Afternoon

So this is what Hull gets up to on a Saturday afternoon in June! Let's start with the copper man who sits on an invisible seat, close by there's the preacher man converting no-one in particular but the whole world in general and roundly ignored by all and sundry.

In Queen's Gardens it was Armed Forces Day with a rock band, loud and not too bad, in the new bandstand and lots of stalls for various army things, not my cup of tea but you can't please everyone. In the morning there had been a march by troops through the town past the mayor in all her glory. Needless to say I missed that.

It was ten minutes 'till the next Punch & Judy show so I moved on and took pictures of the new bridge which I posted yesterday.

On Whitefriargate a man was sculpting a dog out of sand, according to the local newspaper there's a craze for this kind of thing. Whoever would have guessed?

And last but by no means least Hull's Olympic gold medal winning boxer Luke Campbell was giving sparring lessons to anyone brave enough to take him on in Queen Victoria Square ... 

After all that it was time to go home and put my feet up. There were other things going on as well but if I told them all here there'd be nothing left for tomorrow. Hull dull? Nah! Well not today at least.