Victoriana rules

 

The word most often applied to the Glebe Pub in Stoke town is 'stately' - and it is. This old Victorian was restored by the Joules beer company, and really is an asset to this already heritage-rich corner of the town.
The only shame is that we can't go there right now.  We are in the middle of a second Covid lockdown across all England.  Roll on the time when pubs can reopen!

The royal arms over the fireplace are the gasp-out-loud feature as one enters the pub.

Factory makes Biennial

The British Ceramic Biennial comes to an end on Sunday - the exhibition, which highlights contemporary work in the ceramics world, has been taking place over the last few weeks.

Frankly, I wasn't that impressed this year; everything seemed a bit flat, and the exhibits and ideas were a little underwhelming.   But, once again, it was the venue that saved the day - the now empty and decayed Spode factory in Stoke, which housed the show, is fascinating in itself.

Hotel in a knot

When you hear the words 'railway hotel' you know just what you'll find - something amazingly solid and even elaborate. 
The North Stafford Railway Hotel, which stands opposite the railway station itself, was built in 1848 at the height of the early railway boom.  The North Staffs Railway Company must have insisted on the knots being in the design - the Knot being the symbol of the locality.

Wedgwood statue is a lie

This is Stoke-on-Trent's most famous statue - it is the potter Josiah Wedgwood, on a plinth outside Stoke Railway Station.
But... bearing in mind that December 3rd is the International Day of The Disabled... it is an impossible depiction, as Wedgwood should be really shown with just one leg.

Wedgwood is holding a copy of the Portland Vase (a piece of ancient Roman work), but he actually was not allowed to borrow the vase from its owner until 1786 - before reproducing his famous replica of it in 1790 (when he was 60).
But... the fact is that, many years earlier, in 1768, Wedgwood had had to have his right leg amputated.  So, the statue is a lie.

Of course, the statue was erected long after Wedgwood died in 1795, but the sculptor may well have known of Wedgwood's amputation anyway... and simply ignored it. 
The tendency to want our heroes to appear 'perfect' often overcomes a desire for truth. Sadly.

Not so secret society

The idea of freemasonry is still vaguely controversial... are freemasons a secret society of eccentrics or simply an example of a successful networking group?  A recent BBC article opened up the discussion again.

I know that Freemasonry started to get very respectable and widespread in the early part of the last century, but even so I was surprised to see the virtual whole of the west wall of Stoke Minster Church covered in memorial tablets to freemasons.  
I need to read up on the subject I guess.

The Spode who got the girl

Josiah Spode was one of the great potters of the eighteenth century, who, alongside men like Wedgwood, made the Potteries famous. 
Yet, this grand and rather overwhelming monument in Stoke Minster is for his grandson - Josiah Spode III (who is largely unremarked in the history books).  In fact, as far as I can see JS III only ran the business for two years.

Still, to have a grieving maiden weep over your death for nearly two centuries is some sort of achievement I suppose...

Free works of art

The British Ceramic Biennial Show is under way in Stoke-on-Trent again, and lasts until November.  The exhibits on show have a wide range - from industry output to rather eccentric works of pottery art.

On this stand in the photo, the artist Lawrence Epps, who has been working at Ibstock Bricks, was showing some 15,000 items of mass-produced sculpted brick.  Members of the public were encouraged to pick up a paper bag and take one of the pieces home with them.
It certainly solves the problem of what to do with the exhibits at the end of the show...

A row of gold coin

A street not far from Stoke town centre is a monument to good fortune, but unless you look carefully you'll miss the fine details - the words between the bricks.

The row of glazed tiles you see in the photo was installed on the exterior of all the houses along Shelburne Street, a row of terraced homes, when the street itself was created.

The story goes that the developer of the houses here had won a considerable amount of money at the races - which he then used the fund the project.
And the name of the winning horse?  Well, the clue is in the tiles... "Gold Coin"!

May we all have such good fortune in the New Year...

This post was featured on the City Daily Photo Theme Day

Art Deco faces bulldozer

This fabulous Art-Deco decorative piece on the front of The Bird In Hand pub in Oakhill tells a sad story. The pub closed down a while ago, and doesn’t look like re-opening.

To hear of yet another pub closing is not new, but people forget that some pubs really do have some remarkable assets in terms of popular art.
The rest of the pub’s façade is pretty dull; but I hope this section will be saved.

Stafford Knot - railway style

The ‘Stafford Knot’ is the symbol of Staffordshire - as I like to point out in this blog quite frequently!  The symbol is at least 500 years old (though some argue its origins go back a thousand years). Everywhere round here that a reference to the county comes up in a graphic form, you’re likely to see the Knot.

These old gates mark the entrance to a railway property in Stoke, which would have been owned by the North Staffordshire Railway Company up to the company's demise in the last century. The NSR used the Knot as a proud statement of its origins.

Link: Stafford Knot

Advertising sign looks back to Spratts

These old tin advertisement-signs are disappearing now; and you’re more likely to see one in a curio shop than you are up on a wall anymore. So this one is pretty rare!

At one time, Spratts was THE big name in animal food. They were the original makers of ‘Bonio’, an odd, bone-shaped, amazingly popular biscuit for dogs.

Curiously, this sign remains only where it is because it is aligned to a pet-shop - that is still trading from this same spot in the West End of Stoke after all these many years.

Saracenic in Stoke

It looks proudly like the sort of Indo-Saracenic architecture made in British India. This building rises coolly above its rather ugly surroundings in Stoke town centre.
I always am thankful to see it – Stoke town needs this spot of glamour in it, it really does.

In fact, it is (I think) the former Co-Operative store; and is now a set of business offices.

Stoke - by any other name

This Stoke village is actually in… Devon.  But, heck, I just thought it was an interesting example of the fact that place-names, even those of major cities like Stoke-on-Trent, are very often not unique.

The etymology of the name Stoke is “a place where a fire is stirred up”.  So – it could be just about anywhere really…

Legendary Lonnie - Stoke legend

'Legendary Lonnie' is one of the great characters of the Potteries. One of the earliest rock ‘n rollers, starting a band in 1959, he’s been playing rock guitar ever since.
Despite his advancing age, he recently re-issued one of his CDs for the American market!

He had a record shop in Stoke town for a long while in the seventies and eighties. This dilapidated sign – a cartoon image of the great man himself - was all that remained of the shop when he left it, but even this is gone now. I managed to snap a photo of it before it was ripped down.

Link: Legendary Lonnie Band 

Shakespeare in Stoke

This lovely mosiac showing William Shakespeare is the highlight of a tour of Stoke town centre. Yet, Stoke has been allowed to run down so much, that it's virtually the only highlight...

It was created as part of the erection of the original library building in Stoke in the 1870s, when Stoke really was an important place.
It is on the exterior wall, so very easy for the passer-by to see.

But look how run-down the old library building is now!
It just looks grubby and uncared for.
It's currently used by Unison, the trades union, and lies opposite the Sainsbury hyper-market.

But having said that about Stoke town, I do have a soft spot for it. It seems lively somehow; it has the definitive Titanic pub, White Star, and a wonderfully chaotic old records shop, Rubber Soul.

Saved by graphic design

...if the Fine Art show was poor, the Graphic Design section (see photo) of the Staffordshire University Degree Show saved the blushes of the creative community at the Stoke campus. There really are some bright young students in that department, and the ideas fizzed about there in a way sadly lacking in the Fine Art show.

But what of the work of the other students - the ones in Photography, Ceramic Design, Textile Surface Design etc? All a bit desultory i thought. Each of those departments has so much of an eye on the commercial viability of what it does that the work sank without trace for me. (Though you'd think Graphic Design would have similar worries about 'viability'... but it didn't quash their ideas).

I didn't get to see the Film students' work as they decided they would go home early. Some things don't change...