Marco Polo, Chelsea Bridge, MAN holder & Convent – Extra footage from my stroll which started at Vauxhall on Friday twenty eighth July 1989 with 9 Elms Riverside. The earlier submit was Kirtling Avenue to Battersea Energy Station & the Canines – 1989
Considered one of few attention-grabbing postmodern buildings in London, Marco Polo Home, designed by architect Ian Pollard for The Observer and British Satellite tv for pc Broadcasting this was accomplished in 1989. It was demolished in 2014, in all probability to forestall it being listed and changed by the slightly anodyne flats now on the positioning.
One other image of Marco Polo Home with automobiles parked giving an excellent impression of the spectacular scale. At proper is the railway viaduct with a prepare passing on the road from Victoria Station. That is the southern finish of the constructing with a fairy mature tree newly planted within the foreground; it solely briefly survived the demolition of the constructing.
This large stone carried the title of the constructing and I believe was on the north finish of the constructing on the nook of Sopwith Means or maybe somewhat down that minor side-street. At proper you possibly can see somewhat of Marco Polo Home and above it the unmistakable chimneys of Battersea Energy Station, with the cranes with which McAlpine had eliminated the roof within the then just lately deserted scheme to transform it right into a theme park.
I walked up Queenstown Street to the foot of Chelsea Bridge and went a couple of yards down the trail into Battersea Park to take this image wanting throughout the Thames to Pimlico.
Though this was the facet of an historic river crossing fordable when the tide was low, the primary bridge right here was solely opened in 1858 to supply entry from north of the river to the brand new Battersea Park opened in the identical yr. This was a slightly slender and flimsy wanting construction was named Victoria Bridge – and on the different finish of the park Albert Bridge was constructed a couple of years later. Each have been initially toll bridges however didn’t be a business success and have been taken over by the Metropolitan Board of Works in 1877 with the tolls being abolished in 1879.
It was renamed Chelsea Bridge when it was discovered to be structurally unsound to keep away from any embarrassment to the Queen ought to it collapse however it was not till 1926 {that a} alternative was proposed. Within the meantime the previous bridge had appeared in lots of work, drawings and images, though the bridge that impressed Billy Strayhorn – in all probability from the portray by Whistler or Turner to call his impressionist composition Chelsea Bridge, was nearly definitely of Battersea Bridge. The jazz normal was first recorded by the Ellington orchestra in 1941, after each had been changed by extra fashionable buildings. In some way I believe the tune would have been much less profitable had it been named Battersea Bridge.
The present bridge opened in 1937 and “was the primary self-anchored suspension bridge in Britain, and was constructed completely with supplies sourced from inside the British Empire.” The primary cables connect to the top of the bridge deck slightly than onto the financial institution.
I circled and walked again down Queenstown Street, and couldn’t resist taking extra footage of Marco Polo Home from the alternative facet of the street.
Towering above it was the large gasholder and I rigorously selected my place to make this into an unlikely addition to the post-modern constructing. This was the biggest and seventh gasholder to be constructed on the positioning for the 9 Elms gasoline works which was additional down 9 Elms Lane and was in-built 1932 to the progressive designs of the German firm Maschinenfabrik Augsburg-Nürnberg and so was the MAN holder. It and the opposite remaining holders have been lastly demolished in 2015.
And this was the ultimate image I took of Marco Polo Home on the stroll, exhibiting the south finish of the constructing and attaching to it at proper two of the Battersea Energy Station chimneys.
I turned again onto Battersea Park Street to make this {photograph} of the previous convent faculty, with the MAN gasholder showing on the appropriate fringe of the image. The Sisters of Notre Dame got here to Battersea in 1870 to supply Catholic training for the poor kids of the realm with a public elementary faculty and in addition a personal day faculty. In 1901 it reopened as Notre Dame Highschool for Younger Women and in 1906 elevated in measurement because it started to confess ladies on LCC County Scholarships and a brand new wing was opened in 1907. Till 1919 there have been some dormitories for boarders which have been then transformed to extra school rooms and a library.
The grammar faculty expanded additional after the Second World Battle and have become a complete in 1972, closing in 1982 when the constructing was bought. It was later transformed into flats as The Cloisters.
Extra from my stroll into Battersea in later posts.
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Tags: 1989, Battersea, Battersea Bridge, Battersea Park Rd, Battersea Energy Station, Billy Strayhorn, blue gasoline holder, blue gasometer, Chelsea Bridge, Convent of Notre Dame, gasoline h older, London, London Photographs, MAN holder, Marco Polo Home, peter Marshall, Queenstown Rd, River Thames, faculty, self-anchored suspension bridge, The Observer, Wandsworth, Whistler
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