Yesterday afternoon I glimpsed a programme called Grand Tours of Scotland. I wouldn’t normally have watched this (mainly because the good lady thinks the presenter, Paul Murton, has an unappealing voice) but we were in someone else’s house at the time.

It was episode 6 of the series, the only one I’ve seen and Murton was “following the sun” up through the East of Scotland’s sea-side resorts. On the way he visited Stonehaven Swimming pool which has featured in my Scotland’s Art Deco Heritage posts (see link above.)

He ended up at the Beach Ballroom, Aberdeen, which is in my Aberdeen Art Deco Heritage posts. Murton undertook some dancing inside the Ballroom. The interior still retains Art Deco features.

Anyway the programme is available on the BBC iPlayer, but only until Wednesday 21/12/11, so if you tune in you can catch some glimpses yourself.

Also on the iPlayer (till tomorrow 20/12/11) is a piece, about 25 minutes in, from The One Show on the Midland Hotel, my post on which you can see via the link.

It’s a while since I’ve posted any photos of Kirkcaldy and its environs.

Just up the coast and originally a separate village but now swallowed up by greater Kirkcaldy is Dysart.

It has a nice wee harbour which the picture below does not show completely. The former Harbour Master’s House on the quayside is now a bistro.

Dysart’s main industry used to be mining. This is the winding gear of the Barony Coal Mine as was.

There are some striking pan-tiled roof houses in Dysart. This part of the village is known as Pan Ha’.

The tower in the background is called St Serf’s Tower.

A couple more pictures of Dysart are on my flickr.

When in St Andrews we don’t usually stray much beyond South Street and the bit of Market Street that has the most shops. Last time but one though we wandered down North Street and I noticed that the cinema, which is adapted from an old building, actually has a Deco style extension in behind it.

Lured by the promise of a book sale we also ventured into the part of Market Street that leads towards the Bus Station and came upon this combination of buildings, something to do with the University now – the Careers Office? – which has a deco style facade. The photo is a stitch of two.

Judging by the pictures on Google Maps it seems to have been refurbished recently.

Coggeshall is a village on the road between Braintree and Colchester. We used to pass through it a lot on the bus to Colchester (and back) when we went of a Saturday to the big metropolis from the wilds of Braintree. At least it was on the main A 120 road then; like Braintree it too has been bypassed now.

Coggeshall had a reputation in Braintree as being inhabited by yokels – they told tales of “Coggies” in the same way others would of the Irish (or the Irish do of Kerrymen.) It’s barely three miles away!

We went on there after Silver End to see how much it had changed. Answer: not a lot. Mind you the minor road from Silver End to Coggeshall Hamlet (just south of Coggeshall proper) is the windiest thing I’ve ever driven on – like a sideways roller coaster. The road is called Cut Hedge Lane and skirts the edges of a farmer’s fields and there are no fences – nor hedges come to that – the fields start where the road’s edge is.

Coggeshall is still quaint, with Tudor style wooden framed houses of which this was the example most lopsided in appearance.

It’s not without some modern references, though. Someone had obviously been watching The Two Ronnies.

On the way out of Silver End we passed another Art Deco house so of course I had to stop to photograph it.

This is Wolverton, also on Boar’s Tye Road.

It’s nice that the plants outside the door reflect the house’s symmetry – even if the climber doesn’t.

The balcony, with its W motif, is a nice touch and the gatepost (see below) is exquisite.

The housing estate I mentioned in my last Art Deco post was built by Francis Henry Critall for the workers at his window factory in the village.

This more stylish house was for one of the factory managers to live in. I presume the other biggish Deco house in Boar’s Tye Road (see my last Art Deco post,) though not quite as elaborate as Wolverton, was also for a manager.

The day after Braintree we took in the nearby village of Silver End. This was the first time we’d been there as for all the years we lived in Essex we didn’t have a car.

We were looking for the housing estate designed by the architect Thomas S Tait who I see from the link submitted an unsuccessful plan for Kirkcaldy Town Hall. Among other accomplishments he was the architect of St Andrews House in Edinburgh which I have featured here.

We knew we were on the right track when we came upon this in Boar’s Tye Road:-

It’s needing a bit of TLC I would say.

The next junction takes you into Silver Street. Every building is one of Tait’s.

This was taken from the other end of the street after we had parked.

This is the junction of Silver Street and Broadway which also contains many Tait houses.

There must have been around two hundred flat roofed houses in the deco style over the two streets.

A few had some extra deco flourishes like the triangular columns with windows in this photo where you can also see the connecting walls between them which house the gates to the rear gardens.

Why Braintree?

Well: the good lady and myself used to live there when I worked as a Research Chemist. We thought we’d see how it had changed in thirty years so made it one of the last stops on our recent trip down south.

I well remembered the cinema. The Embassy as was. The building is very deco indeed but is now a Wetherspoons pub called the Picture Palace.

Surprisingly the inside has not been mucked about with much. On either side of where the screen was situated – the screen itself appears still to be present behind the bar area – are some original panels one of which I tried to photograph (see left above) but the light level was very low so the result is grainy. Two photographs of the original interior are in a frame on the wall of the foyer (right, above.) The windows are not original but have been replaced very sympathetically. You can just about make them out here.

We astonished the waiter by saying we had actually seen films in it. (By the way, a true life incident – not to do with the film itself – from watching the first Star Trek movie there made it into my novel A Son Of The Rock in somewhat disguised form. It was too good not to use.)

We hadn’t intended visiting Ely but when we discovered it was only twelve miles from Cambridge we thought we might as well.

Its most striking feature is of course the Cathedral (see left.)

Almost the first house we encountered was in a highly traditional style. We had been forewarned by signs in the car park – and the streets up from it – to “Oliver Cromwell’s House.” This surprised me as I’d always thought Cromwell was a farmer from Huntingdon till the Civil Wars dragged him from hearth and home to military fame – not to mention notoriety – regicide and the Lord Protectorship. Anyway the tacky figures outside put us off entering.

I had expected the town would contain mostly traditional architecture. There was nothing extremely modern but I was pleasantly surprised to find not one, nor two, nor even three, but four buildings showing deco styling.

The first had “Coronation Building” and a crown inscribed on it. I suspect this would have been the 1937 Coronation (George VI) rather than that of 1953.

The second now hosts WH Smith’s – I had to stitch two photos as the street wasn’t wide enough to allow me to frame the whole thing in one shot.

The third looked as if it had once been a Woolworths.

The fourth was on another street (Lynn Road?) just off the main one.

The War Memorial was unostentatious, restrained and dignified, set into a niche in the wall that backs onto the cathedral.

There was also a street market which looked pretty thriving. Whether it’s there everyday or merely Wednesdays I don’t know.

Cambridge is a curious mixture of mediævality and the modern. Plus you take your life in your hands walking about the place. People on bikes whizz around almost silently. We nearly got knocked down several times. So many bikes are there parked in one spot I heard one woman say to her companion, “Well my bike’s in there somewhere but I can’t tell where.”

It was morning when I took this, and raining slightly – not many takers for the punts.

King’s College (entrance below left) is impressive, but you can’t get back far enough to photograph it all. See below right for the chapel.

Access to the river is also restricted by the various colleges’ grounds.

On a lane down to the river we saw this unusual vertical sundial – well, actually four vertical sundials, one on each compass point of the tower I suppose.

This is from the footbridge over the Cam that we were able to cross. More empty punts – though if you look hard enough you’ll see one being poled just beyond the right arch of the bridge.

From Grantham we moved on to Stamford, which is apparently where the BBC TV series Cranford was filmed. The town seemed more prosperous tha Grantham had looked.

The approach was olde worlde but the High Street was a bit more modern. I might have expected Deco like this at the western end of the High Street:-

However on Broad street was a fine example of the style:-

It has a lovely rounded facade and original style glazing. Pity about not being able to get a photo with no street furniture in the way. That lamp post!

Central looks like it was once a cinema but now it’s a nightclub. At least it’s getting used.

I noticed it just after photographing the War Memorial, which is on the other side of Broad Street, set into the wall of quite an imposing building.

A couple more photos of Stamford are on my flickr.