On the way back up from Alnwick we stopped at Berwick to get something to eat. We’d have settled for a chippy but there wasn’t one on the main street or the ones leading off it.

On the way in to the town I had spotted this Art Deco garage but I took the photo from the opposite side of the River Tweed. On the way out I had to recross the river first and discovered it was built in 1937.

The old bridge over the Tweed has nice arches. There were lots of swans on the river.

I took this of the newer road bridge, and the railway bridge behind it, from the old one.

The town itself was down at heel and shabby looking even allowing for the fact that it was latish (after closing time.) This must surely once have been a Woolworths.

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This was another building that looks a bit deco.

After Corbridge we headed back up the East coast and took a look in at Alnwick.

The first thing that strikes you on the way in from the south is a huge memorial surmounted by a lion with a long straight tail. Just below, at the road junction, is the war memorial.

A crop showing the war memorial is left. I much prefer these dignified ones to those with angels all over them. Once again many more names from The Great War than from WW2.

The photo (right) is of the tower on the hill crest.

This was apparently erected by grateful tenants after The Duke of Northumberland reduced their rents.

That, on seeing how much they could afford by way of a monument to him, he immediately put up the rents again is seemingly only a rumour. We walked up to it and it is undeniably impressive. Here’s the inscription:-

The base also has lions; at its four corners.

The two memorials are across the road from what used to be Alnwick railway station. The building now houses what claims to be “Britain’s biggest second hand bookshop” Barter Books.

It’s packed with books, to be sure.

In keeping with its setting in the old station there are train sets running around above your head in the middle part of the shop. You can see the “Keep Calm And Carry On” poster from World War 2 in the next photo. I think this is the shop where it was rediscovered.

Had it claimed to be Britain’s most expensive second hand bookshop I’d have been more sure of its right to the title. Old 1960s paperbacks were priced well over £2 and I didn’t see any hardbacks below £9.60. They did have a computerised “search the stock” service if you were looking for a particular book though.

There’s a lovely old entrance arch to the main part of the town just like in York etc.

And what do you know? Just behind where I took the above photo lies an Art Deco cinema.

Its complete with glass bricks! (See close up of the nicely rounded entranceway: right.)

The cinema also doubles as a theatre. The forthcoming productions were advertised on the windows further along past the entrance.

The bulbous bit halfway along the building – just where the van is parked in the photo – has a nice deco frieze running along it.

Apart from the suffix on my previous Durham post you knew this was coming anyway. I can’t seem to go anywhere without seeing Art Deco/Modernist buildings.

Somehow though and despite my experience in Chester last year, I thought pickings in Durham would be small.

Yet entering the main square in Durham the first building we came across was Boots.

There was construction work going on in the square which is why the photo is cropped tightly. Down a narrow street leading off the square there was this:-

I forget who the tenant of the building is now but the Burton’s shop in Durham at the moment is actually the other side of the street from this.

This is the view from the window of the car park we used.

I took this photo because of the roofline of the building just across the river which reminded me of the former Raith Cinema.

Just for contrast here’s one of the River Wear from below the Cathedral (and without any Deco.) There’s a weir stretching from the building on the left diagonally across the river and one of Durham’s bridges in the distance.

On the way out of town I pulled into a cul-de-sac to check the map. The street was full of thirties houses!

The third semi down still has its original Critall windows.

Newcastle’s Northumberland Street does still have a couple of deco frontages. This is a Peacock’s now. Was it once a Woolies? Again the photo is a stitch.

I had thought this one might have been a Burton’s:-

I think now, due to the clock, it was once a Marks and Spencer but it may have been something else. In any case I searched flickr and the picture below is what came up for Burton’s. It looked like one of the art deco buildings I had seen in the book of old Newcastle (see first link in this post):-:-

I saw no sign of this building on present day Northumberland Street. The Marks and Spencer’s shop is now located in the Eldon Square shopping centre. We went in and browsed but there was nothing worth buying.

The photograph below (from flickr via a postcard) was exactly the same as the other art deco building I had seen in the book of old Newcastle:-

I did notice a newer Bhs further along Northumberland Street. The building in the postcard was apparently demolished to make Monument Mall. I doubt that’s as aesthetically pleasing as the former Bhs was.

Right at the end of Northumberland Street we came upon the very tall monument I have pictured floating right.*

It was erected in memory of the dead of the “South African War” as the inscription has it. This is more often known as the Boer War but more accurately was the Second Boer War.

There are quite a few such memorials around. One is on the parapet of Edinburgh’s North Bridge. I have a piece of crested china which is a reproduction of the memorial in Hull to the dead of the same war and I have seen another similarly patterned piece with a different town’s crest. The next day (in Durham) we encountered another tall memorial to the South African War.

On the way back to the car we passed Newcastle’s civic centre. It’s a much more modern building with a tower surmounted by a circular top with horses’ heads and a finial showing the three castle symbol that also appears on silver objects assayed in Newcastle when the city still had an assay office.

The castle motif also appeared on the railings surrounding the civic centre.

*Edited to add:- for some idea of the memorial’s scale see this link. Its surroundings have changed somewhat since the postcard photos in the link were taken.

After leaving the riverside we climbed the hill from the Tyne towards the shops and (eventually) found them.

We went into one of those North of England town extensive inside markets where we browsed a second hand bookshop and I flicked through a book on old Newcastle and discovered Northumberland Street had had some Art Deco buildings on it but my knowledge of Newcastle’s street geography was minimal.

We moseyed around for a while and came upon this unexpectedly on rounding a corner where Debenham’s is (ie not on Northumberland Street.) I couldn’t get the whole thing in one shot so this is a stitch which is why there’s a black strip at the top and it looks bendy.

It’s the Cooperative building; deco in that monumental almost Stalinist way.

Here’s a detail.

There’s a close up on one of the towers on flickr which shows up the trianguloid windows. Plus another of the side of one of the clocks where you can see COOPERATIVE written round the face.

Just off Eldon Square there is this building:-

I found this different angle on flickr:-

Just on a bit we got to Northumberland Street. The Fenwick’s frontage there predates Art Deco. Again this is a stitch as I couldn’t get back far enough to frame it all in one shot.

Last week the good lady and I took ourselves off to North East England for a couple of days.

We’d meant to make the trip a couple of weeks ago but a certain news event there gave us pause.

We actually passed through Ponteland – which has a brick Art Deco town hall but there wasn’t an easy place to stop to photograph it – and saw signs for Rothbury. I can’t say I’d ever heard of either until early last month.

First stop was Newcastle (upon Tyne.)

Well, it was actually Gateshead where we parked adjacent to the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art. This is the view from the west side of the building.

And this is from the Millenium Bridge.

The interior of the gallery is impressive – they’ve done a good job of converting the original flour mill but the contents left me cold.

One of the exhibits was art work by John Cage, more famous for musical compositions (or more accurately for 4 minutes 33 seconds of silence.) His pictures consisted of muddy daubs, streaks and circles. The good lady opined that he must be a genius; he can take the piss in two disciplines, music and art.

The Tomas Saraceno spider web left me cold (as did the fish tanks with spiders in them.) Cornelia Parker’s circle of squashed brass/silver instruments was quite effective – especially when viewed from the floor above.

I’ve enjoyed visits to the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art on Belford Road, Edinburgh and its companion the Dean Gallery over the road so I’m not a complete philistine but this was distinctly underwhelming.

Then it was over the Millenium Bridge to Newcastle. The first picture is from the walkway just by the Gallery.

The second is from the Newcastle side further up the river.

I quite like modern bridges like this. The Clyde Arc (or Squinty Bridge) in Glasgow is another in similar vein.

Since I posted about Kinghorn this week it seemed like a good idea to punt this building up the Fife’s Art Deco Heritage list a bit because the former cinema at Kinghorn has Art Deco features.

The towery bits are hexagonal and have deco steps at the top. The fenestration is modern and “eyes poked out” to my mind.

It’s a pity about the lamp-post in this second photo but it does show off the balcony better.

The cinema is of course no longer showing films. It’s a pub/function place known as “The Carousel” now.

For those of you who care about these things I decided a while ago that the numbering system I was using for my Scotland’s Art Deco Heritage posts had become too unwieldy.

For really signature buildings (or those geographically remote) I have retained the Scotland’s Art Deco Heritage title but otherwise I now list buildings under a narrower geographical heading, Edinburgh, Aberdeen, Dundee etc.

As a result I thought it better to re-number some earlier posts retrospectively and edit the posts accordingly.

For the record the changes are:-

Scotland’s Art Deco Heritage 6. Bon Accord Baths: now Aberdeen’s Art Deco Heritage 1

SADH 7. Carron Restaurant: now SADH 6

SADH 8 (and update.) Nardini’s: now 7 (and update)

SADH 9. Northern Hotel: now Aberdeen 2

SADH 10. Tarlair Swimming Pool: now 8

SADH 11. Ascot Cinema: now 9

SADH 12. Kelvin Court: now 10

SADH 13. Victoria Cinema: now Edinburgh’s Art Deco Heritage 1

SADH 14. Green’s Playhouse: now Dundee’s Art Deco Heritage 1

SADH 15. Murraygate (I): now Dundee 2

SADH 16. Murraygate (II and III): now Dundee 3

SADH 17. now Dundee 4

SADH 18. Causewayside Garage: now Edinburgh 2

SADH 19. Dumbarton: now 11

SADH 20. Tobermory: now 12

SADH 21. Perth: now 13

SADH 17 (ii). Lilybank Mews: now Dundee 5

SADH 9 (ii). Beach Ballroom: now Aberdeen 3

SADH 22. Stonehaven Swimming pool: now 14

End of public information announcement.

As part of the effort to keep weight down the good lady and I try to go for hour or so long walks as often as possible.

One nice day last week we strolled along to the village of Kinghorn (3-4 miles away.)

This is the harbour there. Not quite as quaint as Crail up along the coast but nice enough.

All the way we were keeping pace with a yacht just off shore. Here it is (with another in the background. You can also just make out the twin stacks of Cockenzie and Port Seton power station on the Forth’s other shore.)

The island in the background makes this a good shot I thought.

Someone got to my blog by searching for “skottland art deco hotell” presumably because I’ve recently posted about the Balcomie Links Hotel or more likely the Beresford Hotel in Glasgow.

Anyway I looked at the google search page and found links to the Drumossie Hotel, Inverness.

A quick look through flickr turned up five photos which revealed part of it to be branded Inverness Conference & Banqueting Centre now. It’s undeniably Deco.

One of the flickr contributors complained that the local planning committee had vetoed new windows because they weren’t in keeping. The ones in the pictures don’t look original to me, though.