Industrial Co-operative Society Rooftops, Huddersfield - July 2012
Visited with Fudge
Fudge and I had been planning on tackling this one for a couple of weeks. It was good to finally meet up. We spent an hour or so walking around Town checking in on various ideas we'd had individually, and having popped quickly atop one of Fudge's suggestions for a modest look above the shops and restaurants of Market Place, we went to what is now the Wilkinson's on New Street to get up this one.
The Huddersfield Industrial Society was founded in 1860, and began by opening a small grocery store in part of an old building in Buxton Road. From these early beginnings, the Society acquired several shop premises in outlying districts before finally deciding to enlarge their town centre store, which became the Central Departmental Co-Operative Store.
The property consists of four main sections, incorporating two very contrasting styles. The first block, situated on the corner of Princess Street and New Street (which was known at that time as Buxton Road) was built during 1886-7. It was designed by Abbey and Hanson.
Plans for the next section, of a similar architectural design, but by Joseph Berry, were drawn up in 1892. At the same time as Berry was drawing up his extension, tenders were being submitted for the demolition of the old buildings in Buxton Road, known as Johnson's Buildings, to make way for further proposed extensions to the store.
The third section of the store was built in 1903. An official opening of these three sections of the Co-Operative store took place on 8 September 1906, by Mr. James Broadbent, the President of the Industrial Society.
In comparison, the extension of 1936 by W.A. Johnson and J.W. Cooper is the best early example of a modern town centre building. When this extension was finally completed, the store ran almost the entire length of the section of Buxton Road between Princess Street and Chapel Hill. Sir William Bradshaw, President of the Co-Operative Wholesale Society Limited, officially opened this additional section of 29 May 1937. It's Berry's clocktower and dome that I was after on this one. The 1936 extension is something we may yet go back and take look at because it has a decent vantage point on Chapel Hill junction from the roof, a beltin Modern exterior and has been derelict for sometime now... but we'd done enough scrambling over awkward rooftops already and a pigeon-infested former nightclub just didn't feel right at the time - so we went and had a beer atop Oldgate House instead.
Town Hall/Albert Hall and Queensgate Market rooftops
Ornament Detail and Po Station
In fairness, the roof here really wasn't as good as I was hoping, but the act of traversing the merging eras of roof construction, as well as having to climb the outside of the buildings to get up without being spotted on a busy ring road, gave the night a bit of a ninja edge which I'd be missing since moving out of Manchester.
tweek
Visited with Fudge
Fudge and I had been planning on tackling this one for a couple of weeks. It was good to finally meet up. We spent an hour or so walking around Town checking in on various ideas we'd had individually, and having popped quickly atop one of Fudge's suggestions for a modest look above the shops and restaurants of Market Place, we went to what is now the Wilkinson's on New Street to get up this one.
The Huddersfield Industrial Society was founded in 1860, and began by opening a small grocery store in part of an old building in Buxton Road. From these early beginnings, the Society acquired several shop premises in outlying districts before finally deciding to enlarge their town centre store, which became the Central Departmental Co-Operative Store.
The property consists of four main sections, incorporating two very contrasting styles. The first block, situated on the corner of Princess Street and New Street (which was known at that time as Buxton Road) was built during 1886-7. It was designed by Abbey and Hanson.
Plans for the next section, of a similar architectural design, but by Joseph Berry, were drawn up in 1892. At the same time as Berry was drawing up his extension, tenders were being submitted for the demolition of the old buildings in Buxton Road, known as Johnson's Buildings, to make way for further proposed extensions to the store.
The third section of the store was built in 1903. An official opening of these three sections of the Co-Operative store took place on 8 September 1906, by Mr. James Broadbent, the President of the Industrial Society.
In comparison, the extension of 1936 by W.A. Johnson and J.W. Cooper is the best early example of a modern town centre building. When this extension was finally completed, the store ran almost the entire length of the section of Buxton Road between Princess Street and Chapel Hill. Sir William Bradshaw, President of the Co-Operative Wholesale Society Limited, officially opened this additional section of 29 May 1937. It's Berry's clocktower and dome that I was after on this one. The 1936 extension is something we may yet go back and take look at because it has a decent vantage point on Chapel Hill junction from the roof, a beltin Modern exterior and has been derelict for sometime now... but we'd done enough scrambling over awkward rooftops already and a pigeon-infested former nightclub just didn't feel right at the time - so we went and had a beer atop Oldgate House instead.
Town Hall/Albert Hall and Queensgate Market rooftops
Ornament Detail and Po Station
In fairness, the roof here really wasn't as good as I was hoping, but the act of traversing the merging eras of roof construction, as well as having to climb the outside of the buildings to get up without being spotted on a busy ring road, gave the night a bit of a ninja edge which I'd be missing since moving out of Manchester.
tweek
