Who needs window dressers?

Window dressing is, I'm told, a job. If you aspire to the heights of that line of work I imagine you end up dressing windows in somewhere like Oxford Street, London. But, there is another way of encouraging people to stop and examine the items you are selling. Simply cram the windows of your establishment with the multifarious objects you sell. That seems to be the approach of The Architectural Store in Ross on Wye, Herefordshire, which has several windows filled in this manner. And, it works. After I had taken my photograph I crossed the street to look at what was for sale.

photos © T. Boughen     Camera: Lumix FZ1000 2

View in the side mirror

As my son drove us round the M25 I noticed, in the mirror closest to me, the sun tinged clouds of the setting sun. I took several photographs of what I saw, many of which were blurred due to vibrations, and a few that captured the evening scene. This is the best of the bunch. When I came to caption the photograph it occurred to me that we don't seem to have settled on a name for the mirror by the passnger side door. It's not a wing mirror because they are above the wheel arch. Nor is it a rear-view mirror - they are inside at the top centre of the windscreen. Door mirror is sometimes used, as is A-pillar mirror and side mirror. I've plumped for the latter.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Lumix FZ1000 2

Evening cherry blossom, Islington

Several days in and around London presented both familiar and new subjects for my camera (and phone camera). I noticed this one as we got out of the car and, because we were laden with bags, I took out my phone to get the shot. At our previous home we had a cherry that produced this type of blossom. I took plenty of photographs of the aged tree but not once did I photograph it during the hours of darkness. That's probably because the darkness of a village is so much deeper than the darkness of a capital city. Here the street lights and reflections made for a better image.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: iPhone

The cold light of (almost) winter

 

A necessary visit to Tewkesbury found us, in the early evening, on the bridge over the canalized River Avon looking towards the dark, derelict bulk of the Borough Flour Mill. The cold colours of the sky and its reflection caught my eye, and as I studied the composition in my viewfinder I noticed the pleasing contrast of the leafless branches. In the bright light and colours of daytime in spring and summer this view has only a little to commend it. But in these almost monochrome conditions of late November the silhouettes of the same view are much more appealing.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Houses in the evening sun

The word "photography" was invented by combining the Greek words for "light" and "drawing" and literally means "drawing with light". Remembering that helps photographers to recall the importance of light in the images that they make. Light can transform a scene and render the mundane memorable. In today's photograph the light of the low, evening sun has, I think, elevated the brickwork and solid forms of these mundane houses through colour and shadow.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Lumix FZ1000 2

Gloomy city

This photograph was taken at the end of January when we had a few days in London. It was taken in the early evening as the daylight was fading and man-made lighting was starting to appear in the streets and offices of the city. Looking at it I'm reminded how hideous most of the new towers are at an individual level, and how they are even worse collectively. I chose to put this shot on the blog now because today, unlike the day I made the image, it seems to capture the gloom that is descending on the city and country as the spread of coronavirus quickens daily.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Lumix FZ1000 2

Up and down the City Road

In recent years I've been "up and down the City Road" many times. However, it wasn't until recently that I discovered it is the very same City Road that features in the children's nursery rhyme, "Pop Goes The Weasel". The Eagle pub is round the corner that is below the two new towers on the left of the photograph, on a bit and on the right near the top of the street named Shepherdess Walk. The character in the nursery rhyme wouldn't recognise City Road today, nor would he encounter many shepherdesses. On our recent visit I quickly snapped this shot because it seemed to represent everything that is London in the evening rush hour.


photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Lumix FZ1000 2

Almshouses lights, Ledbury

St Katherine' Hospital, Ledbury, was founded in 1231 and parts dating from the C13 and C14, including the chapel, survive. The almshouses that we see today are the joint work of Robert Smirke (1822-5, the south end and central tower) and William Chick (1866, the north end). They are in the Tudor style of stone with half-timbered gables and an iron veranda at the rear. Here they are seen with Christmas decorations and trees with lights. In the centre is the cenotaph and to the right the clock tower of the Barrett Browning Institute.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Sony DSC-RX100

Grand Pier, Weston-super-Mare

The piers of the British Isles give visitors a feeling of being at sea without leaving dry land. They also offer a range of seaside entertainments. However, their location makes them subject to damage by stormy seas, and their lightweight structure means they are susceptible to fire. Many have been lost and seriously truncated by such events. Weston-super-Mare's Grand Pier was opened in 1904. In 1930 the seaward end, including the pavilion, suffered a major fire. It was restored at a cost of £60,000. Rebuilding took three years. In 2008 the seaward pavilion was again destroyed by fire, and once again it had to be rebuilt, this time after only two years, but at a cost of £39 million.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Rower on Wye, Ross on Wye

It never occurred to me that rowing boats of the type featured in this photograph have names. I suppose I should have guessed it to be so since more sedate rowing boats often do, but I've simply never given it much thought. Quite why the name "2nd Breakfast" should be applied I don't know, but I imagine it means something to someone.  This particular rower was enjoying the last of the day's sun on the River Wye at Ross on Wye and making easy headway against the current.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Sony DSC-RX100

16:9 mute swan

An evening walk by the River Wye produced this photograph of a mute swan swimming upstream across the gold-tinted water. I aimed for a composition with the sun at the top left and the swan at the bottom right, and had an idea that an image with a 16:9 ratio would suit the shot best. When my pocket camera, many years ago now, was a Lumix LX3, I could quickly select this ratio with an on-body switch. On the Sony RX100 that task requires paging through the on-screen menu - something that in this instance would have meant missing the shot.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Sony DSC-RX100

AllSaints store, London

I have little time for fashion in clothing. It seems to me to be a way to encourage people to buy often impractical items before the clothes they own have reached the end of their life. But style and design, in clothing do interest me. I know nothing about the clothing store called ALLSAINTS and the only branch I've ever seen is the one on Commercial Road in London that I came across recently. The illuminated advert looking down on the shoppers passing and entering the premises appealed to the photographer in me.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Sony DSC-RX100