Coty factory, Great West Road

Coty perfume and cosmetics factory, Great West Road – Wallis, Gilbert & Partners – 1932

Opposite the former Firestone building, this factory was used for the manufacture of Coty soaps, lipsticks, scents and creams until 1979.  It has been under scaffolding for a while and is still getting some work done inside, I look forward to it looking rather scrummy in a few months time, hopefully.

Next door to it is a new Audi centre, which, judging by an old photo I’ve seen, used to be a very lovely towered factory for Brittol Ltd and later for Admiralty Oil – massive shame it’s gone.

Wills tobacco factory, Glasgow

Wills factory, Alexandra Parade, Glasgow – architect unknown – date 1940s?

Crikey, I am surprised – I can’t find any info on who originally designed this Glasgow landmark, or when. As you can see in the photos, it’s been recently redeveloped into a business park. Admittedly I’ve been struggling to get my paws and claws around the pages of any books, so maybe haven’t researched as hard as I could, but I’d love any more facts if you’ve got any.

I don’t even know what fags they used to make here…

The Hoover Building

Hoover factory, Western Ave, Perivale – Wallis, Gilbert & Partners – 1931-38

The best building in world ever – the Art Deco factory fan’s Mecca – no more words necessary. Enjoy…

The Hoover Building

Hoover / Tesco car park

rear entrance

Hoover factory canteen rear

Hoover factory canteen front

main gates

front entrance

dog and deco porn

Battersea Power Station

Battersea Power Station – Sir Giles Gilbert Scott – 1933 (completed 1957)

Well, what a fun morning I had on saturday – I finally made it to one of the open days of the Battersea Power Station site! A rare opportunity indeed. If you can possibly make it you should try and get along this saturday (Aug 23rd) between 10am and 5pm – it may be the last chance you get to see it this close up for a long while.

Just a word of warning though, if you’re a dog you probably won’t be allowed closer than I am in this piccie (above) – I had to get special permission (in my professional capacity as representative of Dog and Deco) to get into the site, and as you will see I took Health and Safety Exec guidelines very seriously, sporting a not-so-sexy fluorescent vest throughout my site visit.

For more info see the website: www.battersea-powerstation.com

south elevation

turbine hall

(not a very good photo I’m afraid – I was very distracted by the bit of sausage I found just here – but the turbine hall is so special I thought it worthy of inclusion anyway)

north elevation

north elevation

main boiler house

staircase (adjacent to north west chimney)

a very smug mutt!

The former Packard works steps, Brentford

Packard works (Leonard Williams Ltd), Great West Road, Brentford - 1931 – Wallis, Gilbert and Partners

 

 

 

This site is where they assembled and serviced the Canadian Packard cars. In March 1945 a V2 rocket destroyed the factory and all the remains are the original steps to the showroom. The bomb left 32 dead and 102  seriously injured, which makes the sad loss of the building seem a bit insignificant by comparison. 

It is now site to a remarkably dull Curry’s retail centre – rather ironic, as it is just along the road from the impressive former Curry’s HQ (see previous post).

Curry’s factory – 991 Great West Road

The Curry’s factory / 991 Great West Road – 1936 – F E Simkins

main entrance to Curry's factory

Pickles at former Curry's factory

Restored by Foster and Partners between 1997 and 2000 for J C Decaux.

Pyrene building, ‘Golden Mile’

 

Pyrene Building, Great West Road, Brentford – 1929-30 – Wallis, Gilbert and Partners

 

Former fire extinguisher factory, opposite the Firestone Factory.

 

Pyrene factory entrance

 

Pyrene factory

Natwest bank, Gillette Corner

Just a quickie today…

Natwest Bank, Gillette Corner, Brentford –  architect tbc (possibly Sir Banister Fletcher ?) – date tbc (possibly 1936?) – I’ll keep you posted once I’ve done some rrrresearch.  

**Update: For now have a read of the 2nd comment below…**

Botanic Gardens Garage, Glasgow

Our first wordpress entry, and a bit of a test…

Hello,

This is our first time using WordPress, so we are going to be a bit experimental with our first posting. This blog will generally document our favourite pastime, which is taking pictures of me (Pickles) outside Art Deco and Modernist industrial buildings.  Having said that, today’s (being our experimental day) will break the rule from the start.

We went to see the new proposals for the Botanic Gardens Garage in Glasgow this evening, so we thought we’d start off with a piccy of me posing outside there.  The Botanics Garage was built in 1912 and is the oldest surviving purpose-built garage in the UK.  It was in use as a garage until last year, by Arnold Clark, but they are now planning to develop it into a block of flats despite its recent Grade A listing.

Botanic Gardens Garage, Vinicombe St, Glasgow.  1912.  architect: David Valentine Wyllie.

For more info see http://www.botanicgardensgarage.org/

and The Twentieth Century Society  which has also got a great photo of the garage back in the day.