Old Bleach Yard

Today I was lucky enough to be able to attend the opening up of the Old Bleach Yard!

If you know Loughborough, you are probably familiar with Angel Yard in Market Place, as being the original home of Wills and Hepworth, the publishers of Ladybird books, or maybe The George Yard, at one time home to James' Vaults. Yards like this, as well as courts, were very common in the Loughborough of old, but have changed over the years as new developments have replaced them.

The Old Bleach Yard is the path leading down by the side of the vacuum cleaner shop and The Moon and Bell (or Atherstone House) in Ward's End. For many years I used to buy my birthday cards in the pine shop that used to be on the left towards the bottom, but of late I have had little reason to go down there. The yard ends with a wall, and some concrete garages, with the old Clarke's dyeworks to the right. 

Well, I say this, but now the area has been transformed, the garages and wall knocked down and the pathway opened up into the Granby Street car park, with the aim of making it easier for folk who've parked there to come directly to the wonderful Ward's End, Devonshire Square, Bedford Square shopping area.

There is so much history associated with this area, I don't know what to highlight!! Obviously, Clarkes Dyeworks has played a very important part here, and I blogged quite some time ago about the Clarke family, and about some of the places, like The Gables, Park Street and Park Road where members of the family lived. The Woodbrook which runs through Queen's Park and across Granby Street was also important to the dyeing and bleaching industry. As you can probably tell from the name of this yard, there was also a bleach works, that went hand-in-hand with the dyeworks.

The cattle market used to take place near the opening of the Old Bleach Yard onto Ward's End, before it moved into what is now the Granby Street car park, evidence of which is still there in the form of the ring of stones near the entrance. Also, somewhere in the vicinity was the Drill Hall where the TAs used to meet (don't quote me on that: it might not have been the TA!!)

Just up the road from the entrance to the yard is The Orange Tree pub, previously the Wheatsheaf, and behind this a yard where Henry Moore (the spa ornament maker, not the sculptor!!) lived and worked on fashioning alabaster ornaments (I blogged about this a while ago, too!)

Just down the road from the yard is Devonshire Square, an area that has recently been rejuvenated with a colourful mural depicting local scenes, and created by Silent Hobo (subject of an earlier blogpost).

Whilst I was in town, I looked around Ward's End and took note of the many new shops that have opened in the area, like the Deli at 58, a new coffee shop, and a relatively new florists. Standing cheek by jowl with old-established businesses like George Hill's and Kent Stevenson, I'm sure this new link between the car park and Ward's End will encourage more shoppers to visit the area.

To end, here's some photos of today's event.

  

   

Magistrate's Court, Police Station and the Wheatsheaf Pub

Magistrates, police and spar ornaments

Yesterday morning I had an early start for a Saturday as I had to be at Heathrow Airport to pick up number one son, whose flight from Central America arrived at 9.40. Worried that the Bank Holiday traffic queues would be enormous, and that the world and his wife would be travelling to Heathrow, and the airport would be really busy, I set off at 7am, with some trepidation. Luckily, I arrived at about the same time as the flight and managed to find a space in the short stay car park reasonably easily. The airport was fairly quiet and I had no trouble finding said son in amongst the other disembarkees.

Number one son playing bowls

As a result of this speedy operation, we were on our way home by about 11am and finally arrived about 1.15. He had some lunch and then I whisked him off to the bowls club to take part in a doubles match, which left me with a free afternoon, having not scheduled anything because I hadn’t been sure what time I’d actually get home.

What's left of the police station

Hubby wanted to nip into town, and I also needed a few things, so we walked in together. Usually, we walk along Albert Street, but today we went via Southfields Park, where we passed the new police station. I’d forgotten they were demolishing the old one, but we had a good view of the pile of rubble that is now the former police station.

Which set me thinking …

The Magistrate's Court on Woodgate

Police cell on the right

Now, I know I should know the answer to this, and I have read it somewhere, but, I think the police station which is currently being demolished was built in the late 60s / early 70s. This new building replaced the former police station, which was situated within the Magistrate’s Court on Woodgate. If you walk down Town Hall Passage from Woodgate, you can see 3 windows at ground level on your right, but there is also a window at waist height, which is the old police cell, where prisoners were kept.

The police department left this building to move into dedicated premises, but the Magistrate’s Court continued in this capacity until about 2007 when the new Magistrate’s Court was built on a plot facing the NHS Walk-In Centre, being at right angles to Sparrow Hill. I must admit, the new Magistrate’s Court looks nice, and even won the Building of the Year Award in the Leicestershire and Rutland Society of Architects at the annual award ceremony. Strangely, when, rather belatedly, I settled down to read this week’s local paper, there was a letter in there about the court being underused, and a comment about it now being on the inner relief road, and therefore being seen as the architects intended. Ok, it’s great if the need to use the building is less than expected, but a shame that such a new building has already lost its sense of purpose.

The other thing that happened, because we chose to walk into town a different way, was that I met an old friend in a shop I wouldn’t normally go into because it’s not on my route into town, and how fortuitous that turned out to be! She had recently been clearing out her parents’ home and had come across loads of old photos of Loughborough: I love old photos, especially ones showing people and buildings together, which help to piece together the history of the town.

The Orange Tree (formerly The Wheatsheaf)

My friend also told me about the shop next to the Orange Tree (formerly the Wheatsheaf pub): Apparently, there were spirits in there, which explained why no-one would stand near the till, and also an elderly lady in the back room who didn’t like the constant comings and goings of people. She also told me that long ago that if you went down the passage at the side of the shop and the pub there were houses there, and that there had been a big fire, which burnt them down. This was of great interest to me as this is where Henry Moore was a spar ornament maker. I’d already worked out that the Wheatsheaf Yard contained lots of little houses around a central courtyard, but it was so great to have it confirmed!

The Town Hall

After this I visited the Town Hall to see the new exhibition of local art and paintings. This was fantastic and there was some wonderful stuff on display, which is well worth a look if you have time. 

The Hospital mural

Finally, I walked past the site of the former hospital on Baxtergate and noticed that planning notices had been pinned to the mural: Applications have been submitted by Pizza Express, Bella Italia and Centro, so it looks as though we will be getting another cinema, along with at least two new restaurants.  

That’s all for this week, folks! See ya next week!