Taking Work Home Again #3

Taking Work Home Again #2

Taking Work Home Again #1

A while ago, I wrote a short-short story called Working From Home. It's totally fictional, but set in a real place: Ancoats' backstreet garage Blossom Motor Co, which occupies a space between Gun Street and Henry Street, just near the corner with Blossom Street. I liked the name, and took a photo, and the story grew from that. Once I'd written it, I printed out the story and sent it with a proper letter (remember them?) to the boss of Blossom, having already telephoned to ascertain the full postal address. The same day, I read the tale at the Bad Language spoken word night in the Northern Quarter, thus cementing it in literary history. A month later, I popped into the garage to see if the letter had arrived, but the boss was off, and I still don't know. Oh well. I've since rewritten the story and renamed it Taking Work Home Again, and this incarnation was recently published on the excellent Thick Jam flash fiction site here. I am currently in the process of an even newer version, cutting it down so my "band" Les Malheureux can perform it at our next gig, at the end of the month.

Solid Foundations Are Of Paramount Importance #15

As promised, I went on a little derive of Ancoats over the weekend to document the latest developments in the, er, development. The cobbled road is Bengal Street, which has finally reopened after over a year, and you can just make out one of the new buildings in the distance past the bright streetlight on the corner of Jersey Street (it's white and a bit curvy). The church is St Peter's, which the Halle Orchestra is soon to take over as rehearsal rooms. Behind it on the very left is the original BS41 building; the structure between the two is the first part of the new bit. The picture at the bottom shows all three new bits together.

Solid Foundations Are Of Paramount Importance #14

These shots show the removal of the crane - the whole thing that started us off with these Solid Foundations posts and what the original Ancoats story was about. They also illustrate the size of this development, which now actually dwarfs Beehive Mill (the building in the original photos that says Sankeys Soap on the chimney, and where the final pic of this set is taken from). I'll try and get over to take snaps of the completed structure and reopened road, and then we can lay this part of the Site Specific Stories project to rest and get on with the next exciting instalment. Anyway, these are from October 2012, so pretty much bang on a year from when the crane went up.

Solid Foundations Are Of Paramount Importance #13

This was May 2012 on leafy Bengal Street. You might notice that in fact two buildings not one are now next door to the original apartment block BS41 (the one with white cladding on the left-hand side and a big hole in the middle, if you know your Ancoats landmarks). Hilariously, the company name of the lifting platform you can see through the site gates is: The Art Of Elevation. Made me chuckle.

Solid Foundations Are Of Paramount Importance #12

These two photos are from January and February 2012 - look how gorgeous the weather was a year ago! Who'd've thought, what with all the snow at the mo. Anyway, as you can see the timber and insulation had started going in at this stage.