The green room at the Depot

The green room at the Depot

I have probably said this before here but I do love finding unexpected colours on building sites. Upstairs at the Depot Cinema there is a new row of offices being built. At the moment they are sporting this sea green wall covering. When I arrived they had just been given an application of sealant.

I couldn’t resist capturing both the rich colour and the Jackson Pollock-like drips.

Over the past year and a half I have been documenting the refurbishment of this old brewery depot in the centre of Lewes as it becomes a new community cinema. My client uses the photos to build on the excitement of the local residents and film buffs.

Reflected glory

Reflected glory

I have been photographing this long line of colourful dancers at the Depot cinema building site for over a year now. They twirled their way along two walls of a large warehouse room at Harvey’s Depot, a former industrial building I have been documenting as it becomes a new community cinema. Although they are slowly disappearing through the process of the build, these last few revellers persist, now dancing waist-deep in reflected water.

As the renovation progresses, I like seeking out these remnants of earlier uses that linger on, reminding me of how much has changed. The dancers will be gone soon, remaining only in the photographs. They have been good company and have been part of many of my shoots of this building.

If you have a workplace, building project or event that you are thinking of photographing, please get in touch. Subscribe to my blog to receive my photo of the week directly to your inbox.

Beautiful rubbish

Beautiful rubbish

The builders have been litter-picking at Southover Grange, the Tudor manor in Lewes that I am photographing. But this is rubbish with a difference. This detritus from the past is in fact a cigarette packet-sized window into another era. The workers have collected a very small treasure trove of artefacts from the first decades of the 20th century: a toothpaste carton, a razor blade wrapper, shoe polish, match boxes, cigarette packets of varying designs. Not only are these lovely little objects fascinating as relics of bygone product design, they also start my imagination going. Who was smoking these “wild woodbines” 70 years ago? What were their lives? How did they spend their time?

It is this curiosity that drives my passion for photographing renovations. Old buildings always hold windows into the past – hand chisel marks on stonework revealed beneath ancient lathe and plaster, layers of colour and wallpaper uncovered below peeling paint. By documenting the restoration of buildings, I keep these clues available to us once all has been glossed over and the buildings have begun their next incarnation. All photographs of Southover Grange can be found here.

If you have a workplace, building project or event that you are thinking of photographing, please get in touch. I deliver photographs that delve deeper than showing just the surface of things. Subscribe to my blog to receive my photo of the week directly to your inbox.

Digger at the Depot

Digger at the Depot

Today’s photograph comes from my latest shoot documenting the renovations at the Depot Cinema. Work is ploughing ahead on the former Harvey’s Depot in Lewes where a new community cinema is being built. The old warehouse space is now filled with a ‘birdcage’ that will protect the workers as the structure is built up. This bright orange digger was chipping away at the old floor of the 1930s building at the front of the site.

I do love a bit of colourful industrial machinery, especially if it is catching the light just right.

If you have a workplace, building project or event that you are thinking of photographing, please get in touch. I deliver photographs that delve deeper than showing just the surface of things. Subscribe to my blog to receive my photo of the week directly to your inbox.

Out with the old, in with the new

Out with the old, in with the new

My photo of the week is from the Depot where so much has changed over the past month. The floor is now made up of hollow pre-cast concrete slabs and one can start to get a sense of the spaces of the separate rooms. While I was there the old green roof struts were being taken out one by one and replaced by large grey steel girders. 

The clear spring morning meant there was a deep blue sky overhead. This blue was criss-crossed by jet trails that echoed the angles of the struts. In all, it was a satisfying shoot down at the Depot. 

If you have a workplace, building project or event that you are thinking of photographing, please get in touch. Subscribe to my blog to receive my photo of the week directly to your inbox.

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