scene_again | More Derby architecture

I went shopping in Derby again yesterday, and for reasons that don't need exploring at this juncture (because they're dull) I was in town about an hour before most of the shops opened, which meant I had a chance to pootle about and photograph some more of Derby's cool architecture, of which there is lots.

There seem to be a lot of 1920s style buildings in the town centre, along with some obviously older and some much newer.

This carving seems very grand for the shops that live under it now - perhaps it was something more exalted once.

This rather forbidding looking chap presides over the Zanzibar nightclub.

And he's flanked by these reliefs.

A few buildings along is this nice bit of decorative work.

Further into the main shopping area is this rather nice bit of carved brickwork, though it's sadly soot-stained.

I found a nice quiet place to sit for a while down by the rather nicely ornate fishmarket. The plinth on the left of the picture is a memorial to a local footballer.

I was rather taken with these grotesque fish decorations.

This rather sinister chap was adorning a lovely old building in the main square in the centre of Derby

And having shown you some of the older buildings in the town, here's the very newest one :-

Word is, it's going to be the new bus station. Given that they knocked the old bus station down three years ago, I'm not holding my breath on that one...

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Was the Zanzibar once a theatre or cinema? Mind, I was going to ask that same question about your first photo as well...

"Word is, it's going to be the new bus station"
My, what big buses you have, grandma!
A multi-storey bus stop perchance? That's something I wouldn't mind seeing!

Was the Zanzibar once a theatre or cinema?

That's a jolly good question. [googles]

Go to the top of the class and take a sweetie from the tin! :-)

Twas built in 1934 as the Gaumont Palace Cinema. Later it became and Odeon and then a Canon and now it's a nightclub. Meanwhile they've just built a new cinema in the middle of town...

I don't know about the bird building though.

A multi-storey bus stop perchance?

Wikipedis sez, rather more prosaically, that it's shops apartments and a casino as well as a new bus station.

I still think it's bloody criminal that they were allowed to knock the old one down - it was a lovely Art Deco building and, again according to Wiki, the first purpose built bus station in the country. A murrain upon the scurvy blackguards!

Ooh, I like sweeties! Thank you :)

Whyfor you need a casino? It's all right, you don't have to answer that. We've got a sort of one near here that we needed like so many holes in the head, as well.

Whyfor you need a casino?

Well, I don't need one. I'd rather have a duckpond, personally, but nobody asked me :-)

Thanks for sharing these, they were very interesting. Remarkable the gems like those you've photographed that people walk past every day without looking up. I had no idea Derby had so much art deco and earlier architecture, I kind of imagined another Coventry. It's good they haven't managed to demolish all of those old buildings yet.

Remarkable the gems like those you've photographed that people walk past every day without looking up

Yes. I bet I could show these pictures to people who work in the centre of Derby and they wouldn't recognise half of them...

I kind of imagined another Coventry

I don't think I've ever been to Coventry, but if I remember rightly it got bombed very badly during the war, so it'll be fairly modern in most of it's architecture, I imagine?

It's good they haven't managed to demolish all of those old buildings yet.

Yes indeed - they may have got the bus station, but at least there are a few gems left (even the public toilets in the town centre have an Art Deco look, if you can believe it :-)

Oh, I've never been to Derby, but I might have to now - these are great. I love looking up and seeing funky bits of architecture... your bloke above the Zanzibar is great, and the Punch and Judy too!

I love looking up and seeing funky bits of architecture..

Yes - it makes me wonder what I might have missed in all the places I lived before I got my camera...

More Derby architecture

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