UK
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Michelle Heron’s Fantastic Fascias
Michelle Heron is a London-based painter with a paticular fascination for old shops and shop fronts. Her paintings depict iconic fascias, many of which have been lost since she turned her attention to them, and some that survive in a state of perpetual uncertainty. As with my own work on ghostsigns, Michelle is focused on […]
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NE Signs Scavenger Hunt
Following a series of discussions on Twitter myself and a handful of others have decided to run a scavenger hunt to locate, photograph and map the remaining street signs featuring the now-defunct NE London Postal District. It will take place 2-5pm on the afternoon of Saturday 21 April, meeting at the Clapton Hart, 231 Lower […]
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Tracking Down Boots in Stoke-on-Trent
Back in 2016 I gave a short talk about my archiving work at the annual conference of the Business Archives Council, where one of the organisers was a project archivist for Boots chemists. Afterwards I shared the above image and forwarded her the archival photo below which was shared on the Ghostsigns Facebook page by […]
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Ghostsigns of Clapham, a Forthcoming Walk
Following my talk to the Clapham Society last summer we are joining forces, with Roy Reed, to develop a walk exploring the many ghost signs visible on and around Clapham High Street. We are currently carrying out a mixture of archival and web-based research into the 11 locations chosen for the walk, and would welcome […]
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Ancient Lights in English Law
This blog post [site since shut] highlights an entire category of fading painted signs that I have never come across. They are for ‘ancient lights’ and reference an English law protecting the right of property owners to receive natural light through their windows. The assertion of this right has taken the form of signs beneath […]
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London Street Signs with Alistair Hall
Alistair Hall of We Made This has spent the last couple of years documenting and researching the various forms taken by London’s Street Signs. He is set to present his findings in a lecture at St Bride on 31 May, so of course I’ve bought a ticket. I’m very happy to see an example in […]