Posted on September 28, 2017
The town of Aubusson, in the southern part of the Limousin region of France, is best known for its UNESCO-recognised tradition of tapestry making. The old centre of the town is relatively small, although some of the remaining buildings date back to the Middle Ages. Fortuitously, this provided enough interesting doors for a couple of posts.
(NB All these images were photographed with an iPhone – I was there mainly for the tapestries.)

This one is just next to the Tourist Information Office…

…and this oine is just opposite:

This next couple aren’t among the oldest, but obviously have a long history of neglect:


Like many – if not all – French towns, what was once a thriving commercial centre has many empty retail premises, including this unusual double-entry vestibule, which now appears to operate as an al fresco ashtray (among other things):

Thursday Doors 28 September 2017
Category: Doors Tagged: Aubusson, Doors, Thursday Doors
Posted on September 21, 2017
As noted last week, there are solid reasons why there aren’t very many actual doors left in Oradour-sur-Glane, but the gates have stood the test of time rather more succesfully. Here’s a selection.






Thursday Doors 21 September 2017
Category: Doors Tagged: Doors, Gates, Oradour-sur-Glane, Thursday Doors
Posted on September 14, 2017
Oradour-sur-Glane is a place not very far from here that I’ve visited many times, and I’ve featured images from it in several other posts on this blog.
You can find out more about it here, but suffice it to say that it’s a permanent – and very powerful – memorial to a war crime perpetrated in June 1944.
Given this background, it’s not surprising to hear that there are very few doors left to show, but there are enough to provide hopefully an interesting and enlightening contribution to Thursday Doors.
This was the butcher’s shop:

And this the boulangerie (bakers). The sign on the left says “Here were found two charred corpses”

The village had been there for a long time, as you can see from this ironwork above a doorway on the main street:

This door is in the church:

This barn lies behind the church. Given its reasonable condition, I suspect it is used as a depot for site maintenance:

Finally. this is the heavy bronze door that leads to a crypt in the cemetery which houses a museum dedicated to the victims:

Thursday Doors 14 September 2017
Category: Doors Tagged: Doors, History, Oradour-sur-Glane, Thursday Doors
Posted on September 7, 2017
This week, a brief respite from the usual diet of characterful old French rural doors, with a selection from the mix of historic and modern architecture in the attractive market town of Beverley, in East Yorkshire.
This is probably the oldest door still standing, from the early 16th century. It was the gateway to a Dominican friary that once stood in the centre of the town:

The most characteristic architecture is Georgian, however, and there are quite a few interesting examples still to be seen:




This little cottage lies on a narrow street right in the town centre:

And finally a triple-whammy – three architectural styles in a row:

Thursday Doors 7 September 2017
Category: Doors Tagged: Architecture, Beverley, Doors, Georgian, Thursday Doors, Yorkshire
Posted on August 31, 2017
A final set of doors from Abbaye de La Réau this week.
As we started last week’s instalment with an image taken from inside looking out, here’s another of the same, this time from the smithy/workshop:

This one is in the Visitor Centre:

In the grounds of the Abbey are the ruins of a round defensive tower, a refuge for the monks if some of their theological debates got a little heated:


And a couple more interesting doors from other buildings within the complex:


Thursday Doors 31 August 2017
Category: Doors Tagged: Abbaye de la Reau, Architecture, Church, Doors, France, Medieval, Thursday Doors
Posted on August 25, 2017
This week we’re continuing our exploration of Abbaye de La Réau with some internal doors. I doubt whether any of these are absolutely original, but most of them are pretty old-looking, it has to be said.
However, to bridge the exterior/interior divide, here’s an image looking out from inside the monks’ living quarters:

A few examples of the doors leading off from this entrance space:



Rather prosaically, this is the door to the (communal) privy. Three seats (holes in a plank, to be more precise), no waiting:

And finally for this week, a door situated in the inner courtyard of the complex. Comes complete with bonus door within a door:

Thursday Doors 24 August 2017
Category: Doors Tagged: Abbaye de la Reau, Architecture, Church, Doors, France, Medieval, Thursday Doors
Posted on August 17, 2017
The Abbaye de La Réau is an outstanding set of monastic buildings, some dating back to the 12th century, in the Vienne département of central France. In addition to the massive religious buildings, the site also includes the secular edifices that were a practical necessity to support the community of monks that lived here. The whole site is being sympathetically restored both internally and externally and a recent visit revealed many interesting doors – again, both internal and external – to be shared here over the next few weeks.
To begin with, though, some external views, starting with the great doorway of the Abbey itself:

The roof of the Abbey has completely gone, but the walls still look as solid as ever, even if some former doors have been closed up:

This is a view of the adjacent, and much more recent, residential block:

Although it seems clear from this image that some of the living accommodation was reclaimed from earlier uses:

This is in the grounds, next to what is now the Visitor Centre:

And finlly, for this time around, this building lies just outside the walls that enclose the complex:

Thursday Doors 17 August 2017
Category: Doors Tagged: Abbaye de la Reau, Architecture, Church, Doors, France, Thursday Doors
Posted on August 10, 2017
For the second and final instalment of doors from the great city of Liverpool this week, we’re down in the city centre, which still shows plenty of evidence of the port’s historic prosperity.
To begin with, there’s the grand Walker Art Gallery (although it’s rather overshadowed by it’s immediate neighbour, the great rotunda of the Picton Library – where I worked once upon a time).

However, it was commerce that provided the resources for the architectural statements of the city, as in the case of these Victorian office buildings:


Behind the Town Hall, on an open space called Exchange Flags, there’s this imposing building:

I can remember when the Bank of England had a branch in Castle Street, although the building has stood empty for years:

Finally, here are the splendid bronze doors of what was originally the Adelphi Bank on Castle Street – just opposite the Bank of England in fact.. For a time this was a branch of the Co-operative Bank and I worked in it for a few months in early 1974. It’s now a coffee shop, which means that it’s open from early ’til late, so I couldn’t get a shot of the doors closed. However, for an excellent piece about the Adelphi Bank and its exceptional doors you should visit this excellent blog, Alan’s History & Genealogy Spot.
Thursday Doors 10 August 2017
Category: Doors Tagged: Adelphi Bank, Bank of England, Doors, Liverpool, Thursday Doors
Posted on August 3, 2017
I was back to my Merseyside roots a few weeks ago (armed only with an oldish iPhone rather than my ‘proper’ camera kit) and spent a nostalgic day wandering around the centre of Liverpool.
Of course, a lot of it has been modernised since it was my stamping-ground almost fifty years ago, but there are still plenty of doors that have been around far longer than I have, as I’ll be showing over the next couple of weeks.
To begin with, here is a selection from the area around the Philharmonic Hall and the Anglican cathedral. One of Liverpool’s ‘posher’ thoroughfares is Rodney Street, dating from Georgian times and now – as the local equivalent to London’s Harley Street – largely occupied by medical and dental practices.
Over a hunderd years ago, my grandmother was a domestic servant in one of these grand houses, although probably not this one, which, according to the plaque, was the birthplace (in 1809) of W. E . Gladstone, who was Queen Victoria’s Prime Minister on no less than four separate occasions.

Another impressive example from further along the street:

Nearby is Hope Place, with its Georgian terraces set back from the street:

Heading back downhill into the heart of the city, you pass this long-standing edifice, which is where football referees go to complete their training:

And finally for this week, by way of contrast, just opposite the entrance to the Mersey Tunnel is a small green space called St. John’s Gardens. If memory serves, these used to be the entrances to the Ladies and Gents public conveniences:
Thursday Doors 3 August 2017
Category: Doors Tagged: Doors, Gladstone, Liverpool, Rodney Street, Thursday Doors
Posted on July 27, 2017
This week we have the second instalment of doors in the town of Meillant. Last week we focused on the imposing Chateau, but we are ranging a little further afield this time – although to begin with only as far as the family chapel, which stands in front of the main house:

Just inside the entrance to the site is this visitor centre, which houses a number of miniature models of the chateau and other prominent buildings:

All the doors so far have been in more or less pristine condition, but these two examples in the grounds of the Chateau are rather more neglected – and mysterious:


Finally, because there is a town (or village at any rate) outside the walls, two examples of where the other half 99.9% live:


Thursday Doors 27 July 2017
Category: Doors Tagged: Architecture, chapel, Chateau de Meillant, Church, Doors, France, Meillant, Thursday Doors