C is for Cardinal

Day three of my Random Sightings. This time it’s Cardinal Wolsey randomly caught on camera in Leicester.

Cardinal Wolsey (1473-1530) rose from modest beginnings to become HenryVIII’s Lord Chancellor. A shrewd political operator, he eventually came to wield immense power. However his inability to secure the annulment of Henry’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon led to his ultimate fall from grace. Whilst in Yorkshire, Wolsey was ordered to London to answer a charge of treason but fell ill on the journey and died at Leicester Abbey.

This relief portrait in faience of Cardinal Wolsey (c.1923) is situated over the entrance to the former Wolsey Ltd warehouse on Abbey Park Street, Leicester. The artist is unknown.

The Wolsey knitwear company was founded in Leicester in 1755 and by the 1880’s was the largest hosiery manufacturer in the city. It is still in existence today. More information about the company’s history can be found here: http://www.wolsey.com/Static/History_1755

B is for Beneath Your Feet

Day 2 of the A-Z Challenge and some more Random Sightings. This time at ground level.

I did something similar on one my posts last year but then I called it underfoot and in keeping with the theme it just consisted of pictures taken in Leicester. The pictures this year include one taken in Milan and some from the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter.

A is for Alphabet

Day one of the A-Z challenge. Due to circumstances beyond my control all planning has gone out of the window and I don't know what I'm going to be doing. Last year I took my camera around my home town of Leicester and wrote about what I found. This year it could be anything so I'm calling it Random Sightings. All I can tell you with any certainty is that there will be pictures.

Random Sightings number one is an alphabet of found lettering.

A nice cup of tea and a biscuit

In a moment of madness I decided to do the A-Z Challenge again this year. So I'm sitting down with a nice cup of tea and biscuit and reviewing my blog.

The challenge involves posting every day (except Sundays) throughout April, thematically from A-Z. Last year I took my camera around my home town of Leicester and posted the results.

Being new to blogging the challenge really helped get me going. It also gave me an excuse to take my new camera out, as well as getting to see the City of Leicester in a fresh light. It was lovely when people commented about how nice the place looked (though I sometimes worried I was making it look too good!).

So what to do this year? That is the question.

I'd like to do something similar but will I find enough things? We shall see. Although I struggled once or twice last year it was an enjoyable process and I learned a lot. In particular that less is more.

Good luck to any other A-Z challengers looking in, especially if it's your first time.

The spire of St Mary de Castro, Leicester, back in the summer and
as it is now looking pagoda-like as it's dismantled.

A while back I posted some pictures of historic Leicester taken close to the remains of Leicester Castle. Sadly the spire of the nearby church of St Mary de Castro has become unsafe and is currently being dismantled. The spire is something of a landmark and it'll be strange when it's gone. However they hope to reassemble it sometime in the future if they can raise sufficient funds.

St Mary de Castro (St Mary's by the Castle) was founded in the early 12th century by Robert de Beaumont, 1st Earl of Leicester. The spire was added in the 14th century. There's a possible literary connection as it's been said that Geoffrey Chaucer married Philippa de Roet here sometime around 1366.

http://breaking-cover.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/a-quiet-corner.html

Bad Hair Day and other random things

Welcome to the first blog of 2014 and a belated Happy New Year.

Yes I know it's a bit late but I've been a bit preoccupied with editing my Work in Progress and haven't been going out with the camera much. However I spotted this in Leicester the other day on the side of a barber's shop. In case there's any one left on the planet who doesn't know, the remains of Richard III were found beneath a car park in Leicester back in 2012 and he's been making his presence felt round the city ever since.

I acquired Adobe Lightroom just before Christmas as part of a photography course I was doing and managed to get sidetracked sorting and cataloguing all my photographs (yet another reason why I'm behind with the blog). It was surprising how many I'd forgotten about, such as this one. Am I being paranoid or was this building watching me?

And while I'm on the subject of things with faces, how about this wheelie bin? Do we really need CCTV?

King Lear

This week I took my camera to Watermead Park which is just to the north of Leicester.

The park consists of numerous lakes and ponds surrounded by meadows, woodland and reed beds which were reclaimed from disused sand and gravel pits in the early 1980s. Both the River Soar and the Grand Union Canal run through the park and the place is haven for bird watchers and fishermen.

One of the lakes is named after King Lear, the legendary 8th century BC king of the Britons on whom Shakespeare based his tragedy. Lear (or Leir) was said to have given his name to Leicester and after his death was reputedly buried in a chamber beneath the River Soar somewhere close to where the park is now.

There's a concrete sculpture showing the final scene from Shakespeare's play mounted on a raft on the lake. Normally the raft is visible but with the recent rains, water levels were high and the figures appeared to be floating on the water.

A kneeling King Lear mourns his daughter Cordelia while the
Earl of Kent and the Duke of Albany look on.

Below are a few more pictures of the park.

Open at last

The Silver Arcade in the centre of Leicester has at last reopened after a major renovation and it looks fabulous.

It’s a Grade II listed Victorian shopping arcade dating from 1899, the only surviving four storey arcade in the country. For a long time it was home to many small independent shops but has stood empty for the last 13 years. Although it still retains most of the original features it now has a new glass roof and a new glass lift as well as various other sympathetic improvements.

The Silver Arcade was designed by Amos Hall who was in practice at the Leicester based architecture firm of Isaac Barradale (see: http://breaking-cover.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/retail.html).