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Kadewe is the largest department store in mainland Europe, located in Berlin, Germany. It offers a wide range of luxury goods, including fashion, beauty, and homeware. The store also features a gourmet food hall with a variety of international delicacies.
Features on J.B. Jackson and Howard Fogg, cover photograph by Jeff Brouws. More at: www.railphoto-art.org/railroad-heritage-47/
Jamie Kelley has been telling me that my blue whale has the wrong proportions. And, since he had long ago lent me the National Geographic DVD, Kingdom of the Blue Whale, to help me understand them better, I finally watched it and reworked the design. Here is the result. It features the long, sleek lines of the whale. A better rendition and a better photo will follow.
Musée Marmottan Monet features over three hundred Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings by Claude Monet, including his 1872 Impression, Sunrise.
Marmottan Museum's fame is the result of a donation in 1966 by Michel Monet, Claude's second son and only heir.
A cinematic exploration of serene wetlands and diverse coastal ecosystems. This collection captures the quiet beauty of nature across different moments of the day and night—from the golden mists of sunrise illuminating wooden boardwalks and the smooth pebble shores at dusk, to the dramatic twilight skies towering over dense reeds. The gallery features intimate wildlife encounters, including a resting heron, a dew-drenched dragonfly in stunning macro detail, and a perfectly mirrored flock of flamingos gliding through calm waters. It explores dynamic perspectives, showcasing vibrant aerial views of coastal salt pans, a classic observer's view from inside a wooden bird hide, and a mesmerizing nocturnal landscape under the Milky Way. An homage to biodiversity, atmospheric light, and the pristine quiet of the natural world.
These images were generated by Artificial Intelligence.
Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. Caesars features 3,348 rooms in five towers and is considered the Vegas flagship property of its owner, Harrah's Entertainment.
History: The hotel dates back to 1962, when Jay Sarno, a cabana motel owner, used US$10 million that had been lent to him by the Teamsters Central States Pension Fund to begin plans for a hotel on land owned by Kirk Kerkorian. Sarno would later act as designer and building of the 14-story hotel began in 1962. That first tower featured 680 rooms
Sarno struggled to decide on a name for the hotel. He finally decided to call it Caesars Palace because he thought that the name Caesar would evoke thoughts of royalty because of Roman general Julius Caesar. Sarno felt that guests should feel they were at a king's home while at his hotel. It is called "Caesars" and not "Caesar's" because every guest is a Caesar. Caesars Palace was one of the first Vegas resort to use themeing that would ultimately become very prevelant in Las Vegas hotel design. Source: Wiki
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One of the keys to shooting Epic Landscape Photography is exalting the photograph's soul via golden ratio compositions, thusly wedding the photographic art to the divine proportion by which life itself was designed and exalted.
Dr. Elliot McGucken's Golden Number Ratio Fine Art Landscape & Nature Photography Composition Studies!
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Greetings flickr friends! I am working on several books on "epic photography," and I recently finished a related one titled: The Golden Number Ratio Principle: Why the Fibonacci Numbers Exalt Beauty and How to Create PHI Compositions in Art, Design, & Photography: An Artistic and Scientific Introduction to the Golden Mean . Message me on facebook for a free review copy!
www.facebook.com/goldennumberratio/
The Golden Ratio also informs the design of the golden revolver on all the swimsuits and lingerie, as well as the 45surf logo!
The Golden Number Ratio Principle: Dr. E’s Golden Ratio Principle: The golden ratio exalts beauty because the number is a characteristic of the mathematically and physically most efficient manners of growth and distribution, on both evolutionary and purely physical levels. The golden ratio ensures that the proportions and structure of that which came before provide the proportions and structure of that which comes after. Robust, ordered growth is naturally associated with health and beauty, and thus we evolved to perceive the golden ratio harmonies as inherently beautiful, as we saw and felt their presence in all vital growth and life—in the salient features and proportions of humans and nature alike, from the distribution of our facial features and bones to the arrangements of petals, leaves, and sunflowers seeds. As ratios between Fibonacci Numbers offer the closest whole-number approximations to the golden ratio, and as seeds, cells, leaves, bones, and other physical entities appear in whole numbers, the Fibonacci Numbers oft appear in nature’s elements as “growth’s numbers.” From the dawn of time, humanity sought to salute their gods in art and temples exalting the same proportion by which all their vital sustenance and they themselves had been created—the golden ratio.
Ansel Adams is not only my favorite photographer, but he is one of the greatest photographers and artists of all time. And just like great artists including Michelangelo, Monet, Degas, Renoir, Leonardo da Vinci, Vermeer, Rembrandt, Botticelli, and Picasso, Ansel used the golden ratio and divine proportions in his epic art.
Not so long ago I discovered golden regions in many of his famous public domain his 8x10 aspect ratio photographs. I call these golden harmony regions "regions of golden action" or "ROGA"S, as seen here:
www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1812448512351066.107374...
And too, I created some videos highlighting Ansel's use of the golden harmonies. Enjoy!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGnxOAhK3os
www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFlzAaBgsDI
www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3eJ86Ej1TY
More golden ratio and epic photography composition books soon! Best wishes for the Holiday Season! Dr. Elliot McGucken :)
Some more of the larger lunar features captured just before the full Moon of January 31st, this time from the south western region. The large, dark crater on the terminator (on the left) is Crater Darwin. Below that is Crater Byrgius. Above Crater Byrgius is a row of three crater, these are (from left to right) Crater Fréres, Crater Henry, and Crater Cavendish. On the right of the image is Crater Mersenius and at the bottom is Crater Vieta.
Created from 2 x 1000 frame videos with the best 1000 frames selected.
Captured with FireCapture
Processed in AutoStakkert, Registax and Photoshop
Equipment:
Sky-Watcher Explorer-150PDS
Skywatcher EQ5 Mount
ZWO ASI1600 MC Pro camera
x2 Barlow with extension tubes
Instructions available here: youtu.be/6OzKT5L8F2w
My first alternate model of 42110 Land Rover Defender. The Super Stadium Truck / Short Course Truck features all wheel drive with 3 differentials, 3-speed sequential gearbox with neutral and V8 engine. The front axle with independent suspension is mounted with positive caster angle to absorb the impacts from uneven surface. The rear axle features 4-link suspension. The car has front axle steering and opening bonnet. The interior features a driver's seat, 5 gallon jug, gear shifter lever and rear view mirror. The spare wheel is mounted on the reinforcing frame in the rear.
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Yellowstone National Park (Arapaho: Henihco'oo or Héetíhco'oo) is a national park located primarily in the U.S. state of Wyoming, although it also extends into Montana and Idaho. It was established by the U.S. Congress and signed into law by President Ulysses S. Grant on March 1, 1872. Yellowstone, widely held to be the first national park in the world, is known for its wildlife and its many geothermal features, especially Old Faithful Geyser, one of the most popular features in the park. It has many types of ecosystems, but the subalpine forest is most abundant. It is part of the South Central Rockies forests ecoregion.
Yellowstone National Park spans an area of 3,468.4 square miles (8,983 km2), comprising lakes, canyons, rivers and mountain ranges. Yellowstone Lake is one of the largest high-altitude lakes in North America and is centered over the Yellowstone Caldera, the largest supervolcano on the continent. The caldera is considered an active volcano. It has erupted with tremendous force several times in the last two million years. Half of the world's geothermal features are in Yellowstone, fueled by this ongoing volcanism. Lava flows and rocks from volcanic eruptions cover most of the land area of Yellowstone. The park is the centerpiece of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, the largest remaining nearly-intact ecosystem in the Earth's northern temperate zone.
Hundreds of species of mammals, birds, fish and reptiles have been documented, including several that are either endangered or threatened. The vast forests and grasslands also include unique species of plants. Yellowstone Park is the largest and most famous megafauna location in the Continental United States. Grizzly bears, wolves, and free-ranging herds of bison and elk live in the park. The Yellowstone Park bison herd is the oldest and largest public bison herd in the United States. Forest fires occur in the park each year; in the large forest fires of 1988, nearly one third of the park was burnt. Yellowstone has numerous recreational opportunities, including hiking, camping, boating, fishing and sightseeing. Paved roads provide close access to the major geothermal areas as well as some of the lakes and waterfalls. During the winter, visitors often access the park by way of guided tours that use either snow coaches or snowmobiles.
The park is located at the headwaters of the Yellowstone River, from which it takes its historical name. Near the end of the 18th century, French trappers named the river "Roche Jaune", which is probably a translation of the Hidatsa name "Mi tsi a-da-zi" (Rock Yellow River). Later, American trappers rendered the French name in English as "Yellow Stone". Although it is commonly believed that the river was named for the yellow rocks seen in the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, the Native American name source is not clear.
The first detailed expedition to the Yellowstone area was the Cook–Folsom–Peterson Expedition of 1869, which consisted of three privately funded explorers. The Folsom party followed the Yellowstone River to Yellowstone Lake. The members of the Folsom party kept a journal and based on the information it reported, a party of Montana residents organized the Washburn-Langford-Doane Expedition in 1870. It was headed by the surveyor-general of Montana Henry Washburn, and included Nathaniel P. Langford (who later became known as "National Park" Langford) and a U.S. Army detachment commanded by Lt. Gustavus Doane.
The expedition spent about a month exploring the region, collecting specimens and naming sites of interest. A Montana writer and lawyer named Cornelius Hedges, who had been a member of the Washburn expedition, proposed that the region should be set aside and protected as a national park; he wrote a number of detailed articles about his observations for the Helena Herald newspaper between 1870 and 1871. Hedges essentially restated comments made in October 1865 by acting Montana Territorial Governor Thomas Francis Meagher, who had previously commented that the region should be protected. Others made similar suggestions. In an 1871 letter from Jay Cooke to Ferdinand V. Hayden, Cooke wrote that his friend, Congressman William D. Kelley had also suggested "Congress pass a bill reserving the Great Geyser Basin as a public park forever".
By 1915, 1,000 automobiles per year were entering the park, resulting in conflicts with horses and horse-drawn transportation. Horse travel on roads was eventually prohibited.
The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), a New Deal relief agency for young men, played a major role between 1933 and 1942 in developing Yellowstone facilities. CCC projects included reforestation, campground development of many of the park's trails and campgrounds, trail construction, fire hazard reduction, and fire-fighting work. The CCC built the majority of the early visitor centers, campgrounds and the current system of park roads.
During World War II, tourist travel fell sharply, staffing was cut, and many facilities fell into disrepair. By the 1950s, visitation increased tremendously in Yellowstone and other national parks. To accommodate the increased visitation, park officials implemented Mission 66, an effort to modernize and expand park service facilities. Planned to be completed by 1966, in honor of the 50th anniversary of the founding of the National Park Service, Mission 66 construction diverged from the traditional log cabin style with design features of a modern style. During the late 1980s, most construction styles in Yellowstone reverted to the more traditional designs. After the enormous forest fires of 1988 damaged much of Grant Village, structures there were rebuilt in the traditional style. The visitor center at Canyon Village, which opened in 2006, incorporates a more traditional design as well.
A large arch made of irregular-shaped natural stone over a road
The 1959 Hebgen Lake earthquake just west of Yellowstone at Hebgen Lake damaged roads and some structures in the park. In the northwest section of the park, new geysers were found, and many existing hot springs became turbid. It was the most powerful earthquake to hit the region in recorded history.
In 1963, after several years of public controversy regarding the forced reduction of the elk population in Yellowstone, United States Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall appointed an advisory board to collect scientific data to inform future wildlife management of the national parks. In a paper known as the Leopold Report, the committee observed that culling programs at other national parks had been ineffective, and recommended management of Yellowstone's elk population.
The wildfires during the summer of 1988 were the largest in the history of the park. Approximately 793,880 acres (321,272 ha; 1,240 sq mi) or 36% of the parkland was impacted by the fires, leading to a systematic re-evaluation of fire management policies. The fire season of 1988 was considered normal until a combination of drought and heat by mid-July contributed to an extreme fire danger. On "Black Saturday", August 20, 1988, strong winds expanded the fires rapidly, and more than 150,000 acres (61,000 ha; 230 sq mi) burned.
The expansive cultural history of the park has been documented by the 1,000 archeological sites that have been discovered. The park has 1,106 historic structures and features, and of these Obsidian Cliff and five buildings have been designated National Historic Landmarks. Yellowstone was designated an International Biosphere Reserve on October 26, 1976, and a UN World Heritage Site on September 8, 1978. The park was placed on the List of World Heritage in Danger from 1995 to 2003 due to the effects of tourism, infection of wildlife, and issues with invasive species. In 2010, Yellowstone National Park was honored with its own quarter under the America the Beautiful Quarters Program.
Heritage and Research Center
The Heritage and Research Center is located at Gardiner, Montana, near the north entrance to the park. The center is home to the Yellowstone National Park's museum collection, archives, research library, historian, archeology lab, and herbarium. The Yellowstone National Park Archives maintain collections of historical records of Yellowstone and the National Park Service. The collection includes the administrative records of Yellowstone, as well as resource management records, records from major projects, and donated manuscripts and personal papers. The archives are affiliated with the National Archives and Records Administration.
Approximately 96 percent of the land area of Yellowstone National Park is located within the state of Wyoming. Another three percent is within Montana, with the remaining one percent in Idaho. The park is 63 miles (101 km) north to south, and 54 miles (87 km) west to east by air. Yellowstone is 2,219,789 acres (898,317 ha; 3,468.420 sq mi) in area, larger than the states of Rhode Island or Delaware. Rivers and lakes cover five percent of the land area, with the largest water body being Yellowstone Lake at 87,040 acres (35,220 ha; 136.00 sq mi). Yellowstone Lake is up to 400 feet (120 m) deep and has 110 miles (180 km) of shoreline. At an elevation of 7,733 feet (2,357 m) above sea level, Yellowstone Lake is the largest high altitude lake in North America. Forests comprise 80 percent of the land area of the park; most of the rest is grassland.
The Continental Divide of North America runs diagonally through the southwestern part of the park. The divide is a topographic feature that separates Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Ocean water drainages. About one third of the park lies on the west side of the divide. The origins of the Yellowstone and Snake Rivers are near each other but on opposite sides of the divide. As a result, the waters of the Snake River flow to the Pacific Ocean, while those of the Yellowstone find their way to the Atlantic Ocean via the Gulf of Mexico.
The park sits on the Yellowstone Plateau, at an average elevation of 8,000 feet (2,400 m) above sea level. The plateau is bounded on nearly all sides by mountain ranges of the Middle Rocky Mountains, which range from 9,000 to 11,000 feet (2,700 to 3,400 m) in elevation. The highest point in the park is atop Eagle Peak (11,358 feet or 3,462 metres) and the lowest is along Reese Creek (5,282 feet or 1,610 metres). Nearby mountain ranges include the Gallatin Range to the northwest, the Beartooth Mountains in the north, the Absaroka Range to the east, and the Teton Range and the Madison Range to the southwest and west. The most prominent summit on the Yellowstone Plateau is Mount Washburn at 10,243 feet (3,122 m).
Yellowstone National Park has one of the world's largest petrified forests, trees which were long ago buried by ash and soil and transformed from wood to mineral materials. This ash and other volcanic debris, are believed to have come from the park area itself. This is largely due to the fact that Yellowstone is actually a massive caldera of a supervolcano. There are 290 waterfalls of at least 15 feet (4.6 m) in the park, the highest being the Lower Falls of the Yellowstone River at 308 feet (94 m).
Three deep canyons are located in the park, cut through the volcanic tuff of the Yellowstone Plateau by rivers over the last 640,000 years. The Lewis River flows through Lewis Canyon in the south, and the Yellowstone River has carved two colorful canyons, the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone and the Black Canyon of the Yellowstone in its journey north.
Yellowstone is at the northeastern end of the Snake River Plain, a great U-shaped arc through the mountains that extends from Boise, Idaho some 400 miles (640 km) to the west. This feature traces the route of the North American Plate over the last 17 million years as it was transported by plate tectonics across a stationary mantle hotspot. The landscape of present-day Yellowstone National Park is the most recent manifestation of this hotspot below the crust of the Earth.
The Yellowstone Caldera is the largest volcanic system in North America. It has been termed a "supervolcano" because the caldera was formed by exceptionally large explosive eruptions. The magma chamber that lies under Yellowstone is estimated to be a single connected chamber, about 37 miles (60 km) long, 18 miles (29 km) wide, and 3 to 7 miles (5 to 12 km) deep. The current caldera was created by a cataclysmic eruption that occurred 640,000 years ago, which released more than 240 cubic miles (1,000 km³) of ash, rock and pyroclastic materials. This eruption was more than 1,000 times larger than the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens. It produced a caldera nearly five eighths of a mile (1 km) deep and 45 by 28 miles (72 by 45 km) in area and deposited the Lava Creek Tuff, a welded tuff geologic formation. The most violent known eruption, which occurred 2.1 million years ago, ejected 588 cubic miles (2,450 km³) of volcanic material and created the rock formation known as the Huckleberry Ridge Tuff and created the Island Park Caldera. A smaller eruption ejected 67 cubic miles (280 km³) of material 1.3 million years ago, forming the Henry's Fork Caldera and depositing the Mesa Falls Tuff.
Each of the three climactic eruptions released vast amounts of ash that blanketed much of central North America, falling many hundreds of miles away. The amount of ash and gases released into the atmosphere probably caused significant impacts to world weather patterns and led to the extinction of some species, primarily in North America.
Wooden walkways allow visitors to closely approach the Grand Prismatic Spring.
A subsequent caldera-forming eruption occurred about 160,000 years ago. It formed the relatively small caldera that contains the West Thumb of Yellowstone Lake. Since the last supereruption, a series of smaller eruptive cycles between 640,000 and 70,000 years ago, has nearly filled in the Yellowstone Caldera with >80 different eruptions of rhyolitic lavas such as those that can be seen at Obsidian Cliffs and basaltic lavas which can be viewed at Sheepeater Cliff. Lava strata are most easily seen at the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, where the Yellowstone River continues to carve into the ancient lava flows. The canyon is a classic V-shaped valley, indicative of river-type erosion rather than erosion caused by glaciation.
Each eruption is part of an eruptive cycle that climaxes with the partial collapse of the roof of the volcano's partially emptied magma chamber. This creates a collapsed depression, called a caldera, and releases vast amounts of volcanic material, usually through fissures that ring the caldera. The time between the last three cataclysmic eruptions in the Yellowstone area has ranged from 600,000 to 800,000 years, but the small number of such climactic eruptions cannot be used to make an accurate prediction for future volcanic events.
The most famous geyser in the park, and perhaps the world, is Old Faithful Geyser, located in Upper Geyser Basin. Castle Geyser, Lion Geyser and Beehive Geyser are in the same basin. The park contains the largest active geyser in the world—Steamboat Geyser in the Norris Geyser Basin. A study that was completed in 2011 found that at least 1283 geysers have erupted in Yellowstone. Of these, an average of 465 are active in a given year. Yellowstone contains at least 10,000 geothermal features altogether. Half the geothermal features and two-thirds of the world's geysers are concentrated in Yellowstone.
In May 2001, the U.S. Geological Survey, Yellowstone National Park, and the University of Utah created the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory (YVO), a partnership for long-term monitoring of the geological processes of the Yellowstone Plateau volcanic field, for disseminating information concerning the potential hazards of this geologically active region.
In 2003, changes at the Norris Geyser Basin resulted in the temporary closure of some trails in the basin. New fumaroles were observed, and several geysers showed enhanced activity and increasing water temperatures. Several geysers became so hot that they were transformed into purely steaming features; the water had become superheated and they could no longer erupt normally. This coincided with the release of reports of a multiple year United States Geological Survey research project which mapped the bottom of Yellowstone Lake and identified a structural dome that had uplifted at some time in the past. Research indicated that these uplifts posed no immediate threat of a volcanic eruption, since they may have developed long ago, and there had been no temperature increase found near the uplifts. On March 10, 2004, a biologist discovered 5 dead bison which apparently had inhaled toxic geothermal gases trapped in the Norris Geyser Basin by a seasonal atmospheric inversion. This was closely followed by an upsurge of earthquake activity in April 2004. In 2006, it was reported that the Mallard Lake Dome and the Sour Creek Dome— areas that have long been known to show significant changes in their ground movement— had risen at a rate of 1.5 to 2.4 inches (3.8 to 6.1 cm) per year from mid–2004 through 2006. As of late 2007, the uplift has continued at a reduced rate. These events inspired a great deal of media attention and speculation about the geologic future of the region. Experts responded to the conjecture by informing the public that there was no increased risk of a volcanic eruption in the near future. However, these changes demonstrate the dynamic nature of the Yellowstone hydrothermal system.
Yellowstone experiences thousands of small earthquakes every year, virtually all of which are undetectable to people. There have been six earthquakes with at least magnitude 6 or greater in historical times, including a 7.5‑magnitude quake that struck just outside the northwest boundary of the park in 1959. This quake triggered a huge landslide, which caused a partial dam collapse on Hebgen Lake; immediately downstream, the sediment from the landslide dammed the river and created a new lake, known as Earthquake Lake. Twenty-eight people were killed, and property damage was extensive in the immediate region. The earthquake caused some geysers in the northwestern section of the park to erupt, large cracks in the ground formed and emitted steam, and some hot springs that normally have clear water turned muddy. A 6.1‑magnitude earthquake struck inside the park on June 30, 1975, but damage was minimal.
For three months in 1985, 3,000 minor earthquakes were detected in the northwestern section of the park, during what has been referred to as an earthquake swarm, and has been attributed to minor subsidence of the Yellowstone caldera. Beginning on April 30, 2007, 16 small earthquakes with magnitudes up to 2.7 occurred in the Yellowstone Caldera for several days. These swarms of earthquakes are common, and there have been 70 such swarms between 1983 and 2008. In December 2008, over 250 earthquakes were measured over a four-day span under Yellowstone Lake, the largest measuring a magnitude of 3.9. In January 2010, more than 250 earthquakes were detected over a two-day period. Seismic activity in Yellowstone National Park continues and is reported hourly by the Earthquake Hazards Program of the U.S. Geological Survey.
On March 30, 2014, a magnitude 4.8 earthquake struck almost the very middle of Yellowstone near the Norris Basin at 6.34am; reports indicated no damage. This was the biggest earthquake to hit the park since February 22, 1980.
Over 1,700 species of trees and other vascular plants are native to the park. Another 170 species are considered to be exotic species and are non-native. Of the eight conifer tree species documented, Lodgepole Pine forests cover 80% of the total forested areas. Other conifers, such as Subalpine Fir, Engelmann Spruce, Rocky Mountain Douglas-fir and Whitebark Pine, are found in scattered groves throughout the park. As of 2007, the whitebark pine is threatened by a fungus known as white pine blister rust; however, this is mostly confined to forests well to the north and west. In Yellowstone, about seven percent of the whitebark pine species have been impacted with the fungus, compared to nearly complete infestations in northwestern Montana. Quaking Aspen and willows are the most common species of deciduous trees. The aspen forests have declined significantly since the early 20th century, but scientists at Oregon State University attribute recent recovery of the aspen to the reintroduction of wolves which has changed the grazing habits of local elk.
There are dozens of species of flowering plants that have been identified, most of which bloom between the months of May and September. The Yellowstone Sand Verbena is a rare flowering plant found only in Yellowstone. It is closely related to species usually found in much warmer climates, making the sand verbena an enigma. The estimated 8,000 examples of this rare flowering plant all make their home in the sandy soils on the shores of Yellowstone Lake, well above the waterline.
In Yellowstone's hot waters, bacteria form mats of bizarre shapes consisting of trillions of individuals. These bacteria are some of the most primitive life forms on earth. Flies and other arthropods live on the mats, even in the middle of the bitterly cold winters. Initially, scientists thought that microbes there gained sustenance only from sulfur. In 2005 researchers from the University of Colorado at Boulder discovered that the sustenance for at least some of the diverse hyperthermophilic species is molecular hydrogen.
Thermus aquaticus is a bacterium found in the Yellowstone hot springs that produces an important enzyme (Taq polymerase) that is easily replicated in the lab and is useful in replicating DNA as part of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) process. The retrieval of these bacteria can be achieved with no impact to the ecosystem. Other bacteria in the Yellowstone hot springs may also prove useful to scientists who are searching for cures for various diseases.
Non-native plants sometimes threaten native species by using up nutrient resources. Though exotic species are most commonly found in areas with the greatest human visitation, such as near roads and at major tourist areas, they have also spread into the backcountry. Generally, most exotic species are controlled by pulling the plants out of the soil or by spraying, both of which are time consuming and expensive.
Yellowstone is widely considered to be the finest megafauna wildlife habitat in the lower 48 states. There are almost 60 species of mammals in the park, including the gray wolf, the threatened lynx, and grizzly bears. Other large mammals include the bison (often referred to as buffalo), black bear, elk, moose, mule deer, white-tailed deer, mountain goat, pronghorn, bighorn sheep, and mountain lion.
Bison graze near a hot spring
The Yellowstone Park bison herd is the largest public herd of American bison in the United States. The relatively large bison populations are a concern for ranchers, who fear that the species can transmit bovine diseases to their domesticated cousins. In fact, about half of Yellowstone's bison have been exposed to brucellosis, a bacterial disease that came to North America with European cattle that may cause cattle to miscarry. The disease has little effect on park bison, and no reported case of transmission from wild bison to domestic livestock has been filed. However, the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) has stated that bison are the "likely source" of the spread of the disease in cattle in Wyoming and North Dakota. Elk also carry the disease and are believed to have transmitted the infection to horses and cattle. Bison once numbered between 30 and 60 million individuals throughout North America, and Yellowstone remains one of their last strongholds. Their populations had increased from less than 50 in the park in 1902 to 4,000 by 2003. The Yellowstone Park bison herd reached a peak in 2005 with 4,900 animals. Despite a summer estimated population of 4,700 in 2007, the number dropped to 3,000 in 2008 after a harsh winter and controversial brucellosis management sending hundreds to slaughter. The Yellowstone Park bison herd is believed to be one of only four free roaming and genetically pure herds on public lands in North America. The other three herds are the Henry Mountains bison herd of Utah, at Wind Cave National Park in South Dakota and on Elk Island in Alberta.
Elk Mother Nursing Her Calf
To combat the perceived threat of brucellosis transmission to cattle, national park personnel regularly harass bison herds back into the park when they venture outside of the area's borders. During the winter of 1996–97, the bison herd was so large that 1,079 bison that had exited the park were shot or sent to slaughter. Animal rights activists argue that this is a cruel practice and that the possibility for disease transmission is not as great as some ranchers maintain. Ecologists point out that the bison are merely traveling to seasonal grazing areas that lie within the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem that have been converted to cattle grazing, some of which are within National Forests and are leased to private ranchers. APHIS has stated that with vaccinations and other means, brucellosis can be eliminated from the bison and elk herds throughout Yellowstone.
A reintroduced northwestern wolf in Yellowstone National Park
Starting in 1914, in an effort to protect elk populations, the U.S. Congress appropriated funds to be used for the purposes of "destroying wolves, prairie dogs, and other animals injurious to agriculture and animal husbandry" on public lands. Park Service hunters carried out these orders, and by 1926 they had killed 136 wolves, and wolves were virtually eliminated from Yellowstone. Further exterminations continued until the National Park Service ended the practice in 1935. With the passing of the Endangered Species Act in 1973, the wolf was one of the first mammal species listed. After the wolves were extirpated from Yellowstone, the coyote then became the park's top canine predator. However, the coyote is not able to bring down large animals, and the result of this lack of a top predator on these populations was a marked increase in lame and sick megafauna.
Bison in Yellowstone National Park
By the 1990s, the Federal government had reversed its views on wolves. In a controversial decision by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (which oversees threatened and endangered species), northwestern wolves, imported from Canada, were reintroduced into the park. Reintroduction efforts have been successful with populations remaining relatively stable. A survey conducted in 2005 reported that there were 13 wolf packs, totaling 118 individuals in Yellowstone and 326 in the entire ecosystem. These park figures were lower than those reported in 2004 but may be attributable to wolf migration to other nearby areas as suggested by the substantial increase in the Montana population during that interval. Almost all the wolves documented were descended from the 66 wolves reintroduced in 1995–96. The recovery of populations throughout the states of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho has been so successful that on February 27, 2008, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service removed the Northern Rocky Mountain wolf population from the endangered species list.
An estimated 600 grizzly bears live in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, with more than half of the population living within Yellowstone. The grizzly is currently listed as a threatened species, however the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has announced that they intend to take it off the endangered species list for the Yellowstone region but will likely keep it listed in areas where it has not yet recovered fully. Opponents of delisting the grizzly are concerned that states might once again allow hunting and that better conservation measures need to be implemented to ensure a sustainable population. Black bears are common in the park and were a park symbol due to visitor interaction with the bears starting in 1910. Feeding and close contact with bears has not been permitted since the 1960s to reduce their desire for human foods. Yellowstone is one of the few places in the United States where black bears can be seen coexisting with grizzly bears. Black bear observations occur most often in the park's northern ranges and in the Bechler area which is in the park's southwestern corner.
Population figures for elk are in excess of 30,000—the largest population of any large mammal species in Yellowstone. The northern herd has decreased enormously since the mid‑1990s; this has been attributed to wolf predation and causal effects such as elk using more forested regions to evade predation, consequently making it harder for researchers to accurately count them. The northern herd migrates west into southwestern Montana in the winter. The southern herd migrates southward, and the majority of these elk winter on the National Elk Refuge, immediately southeast of Grand Teton National Park. The southern herd migration is the largest mammalian migration remaining in the U.S. outside of Alaska.
In 2003 the tracks of one female lynx and her cub were spotted and followed for over 2 miles (3.2 km). Fecal material and other evidence obtained were tested and confirmed to be those of a lynx. No visual confirmation was made, however. Lynx have not been seen in Yellowstone since 1998, though DNA taken from hair samples obtained in 2001 confirmed that lynx were at least transient to the park. Other less commonly seen mammals include the mountain lion and wolverine. The mountain lion has an estimated population of only 25 individuals parkwide. The wolverine is another rare park mammal, and accurate population figures for this species are not known. These uncommon and rare mammals provide insight into the health of protected lands such as Yellowstone and help managers make determinations as to how best to preserve habitats.
Eighteen species of fish live in Yellowstone, including the core range of the Yellowstone cutthroat trout—a fish highly sought by anglers. The Yellowstone cutthroat trout has faced several threats since the 1980s, including the suspected illegal introduction into Yellowstone Lake of lake trout, an invasive species which consume the smaller cutthroat trout. Although lake trout were established in Shoshone and Lewis lakes in the Snake River drainage from U.S. Government stocking operations in 1890, it was never officially introduced into the Yellowstone River drainage. The cutthroat trout has also faced an ongoing drought, as well as the accidental introduction of a parasite—whirling disease—which causes a terminal nervous system disease in younger fish. Since 2001, all native sport fish species caught in Yellowstone waterways are subject to a catch and release law. Yellowstone is also home to six species of reptiles, such as the painted turtle and Prairie rattlesnake, and four species of amphibians, including the Boreal Chorus Frog.
311 species of birds have been reported, almost half of which nest in Yellowstone. As of 1999, twenty-six pairs of nesting bald eagles have been documented. Extremely rare sightings of whooping cranes have been recorded, however only three examples of this species are known to live in the Rocky Mountains, out of 385 known worldwide. Other birds, considered to be species of special concern because of their rarity in Yellowstone, include the common loon, harlequin duck, osprey, peregrine falcon and the trumpeter swan.
As wildfire is a natural part of most ecosystems, plants that are indigenous to Yellowstone have adapted in a variety of ways. Douglas-fir have a thick bark which protects the inner section of the tree from most fires. Lodgepole Pines —the most common tree species in the park— generally have cones that are only opened by the heat of fire. Their seeds are held in place by a tough resin, and fire assists in melting the resin, allowing the seeds to disperse. Fire clears out dead and downed wood, providing fewer obstacles for lodgepole pines to flourish. Subalpine Fir, Engelmann Spruce, Whitebark Pine, and other species tend to grow in colder and moister areas, where fire is less likely to occur. Aspen trees sprout new growth from their roots, and even if a severe fire kills the tree above ground, the roots often survive unharmed because they are insulated from the heat by soil. The National Park Service estimates that in natural conditions, grasslands in Yellowstone burned an average of every 20 to 25 years, while forests in the park would experience fire about every 300 years.
About thirty-five natural forest fires are ignited each year by lightning, while another six to ten are started by people— in most cases by accident. Yellowstone National Park has three fire lookout towers, each staffed by trained fire fighters. The easiest one to reach is atop Mount Washburn, though it is closed to the public. The park also monitors fire from the air and relies on visitor reports of smoke and/or flames. Fire towers are staffed almost continuously from late June to mid-September— the primary fire season. Fires burn with the greatest intensity in the late afternoon and evening. Few fires burn more than 100 acres (40 ha), and the vast majority of fires reach only a little over an acre (0.5 ha) before they burn themselves out. Fire management focuses on monitoring dead and down wood quantities, soil and tree moisture, and the weather, to determine those areas most vulnerable to fire should one ignite. Current policy is to suppress all human caused fires and to evaluate natural fires, examining the benefit or detriment they may pose on the ecosystem. If a fire is considered to be an immediate threat to people and structures, or will burn out of control, then fire suppression is performed.
In an effort to minimize the chances of out of control fires and threats to people and structures, park employees do more than just monitor the potential for fire. Controlled burns are prescribed fires which are deliberately started to remove dead timber under conditions which allow fire fighters an opportunity to carefully control where and how much wood is consumed. Natural fires are sometimes considered prescribed fires if they are left to burn. In Yellowstone, unlike some other parks, there have been very few fires deliberately started by employees as prescribed burns. However, over the last 30 years, over 300 natural fires have been allowed to burn naturally. In addition, fire fighters remove dead and down wood and other hazards from areas where they will be a potential fire threat to lives and property, reducing the chances of fire danger in these areas. Fire monitors also regulate fire through educational services to the public and have been known to temporarily ban campfires from campgrounds during periods of high fire danger. The common notion in early United States land management policies was that all forest fires were bad. Fire was seen as a purely destructive force and there was little understanding that it was an integral part of the ecosystem. Consequently, until the 1970s, when a better understanding of wildfire was developed, all fires were suppressed. This led to an increase in dead and dying forests, which would later provide the fuel load for fires that would be much harder, and in some cases, impossible to control. Fire Management Plans were implemented, detailing that natural fires should be allowed to burn if they posed no immediate threat to lives and property.
1988 started with a wet spring season although by summer, drought began moving in throughout the northern Rockies, creating the driest year on record to that point. Grasses and plants which grew well in the early summer from the abundant spring moisture produced plenty of grass, which soon turned to dry tinder. The National Park Service began firefighting efforts to keep the fires under control, but the extreme drought made suppression difficult. Between July 15 and 21, 1988, fires quickly spread from 8,500 acres (3,400 ha; 13.3 sq mi) throughout the entire Yellowstone region, which included areas outside the park, to 99,000 acres (40,000 ha; 155 sq mi) on the park land alone. By the end of the month, the fires were out of control. Large fires burned together, and on August 20, 1988, the single worst day of the fires, more than 150,000 acres (61,000 ha; 230 sq mi) were consumed. Seven large fires were responsible for 95% of the 793,000 acres (321,000 ha; 1,239 sq mi) that were burned over the next couple of months. A total of 25,000 firefighters and U.S. military forces participated in the suppression efforts, at a cost of 120 million dollars. By the time winter brought snow that helped extinguish the last flames, the fires had destroyed 67 structures and caused several million dollars in damage. Though no civilian lives were lost, two personnel associated with the firefighting efforts were killed.
Contrary to media reports and speculation at the time, the fires killed very few park animals— surveys indicated that only about 345 elk (of an estimated 40,000–50,000), 36 deer, 12 moose, 6 black bears, and 9 bison had perished. Changes in fire management policies were implemented by land management agencies throughout the United States, based on knowledge gained from the 1988 fires and the evaluation of scientists and experts from various fields. By 1992, Yellowstone had adopted a new fire management plan which observed stricter guidelines for the management of natural fires.
from Wikipedia
Features: Bronzer, Freckles, Mole, Blush, Evox and Swallow Ears Compatible
AIMI SKINS EXCLUSIVE @ SWANK Event
Event Period: MAR 7th to 31ST
Event Location: maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Swank%20Events/156/218/37
@ Mainstore after event:
Paxton’s Tower,
Llanarthne,
Carmarthenshire.
TAKEN - Sat 30th Oct'21
The tower is 36 feet high. The lower part of the tower is triangular in shape with a turret at each corner. On the first floor there is a banqueting room. Coloured glass from one of the windows can now be seen in the Carmarthen Museum at Abergwili. On the second floor there is a hexagonal prospect room surrounded by roof terraces. The windows to the prospect room are now bricked up. There is currently public access to the first floor banqueting room via stairs in one of the corner turrets.
I captured this view of the harbour as I stood on the Jetty below Torry Battery .
Harbour History from 1797
The oldest part of the harbour is the North Pier which was built (in 1775-81) by John Smeaton, extended (in 1810-16) by Thomas Telford, and extended again (in 1874-7).
The inner South Breakwater was completed in 1816 (by Telford) and superseded by a longer one, built of concrete, in 1870-3 The 1st dock was the Victoria Dock which was built in 1840-8; the Albert Basin which was the fish dock, followed in 1869-70.
The mouth of the River Dee is also Quayed and had a small dock opening off it. Perhaps the most interesting features, since the demolition of the hydraulic Regent Bridge in 1974, are the control tower an unusual 5-storey octagonal building from which are operated signal balls; the slotted post signals which control the entrance to Victoria Dock; the 2-storey harbour workshops on Matthew's Quay; the 18-bay, 2-storey, snecked-rubble warehouse on Regent's Quay with its 8 covered hoists, 4 roof cranes and bowed ends, built c. 1900 and two riveted light-towers in Torry built 1842.
John Rennie Proposals
The original Harbour Act of 1773 was followed by 2 subsidiary Acts in 1795 and 1797. The former was merely a continuation of the previous Act, but the latter gave additional powers. Before applying for it the magistrates consulted John Rennie, who planned the London Docks and drained the great marshy district on the Ouse in England.
He recommended bringing into the harbour below Shore Brae a branch channel from the Dee which entered lower down; but he proposed to put a breastwork upon it so that the river water would have some fall in entering the harbour and help to scour out mud. The salmon fishers caught their fish at low tide, and they objected to anything tending to hinder the rapid fall of the river, so this scheme had to be left out of the new Act.
The North Pier had been founded on the natural bed of the sea, cleared perhaps of some sand. It had done its work so well that the navigation channel had been scoured out 2 feet below the foundation of the Pier, and a footing of loose stones had been laid down to protect it.
These, Rennie said, should be removed, substituting 2 rows of piles, 1 close to the Pier and the other 10 feet off. He said the clay between the rows should be excavated and dressed stones should be put in instead on end. The upper part of the Harbour had been cleaned out by digging out the mud and putting it on lighters at low water and Boating them down the harbour at high water.
The original Quay had been founded on the muddy bottom of the harbour, and the foundation was now laid bare. He proposed to bring forward the quay 10 or 12 feet and found a new wall 6 feet deeper. The Waterloo Quay - not so called then, however - he said should be put back all the way down to the shipbuilding yards. Lastly, the proposal to have a wet dock should not be attempted in the Harbour because the bottom was pure fine sand full of water, and a foundation for a lock would be expensive; therefore, he proposed to form a wet dock at Futtie, 7 acres in extent, with the surface of the water above the level of the Quay.
The Canal Act had been passed, and he proposed to fill the dock with water from the Canal. The entrance was to be at the bar, which began at the head of the navigation channel. It does not appear that much of Rennie's advice was followed at the time. His wet dock was too far from the town, and it was feared that it would leak, being on a sandy bottom at a higher elevation than the water in the harbour.
Improvements inside the harbour were recommended in later years by several leading engineers, the names of Rennie, Telford, Walker, Gibb and Stevenson all appearing in the record, as well as that of James Abernethy who was appointed resident engineer in 1840. Rennie was consulted in 1797, and, although his recommendation were not carried out, it is important to remember that they included the formation of a wet dock.
Telford made a report in 1802, and a Bill based on it was passed in 1810 which authorised an extension to Smeaton's North Pier, the construction of a wet dock and spillway, and the diversion of the River's current. By 1829 all these works had been carried out apart from the wet dock, of which only the quay-walls had been completed; the length of the North Pier, no doubt in its extended form, is given as 2000 ft (610m) at this date. Other major works of this period were the South Breakwater of 1812-15, stretching 800 ft (244m) from the South shore at a point outside the entrance and reaching to within 250 ft (76m) of the end of the North Pier; and wharfage along the whole length of Waterloo and Regent Quays.
To attempt to describe in detail the whole process of the harbour's development in the 1st half of the 19th century would not be a rewarding exercise, partly for the danger of obscuring the wood through over-attention to the trees.
Reference, however, may usefully be made to a general account of what was done between 1840 and 1846 as given in evidence to the Tidal Harbours Commission by James Abernethy, the Resident Engineer; this shows that, in the course of these years, the harbour as a whole had been widened and deepened, some sand-banks at the entrance had been dredged away, part of Abercromby's Jetty had been found to be unserviceable and removed, and likewise old warping-posts and cairns of stones which caused obstruction in the fairway. At the same time, 330 yds (301m) of new wharfage had been built and effective leading lights set up at the harbour entrance.
The depth of water at the entrance was now 19 ft (5.8m) and the width between pier-heads 380 ft (116m); that between Pocra Jetty and the point of the 'inch' opposite it was 350 ft (107 m). Navigation at this point was difficult, especially for long steamers, as it was necessary to make a turn of almost 90 degrees.
Thomas Telford 1757 - 1834
Born in Westerkirk, Scotland. He was a stonemason, architect and civil engineer and a noted road, bridge and canal builder.
Telford's Recommendations.
In 1802 Thomas Telford was consulted, and he recommended the conversion of the whole harbour - that is the long, narrow, winding channel extending from Poynernook to Pocra Jetty - into a wet dock, in 2 divisions, separated by a gate which would be usually open, but which could be shut at spring tides to allow the lower division to scour out the Lower Basin and the Navigation Channel.
In 1805 Mr Jessop was called to inspect and report, which he did, but nothing followed. In 1809 the Town Council again applied to Telford, and he gave in a report and proposals with an estimate, and the Magistrates resolved to apply to Parliament next year. In April, 1810, Telford gave in a more complete scheme, the chief features of which were:- Extension of the North Pier 300 feet, and of the South Pier 300 feet; a lower wet dock 2350 feet in length, about 22 acres, and an upper, 1550 feet, about 11 acres; 3 graving docks, each for 2 large ships; altering the course of the Dee; embanking the Inches, and raising the whole above high water; and excluding the Dee from the Harbour.
His plan was shown in London to Mr Jessop, and approved by him. In spite of opposition from Shipowners and Shipmasters, who dreaded increased expense, the Bill became an Act. The Provost, Mr James Hadden of Persley, got a dinner, at which Alexander Bannerman (MP for Aberdeen), one of the opponents of the Bill, was present somewhat reluctantly. The dinner bill, he said afterwards was £2 19s 6d per head, and he did not recover from the effects of the dinner for 3 months
EXTENSIONS OF THE NORTH PIER
Mr Telford thought that the most important of the works to be done was the extension of the North Pier. He recommended the appointment of Mr John Gibb as Resident Engineer, residing in Aberdeen, and he was engaged by the magistrates. In 1811 the North Pier was extended 300 feet, and when work could not be carried on at the pier the workmen were employed in building a wharf wall at Waterloo Quay. This extension of the North Pier gave an increase of depth of 3 feet, and so well satisfied was everybody that a farther extension was resolved upon: and in 1812 an addition of 450 feet was made, which was extended to 865 feet next year, and completed with a circular head of dressed granite blocks dovetailed together. The whole length of the pier was now 2000 feet, the length of the original head being lost. The 2nd addition had given 3 feet more water, and the 14 feet had before 1810 became 20 feet.
The pier had been founded on sand, and in 1813 in a severe storm the sand was washed out at the sides of the head, leaving them unsupported, but the head stuck together for a few days. At length a breach was made between the head and the pier, and the head fell. It was rebuilt with a better foundation, but it fell again in 1815, and was rebuilt with a long slope into the sea and shorter slopes at the sides. This stood well for several years, but the North Pier head cost £6655 between 1827 and 1831.
THE SOUTH BREAKWATER
It had been proposed to make a breakwater, not connected with the land at either end, to cover the points of the North and South Piers, but in 1812 at the instigation of Mr Gibb it was commenced by extending it from the south shore in the same direction as it had been originally planned.
It was finished in 1815, and it extended 800 feet from the south shore, reaching within 250 feet of the North Pier. The cost of the work was £14,000.
This had not been contemplated in the estimate, but the erection of this breakwater rendered the extension of the South Pier unnecessary, which was a great saving, all that was done to the South Pier being replacing with dressed granite the original wooden head, destroyed before 1809. The breakwater was constructed of stones quarried at Greyhope Bay, and conveyed by a railway. The stones were tumbled into the sea without dressing or building, the only care taken being to put the larger blocks to the outside.
This breakwater was thought unnecessary and in the way of ships entering the harbour after the last extension of the North Pier and the erection of the present South Breakwater. It was, therefore, removed, all but 100 yards at the shore end. Telford seems to have kept most in view the scouring of the navigation channel by the River, and was unwilling to give up the South Pier; but Gibb, looking more to the safety and comfortable quarters of ships in the Harbour, favoured the breakwater as providing a broad space where waves could expand within the Pier Heads. In this he was supported by Robert Stevenson, the light-house engineer, who said that if he had been consulted by the Harbour Trustees he would have advised them to abandon the South Pier and construct the breakwater, because when a wave was confined between 2 Piers it would continue to undulate to the very top of the Harbour. Mr Alexander Bannerman, an amateur engineer who opposed Telford because he would not adopt his proposals, regarded it as a proof of his ineffable folly that he had allowed the breakwater to take the place of the South Pier.
The Harbour Channel
The Harbour, then being naturally only the channel of the Denburn though the tide flowed and ebbed in it, was very narrow, not exceeding 50 yards in width at the Quay head and 100 yards at Point Law. It did not, therefore, require a great expenditure of labour to make some improvement upon it.
At first this was done by spade work and lighters; but after the navigation channel had been deepened by a steam dredger which was procured after 1810 it was used in the harbour, and so efficient did it prove that in a short time the foundations of the piers were out of the water at low tide, and they were constantly falling and needing rebuilding.
This mending and patching up continued till 1827, when new wharf walls began to be made at Trinity; but they were built 30 or 40 feet in front of the old quay to have a broad road between the houses and the water. The walls were founded on piles, which afterwards enabled the harbour to be dredged to a considerable depth without endangering the walls. The walls were next extended downwards to Commerce Street and upwards to Poynernook.
MANAGEMENT
For a long time when any improvement had to be made in the Harbour, or when the entrance had to be cleared, the Magistrates called on the citizens to turn out and do the work themselves. By the Acts of 1773, 1795, 1797, the management was left with the Town Council, to whom the harbour belonged. But when the Act of 1810 was first proposed the political party calling themselves Radical Reformers insisted on 2/3rds of the Managers being men chosen by the citizens, which the Town Council were not at that time. The Magistrates would not agree to this, but proposed the appointment under the Act of 7 Auditors, with power of controlling to some extent the actions of the Magistrates. In spite of the opposition of the Radicals, the Town Council's Bill passed into law. In another Act, passed in 1813 to amend the former Act, the same controlling body was retained. In 1828 the Magistrates wished to have a new Act for the improvement of the Harbour. Again the Radicals demanded that the citizens, who would have to pay the dues on goods imported and exported, and the shipping dues, should have the Management of the Harbour. The Magistrates were anxious to conciliate them and agreed to admit men outside the Town Council to a large extent; but the Radicals would not be satisfied with less than a majority and successfully opposed the passing of the Bill.
THE ACT OF 1829
In 1829 a new Act of Parliament was obtained repealing and consolidating all former Acts. The new Act was to endure for 21 years, but it was enacted that everything to be done under it should be completed within 5 years, except that the course of the River might be altered after the expiry of the 5 years, if deemed necessary. The Management was committed to 9 members of the Town Council, 5 Burgesses of Guild, and 1 member of the Incorporated Trades. The objects of the Act were to cleanse, deepen, and scour the Harbour; to exclude from it the polluted Denburn and Millburn; to make a spillwater channel on the south side of the Dee to hasten its fall after high tide, and thereafter to close up channels from the Dee entering the harbour at high tide. Power was given to raise £200,000 to carry out the works sanctioned by the Act and to pay a debt of £113,000, consisting of £30,000 taken over in 1810 from previous Acts, and £83,000 additional incurred under the Act of 1810. Under the powers of this Act were completed the quay extending 1900 yards from the lower end of Waterloo Quay to Poynernook, which was not near the modern Poynernook Road, but to the north of the line of Marywell Street, on the south side of the Denburn when it turned east. Its site is outside the south end of the Joint Station arched building. Regent Bridge was also erected, a stone and iron structure 200 feet long resting on 2 end piers and 2 in the water. It gave access to the south side of the harbour, where Provost Blaikie's Quay, a wooden wharf for lime ships, was constructed. Enormous quantities of lime were used as manure at this time, and the Quay for the Lime Vessels was 1200 to 1300 feet long, opposite the angle where Waterloo and Regent Quays meet.
THE FROST AND FLOOD OF 1831
In February, 1831, during a severe frost, the Pot above the Craiglug was frozen over. A thaw came on the 16th and melted the snow on the hills, causing a great flood in the river, which burst the ice barrier and swept it before it. The Inch Dyke (about the north-west corner of Albert Basin) resisted the ice, but both above and below it the river swept over the Inches into the Harbour. A great deal of water and ice entered the Harbour by the Back Burn at Poynernook, meeting with some obstruction at the wooden bridge at Shore Brae.
So great was the force of the current that 3 vessels pulled out their mooring posts and were swept along till they were stopped by 2 large Steamships which had broken loose and had grounded, entirely blocking up the harbour.
The old dredger lying farther down was carried out to sea and must have sunk as it was never seen again. In the Upper Harbour the current ran strongly between ships and the pier, and though the foundation was deeply piled, with a platform for the wall, it sunk 6 feet, and 150 feet had to be taken down and rebuilt. In the end of 1831 the Raik Dyke was removed from the head of the channel which branched off from the River and flowed past Torry on the south side of Point Law.
This hastened the fall of the River after flood tide, and let the Raik fishers begin work sooner. Then the embanking of the Inches on the south side was completed, and the Back Burn connecting the River and the Harbour at high water at Poynernook was closed up.
The interior of the harbour was greatly improved by dredging out the silt and mud which had accumulated in it. Market Street was not formed till 1842; but west of the line of it Trinity Quay had been extended in a double curve lo Poynernook, the first concave curve facing the south-east and the second the north-west.
This part of the harbour allowed ships with coals to approach the then Gasworks, the site of which was in the open space on the east of the Joint Station. The extreme upper end accommodated the Clayhills Brick Works, giving access to ships bringing coals for the kilns and to barges and lighters taking away bricks and drain pipes. The Clayhills were high steep banks of alluvial clay on the site of Wellington Road, between Portland Street and Affleck Street. The clay banks were so high that sandmartins built nests in them.
"THE OLD OAK TREE"
Much excavation had to be made in the inner part of the Upper Harbour alongside the Quay, and in 1832 a large oak tree was found within 150 yards of the Trades Hospital, which was near the bottom of Exchange Street. It was within a few inches of the surface and some people remembered seeing part of a branch of it projecting above the ground in the edge of the Trinity Inche. When taken out it was found to be 20ft 2in. in circumference, and the trunk was 6ft 6in. in length from the root to the first branch, which was 23ft 6in. long, and 13ft 10in in circumference. Part of another limb was 6ft 7in. in circumference and 3ft long. The tree was lying horizontally from south-east to north-west. It was not much decayed, and did not seem to have lain very long where it was found. There were anciently many oak trees in the Forest of Birse, and as that parish is liable to heavy rains, causing floods in the Feugh when the wind is in the South-east in autumn, the tree may have come from Birse. A South-east wind would have prevented it from going out to sea and would have blown it into the north-west corner of the estuary of the Dee. There were anciently many oaks in some parts of Aberdeenshire; but the oak rarely produces ripe acorns in the north of Scotland, and most likely they had been grown from acorns imported from England. The introduction of the oak into Scotland may be ascribed either to Margaret, wife of Malcolm Canmore, an English lady, or to David I., her youngest son, who had been much in England before he became King. The oak tree was set up near the then Inches (now Commercial Road/Quay) at the far end of Regents Road in 1836, where it stood till it was found to be somewhat in the way. It suffered from a fire in an adjoining Timber Yard and was removed to the Duthie Park (Inset).
Permanently berthed in Aberdeen Harbour was HMS Clyde a Naval Training Ship. HMS Clyde was a man o' war with 14 guns and 1081 tons. The ship was for a long time moored in the Upper Dock where it served as a training ship. Connected to the quay by a floating gangway, the ship was open to visitors on Sunday mornings. After being shifted to Albert Quay it was towed away to be scrapped.
THE EXCAVATION OF VICTORIA DOCK
The Lower Jetty at the south end of Pocra Quay was removed in 1832. Apparently no useful purpose was served by its removal, but the stones forming it were good and were utilised in building part of Waterloo Quay. The greatest improvement effected on the Harbour under the Act of 1829 was the excavation of Victoria Dock (though it did not bear that name till afterwards) and the making up of the Inches. Before 1829 the Harbour near the head of Waterloo Quay was only 60 yards wide, and its south side was where the north edge of the dock is. Under the Act of 1829 the dock was excavated, the quay was completed in 1804, and the old harbour was filled up. From Market Street to Church Street the whole of the old harbour is now covered by the Quays. Below Church Street the area of the old harbour was in the space now covered by the east end of the dock and the tidal harbour. These works cost £122,200, and as the working powers of the Act expired in 1834 there was neither time nor money to do anything at the entrance of the harbour or to attempt the formation of a wet dock.
Mr James Walker's Proposals.
In 1837, when there were still thirteen years of the Act to run, there being a clamant demand for the immediate completion of the harbour by the formation of a wet dock, the Harbour Trustees resolved to have the harbour surveyed and examined by an engineer of eminence and experience. Mr James Walker, civil engineer, London, was selected to examine and report upon the subject of a wet dock. He came to Aberdeen in January, 1838, and after examining plans, sections, and reports in the possession of the Trustees, and hearing the opinions and wishes of all concerned he gave in a plan and report in April of the same year.
He recommended the formation of a dock in the harbour by a lock at Lime Street, with a gate at Regent Bridge forming an inner dock above it. About 160 yards of the upper end of the harbour was to be cut off and filled up; but the remainder was to be widened, and new quays were to be formed on the south and east sides; the tidal harbour was to be greatly extended by prolonging Provost Blaikie's Quay to the eastward ; the river was to be diverted southward; and a new spill water channel was to be formed on the south side of the river to prevent opposition from the salmon fishers.
A bill was brought into Parliament in 1839 to carry out Mr Walker's proposals ; but it unexpectedly met with opposition from shopkeepers on account of the increasing shore dues proposed to be levied on their goods, from the shipping companies, and from Messrs Hogarth, Reid, and Pirie, who proposed a Dock in the river with a new channel for it. The bill, moreover, was opposed in Committee by the City member of Parliament, who had agreed to introduce it and had promised to give his best aid and assistance in carrying it through Parliament. The decision of the Committee was unanimously against the bill, and it was lost, mainly apparently on the ground that due time had not been given to the inhabitants to consider it maturely. Nothing was done for three years.
THE ACT OF 1843 — Mr James Abernethy's Proposals.
Notwithstanding the rejection of the bill of 1839 there was still a great desire for a wet dock, and in 1842 Provost Thomas Blaikie called a public meeting of the citizens to obtain their sanction to a bill for the improvement of the harbour by the construction of a wet dock and the extension of the quays, and the removal of the nuisance caused by the infall of sewers into the harbour. A large meeting was held, at which a Committee was appointed to consider schemes and plans and to prepare a new Harbour Bill. Several schemes and plans were considered : — three by Mr James Walker, London; four by Mr Alexander Gibb, engineer, Aberdeen; one by Mr William Leslie, Aberdeen; and two by Mr James Abernethy, Resident Harbour Engineer, Aberdeen.
The plan by Mr James Abernethy was adopted, which showed the upper part of the harbour converted into a wet dock by a lock at the end of York Place, by it ships could pass in and out of the dock at any state of the tide, and alongside of it there was another lock with a single gate by which ships of any length could easily pass in and out at high tide. The dock was to be divided into 2 parts by Regent Bridge and a pier extending southward from the bridge.
The upper part was shown to be 550 feet wide, with its north and south sides parallel; and the south-west corner of Victoria Dock was to be extended till its South side came into line with the South side of the Upper Dock. Two jetties were proposed to give more berths for ships, 1 extending Southward into the Harbour at Sugarhouse Lane, and the other at Market Street.
The west end of the Old Harbour was to be filled up, and the new Upper Dock was not to go beyond Stirling Street. The bill passed, and operations were begun at once, but the 1st Contractors failed after making some progress, and they abandoned the contract.
The Aberdeen Railway Act was passed in 1844, and as the station was planned to be between the Market and Guild Street it was seen that the Railway Company would need the whole of the Upper Harbour west of the line of Market Street, so instead of the jetty a Quay was made. The other jetty, at Sugarhouse Lane, was also relinquished.
The Upper Dock was widened out at its West end and narrowed at its East end; the pier extending south from Regent Bridge was abandoned; and the extension of the South-west corner of Victoria Dock was also given up, so that the South side of the 2 docks is not parallel to Regent Quay as was proposed in the plan sanctioned by Parliament. The plan adopted was probably cheaper than James Abernethy's, but not so shapely in appearance.
THE HARBOUR AND THE RAILWAY
The resolution of the Aberdeen Railway Company to abandon the site on the north side of Guild Street, which they had at first selected for their station, for a larger and more commodious site on the south side required new Acts of Parliament, both for the Harbour Commissioners to sell part of their ground and for the railway company to buy it. The railway company wished to acquire not only the Inner Dock, but the part of the Inches west of Regent Bridge. The Harbour Commissioners, however, resolved to retain for themselves ground sufficient for the foundation of a quay in the line of Market Street and a row of houses on the west side of the quay, and also the whole of the ground lying east of the line of the new quay.
THE LIME BASIN AND THE CANAL BASIN
The dust of calcined limestone is injurious to the clothing and the persons of those on whom it lights, and ships freighted with lime were ordained to discharge their cargoes at a place apart from other ships. The part of the harbour assigned to them was what is now covered by the south end of Waterloo Railway Station, lying west of Church Street. When the Canal Company was formed in 1797 it was settled that the canal was to terminate beside the Lime Basin, and a lime shed was erected for storing lime discharged from ships, where it would be near the canal barges which conveyed it into the interior of the county. The Canal Basin was on the north-west of the Lime Basin, both lying between the ends of Commerce Street and Canal Terrace; but the south end of the terrace has been absorbed into the railway station. Both the Lime Basin and the Canal Basin were originally within the harbour area, being in the wide mouth of the Powcreek Burn; but though they were in close proximity to one another, there was no connection between them. The Lime Basin was merely a nook of the harbour, quite open to it on the west side. The Canal Basin was an excavation with a road between it and the harbour, made on material excavated from the basin. The water in the Canal Basin was fresh, and only its overflow entered the harbour. That it was originally part of the harbour is shown by Kennedy's " Annals," wherein there is mention of ships' anchors being found when it was excavated. The. south end of Waterloo Quay began to be formed in 1811, and when it was extended to its full length northward and joined to Regent Quay the Lime Basin was cut off and rendered useless for ships. For their use a wooden wharf was formed at Provost Blaikie's Quay, on the other side of the harbour, well towards the upper end, to be near Regent Bridge, so as to shorten the cartage of lime between the ships and the Canal. In 1834 the Canal was connected with the harbour by a sea lock, and in 1835 the old Lime Basin was filled up and afterwards built upon.
Kennedys Annals 1818
In 1844 the Great North of Scotland Railway Act was passed, and in view of this an agreement was entered into between the Canal Company and the Railway Company that after the passing of the Act the Canal should be worked for the Railway Company and transferred to them when its bed was required for the construction of the railway. It was given up in 1853, and the Canal Basin and the site of the old Lime Basin were required for the formation of Waterloo Railway Station.
After the formation of the dock-gates in 1848 and the subsequent dredging of the Victoria Dock no new works requiring the borrowing of more money were undertaken for a long time; but the penalty for making a harbour in the mouth of a river had constantly to be paid in the shape of unceasing dredging of sand and gravel brought down by the Dee. This is deposited where the outflow of the river is met by the influx of the tide. When the current of the river is brought to rest the sand and gravel which roll along its bed sink to the bottom and form a firm, compact bed which can be removed only by dredging.
THE ACT OF 1868
In 1867 the great increase of the harbour revenue induced the Commissioners to think of undertaking new works for the improvement of the harbour; and Messrs Hawkshaw and Abernethy, Consulting Engineers, were employed to report on the best means of improving the harbour. Following upon their report a bill was introduced into Parliament, which became an Act in 1868.
This Act repealed and consolidated the Acts of 1843 and 1844. It vested the management of the harbour in a Commission composed of the Town Council and twelve elected members, with a duration of 55 years. In 1923 the harbour reverts to the Town Council.
The Commissioners hold a statutory meeting on the first Monday of the year, and monthly meetings thereafter. The limits of Aberdeen Harbour include the mouths of the Don and Dee, and the intermediate sea coast. The purposes of the Act are defined to be : — the extension of the North Pier to the extent of 166 yards; a new pier or breakwater 420 yards south-east of the then existing breakwater, which had been erected under the superintendence of Telford ; the improvement and deepening of the navigation channel along its whole length from the pier heads to a point 50 yards west of the lower jetty; the removal of 50 yards of the north end of the South Breakwater; the removal of Telford's South Pier on the river side; the improvement, deepening, and widening of a navigation channel between the lower jetty and the dock-gates; the removal of 160 yards of the point of the Inches; the diversion of the Dee, beginning at Wellington Bridge and terminating 120 yards west of the lower jetty; the reclamation and filling up of the old bed of the river Dee; and the widening of Trinity Quay east of Market Street.
MR DYCE CAY'S WORKS
The Commission was empowered to borrow to the extent of £450,000, which covered the debt on the harbour at the commencement of the Act. Mr William Dyce Cay, the resident Harbour Engineer, was appointed to carry out the works sanctioned by the Act, which were to be begun early in 1869, and Messrs Hawkshaw and Abernethy were consulted as to the order in which they should be executed. In 1868 the revenue of the harbour was £2,500, the highest yet reached; and the debt amounted to £180,000, a third of which was for property purchased. £7332 was given to reduce the debt.
THE NEW SOUTH BREAKWATER
The first work undertaken was the erection of the New South Breakwater, which was begun in July, 1869. As long as the work could be carried on without going under water the foundation was prepared by blasting, and the pier was formed of liquid concrete in frames; but when the work had to be carried on in the sea a staging was formed by means of tall Oregon Spars which cost £55 each.
So long as the foundation of the pier was on rock, iron shoes to receive the lower ends of the spars were bolted to the rock. The spars were set up vertically and fastened together by horizontal and diagonal bars. At the top of the spars, at; !0 feet above the sea, a staging was erected with rails for waggons to convey blocks of concrete to be lowered into position.
When the new breakwater had made some progress the stones of the old breakwater and the South Pier were used as "hearting." A railway was laid along the edge of the sea to the Bay of Nigg, where sand and gravel and loose stones were got to help to form the breakwater. Sand was also got from a quarry on the hill of Balnagask. The Work was carried on during summer only, and everything movable was removed during winter. The breakwater extends 1050 feet from high-water mark, and 700 feet from low- water mark of ordinary spring tides. It cost £78,000, an unusually large proportion of which went for preliminary expenses and works and purposes other than the cost of the materials used in construction and the wages of workmen employed at the breakwater.
When the breakwater was finished the spars of the staging were sawn off at the level of the top of the pier. Though they were of the finest quality of wood that could be obtained - such spars could not be obtained now - they did not last long, and only the upper parts remained sound. Large holes were bored in the spars with augers, and liquid cement was poured in to take the place of the decayed wood.
In 1870 the widening of Trinity Quay was ordered. This was a much-needed improvement, as the roadway between the houses and the water was very narrow. The cost of the whole work was £4900, the greater part of which went for paving and other purposes than the building of the quay wall.
THE DIVERSION OF THE RIVER DEE
The diversion of the River Dee was effected under a contract which amounted to nearly £60,000. Borings made in the channel formed for the river yielded fresh water, but it rose and fell in harmony with the rise and fall of the tide. The whole area of the estuary of the Dee, and also the bed of the river for a good way up, had been at one time a bed of fine laminated clay resting upon sand. Water from the river enters below the upper edge of the clay, and passing through the sand comes out at the lower edge of the clay, where the Navigation Channel begins.
As the tide rises the under current of water is stopped and rises in bores, but it runs away again when the tide falls. About 200 yards below Craiglug Bridge, where there was anciently a ferry, dressed sandstone blocks were found.
They could hardly have been the remains of a bridge over the river, but they might have been in a pier projecting into the river, at which passengers and horses embarked and disembarked. Farther down beams of oak were found, still connected together. These might have formed part of a wooden bridge, formed with planks resting on piles driven into the river bed. Such a bridge would easily have been constructed — one in Switzerland is carried across a broad lake — but it would have been in danger from ice and snow coming down the river.
This might have been the bridge for the upholding of which John Crab made a bequest. The diversion of the river cost £37,000, and as the salmon fishers were tenacious of their rights and obstructed the operations of the Commissioners an Act of Parliament was obtained in 1871, empowering the Commissioners to purchase the 'fishings' at a price to be fixed by arbiters. £38,000 was paid for the fishings in the sea within the new breakwater and for those in the river up to the Chain Bridge at Craiglug.
The material excavated from the new channel for the river was employed in filling up the old channel, and by it and the dredgings from the Victoria Dock a large extent of ground was reclaimed. Some material was obtained also from the point of the Inches, which was removed lo facilitate the entrance of large ships into the dock.
The Navigation Channel was cleared of all obstructions by the removal of the greater part of the old breakwater and the South Pier, only the end of it being left. Both these works had cost, much money and had been regarded as great improvements when they were made. In dredging the Navigation Channel, cairns built up around posts were found and removed, and the channel was widened out to 300 feet. The posts had been used in warping ships into the harbour against the wind.
THE ACT OF 1879
No new works in connection with the outer entrance to the harbour were contemplated by this Act; but the channel had been so much deepened that the platform at the base of the head of the old North Pier had become a source of danger to ships entering the harbour, and it had to be removed. At the same time something had to be done to secure the foundation of the old part of the North Pier.
By much dredging the channel had been lowered below the base of the pier, and it was in danger of being undermined by the rush of waves inward along the south face of the wall. Large blocks of stones had been laid down at the foot of the wall to protect it.
These were now removed, and a row of piles was driven into the hard clay at some distance from the wall. Then an excavation was made between the piling and the wall, and this was filled with concrete. But the chief works carried out by the money borrowed under the Act were done within the harbour. Mr William Smith, the resident Harbour engineer, proposed to remove Regent Bridge to the end of Commerce Street; to continue Provost Jamieson's Quay eastward to join Provost Blaikie's Quay; to project a jetty 650 feet into the Upper Dock from Market Quay; and to lay a double line of railway along the quays. Some of. these recommendations, however, were not carried out. Trinity Quay was narrow, and its foundation was only 7 feet above the sill of the dock gate. Smith proposed to found a new wall 50 feet from the old quay, making it 120 feet wide, and to found it 20 feet deeper than the old wall. Another great undertaking was the filling up of the old bed of the Dee. It would have been desirable to utilise for this purpose the whole of the dredgings from the docks and the navigation channel, but this would have greatly hindered the work of dredging, and most of the excavated matter was carried out to sea and dropped in deep water.
The enormous quantity of 22,000 tons of refuse had to be removed every year from the town, and it was arranged to deposit a considerable part of this in the old bed of the Dee. By September, 1880, the whole of the old bed of the river, west of Market Street, had been filled up and laid out in streets or roads, and the part east of Market Street was formed into a tidal harbour, called Albert Basin. The name Commercial Road was given to the new road formed along the northern bank of this basin, where the Fish Market was. It was also resolved to form a quay, to be called Provost Jamieson's Quay, along the south side of the Upper Dock. The cost was estimated at £11,000 but it ultimately amounted to £15,000.
The herring fishing began at Aberdeen in 1836 at the instillation of the fishermen of the Cove and Portlethen. Some provision for accommodating herring boats had been made at Point Law, and it was proposed to do more for the promotion of this industry when there was more money at the command of the Harbour Board.
RECENT IMPROVEMENTS
Under the powers conferred by the Act of 1899 the Old Regent Bridge was removed and a new and wider bridge has taken its place, which is opened and closed by electric power. It was completed in 1905. Part of Point Law has been removed and a wharf has been erected on the north side of the channel of the Dee, on the south side of the point. Much dredging has been done between the dock gates and the pier heads. The sills of the two gates are 22 Feet and 26 feet, respectively, below high water, and the depth between the pier heads is now 29 feet. Sand and gravel and some shells, called Solen siliqua, are driven in during storms to a distance of 300 yards from the entrance, and they form a bar, which has to be removed by dredging.
First established as a business in 1136 by King David 1st of Scotland, Aberdeen Harbour is, according to the Guinness Book of Business Records, the oldest existing business in Britain, with a history that has spanned almost 900 years.
It is only when we map this history against the development of Aberdeen itself into a busy and vibrant city, and against a backdrop of important world events, that we can truly appreciate the port’s incredible story, and its transformation in to a modern, state-of-the-art facility.
Before the harbour improvements began in 1773, and even for many years after, the whole estuary of the Dee was covered at high water. This required such a volume of water that, as soon as the tide began to rise, the current of the river was arrested and the sea began to flow in, which ordinarily caused a scour in the harbour mouth when it flowed out. This state of matters has been completely changed by the deepening and widening of the navigation channel and the formation of the wet dock and the embankment of the Inches.
There is less influx of sea water at the bottom, and there is a steady flow outward of the warm, light river-water at the surface at all states of the tide. When the tide begins to rise, sea-water gently comes along the bottom of the channel without arresting the outward flow of the River till Point Law is reached, where the depth of the River rapidly diminishes. Here the stream of sand and gravel incessantly rolling along the bed of the river is arrested and a bank is formed which must be removed by dredging, and there is now no scour in the navigation channel.
Foreseeing the necessity of enlarging the accommodation for shipping the Harbour Commissioners spent a large sum in the purchase of land on the south side of the Dee for the formation of new docks. The dimensions of ships are increasing, and they wish to deepen the entrance channel and some parts of the harbour to 30 feet. This requires more money and new powers, and they obtained a Provisional Order, titled the Aberdeen Harbour Order, 1907, authorising them to borrow £300,000 additional for the execution of new works, comprehending : — securing the foundations of the North Pier; improvement of the Upper Dock by deepening, reconstructing the quays, and extension southward ; widening Waterloo Quay and Provost Blaikie's Quay; removal of the Graving Dock; construction of floating docks ; wharves at Point Law and Albert Quay; wharves at the Fish Market; docking of the River Dee ; reconstruction of the harbour railways ; the purchase of locomotive engines; and the purchase of land. When deepening the Navigation Channel by dredging began the first obstacle met with was loose boulders which had been dropped by the Dee Glacier as it melted on entering the sea.
These were lifted and removed, and dredging went on till another difficulty was encountered. It was found that solid rock extends northward from the Torry side under the Channel. For a time it was possible to remove upstanding points and decayed parts of the rock by dredging, and a depth of 27 feet was obtained by this means; but the deeper the dredging was carried the further the rocky area was found to extend northward and eastward. It is at present known to extend 400 feet from east to west, and in some places nearly as far as to the North Pier. Beyond it rock is found at the depth of 100 feet under the beach.
The increasing size of ships coming to Aberdeen has made it desirable to attain a depth of 30 feet in the entrance channel of the harbour, and this cannot be got by dredging. Hitherto the removal of submarine rock in harbours has been done by boring a row of holes, charging them with explosives, and firing them off simultaneously by electricity.
At Aberdeen another method of breaking up solid rock has been adopted. A small ship has been furnished with an iron cylinder weighing 26 tons, with a steel pointed head. This is raised vertically and dropped on the rock several times in succession on the same place. In a short time the rock is broken up to the depth of 3 feet and then the ship is shifted to another place. The apparatus does its work efficiently and economically, and after a depth of 30 feet is obtained all over the Channel an effort may be made to reach 33 feet.
River Dee Dock
By the early 20th century, Aberdeen was Scotland's leading white fish port and with this came the need for expanded quayside facilities.
The River Dee Dock was built between 1909 and 1915 and was used to provide servicing for the fishing fleet. It is now the site for tankers to offload petroleum to the large tanks on shore. This has recently been piled and filled in 2012 to provide more Quay space on the Torry side.
Working Docks
Wood and Davidson's had a small ship repair works at Point Law which employed the floating pontoons to make jobbing repairs to small vessels such as trawlers.
Thanks goes to the wonderful people at The Doric Columns for the above history on the harbour .
Aberdeen Harbour
Aberdeen Harbour is the UK's oldest existing business and Europe’s premier marine support centre for the oil and gas industry. Construction of the new South Harbour commenced in 2017 and the £350m project will up-scale opportunities for existing customers and open the door to new markets. Combined with the existing port, Aberdeen Harbour will soon become the largest port in Scotland in terms of berthage, and one of the most tidally unrestricted.o
Features a dark, glossy green-blue cap, a rich chestnut or maroon neck, greyish-green wings, and distinct bright yellow legs and eyes. Unlike larger, long-legged herons, the Green Heron is quite compact and often keeps its neck pulled tightly against its body, making it look almost hunched. They are famous for being one of the few bird species known to use tools. They will drop insects, twigs, feathers, or breadcrumbs onto the surface of the water to lure curious fish within striking distance. They are found near small wetlands, ponds, marshes, and heavily vegetated stream banks where they hunt under dense cover.
Chacahua Lagoons National Park
Oaxaca Mexico
The Ave Maria Welcome Center is located at 5076 Annunciation Circle #104, Ave Maria, FL 34142, in the heart of the town center. The center is open Monday through Friday from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM, and Saturday and Sunday from 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM. You can contact the staff directly by calling (239) 352-3903 or emailing Info@AveMaria.com.
Ave Maria is an award-winning, master-planned community in Southwest Florida, located about 45 minutes east of Naples. Founded in 2005 by Domino’s Pizza founder Tom Monaghan and Barron Collier Companies, it is renowned for its small-town charm, affordability, and close-knit, faith-based roots anchored by Ave Maria University.
Key Community Features
Location: Collier County, FL, roughly 45 minutes inland from Vanderbilt Beach and Southwest Florida International Airport.
Housing: Master-planned by builders like Lennar, Pulte Homes, and CC Homes, with prices generally spanning from the low $200s to the $800s.
Neighborhoods: Includes multi-generational communities like Avalon Park, Maple Ridge, and the 55+ Del Webb Naples neighborhood.
Amenities & Lifestyle
Town Center: Features over 70 businesses, including dining, shopping, medical offices, and a Publix grocery store.
Recreation: Resort-style water parks, two expansive community parks, a dog park, and two 18-hole championship golf courses.
Schools: Offers A-rated K-12 schools, making it highly attractive for growing families.
University: Ave Maria University is situated at the center of the town alongside the striking Ave Maria Parish church, known for its iconic steel and glass oratory.
Credit for the data above is given to the following websites:
www.google.com/search?q=town+of+ave+maria+florida&sca...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ave_Maria,_Florida
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Wells Cathedral is an Anglican cathedral in Wells, Somerset, England, dedicated to St Andrew the Apostle. It is the seat of the Bishop of Bath and Wells, whose cathedra it holds as mother church of the Diocese of Bath and Wells. Built as a Roman Catholic cathedral from around 1175 to replace an earlier church on the site since 705, it became an Anglican cathedral when King Henry VIII split from Rome. It is moderately sized for an English cathedral. Its broad west front and large central tower are dominant features. It has been called "unquestionably one of the most beautiful" and "most poetic" of English cathedrals.
Its Gothic architecture is mostly inspired from Early English style of the late 12th to early 13th centuries, lacking the Romanesque work that survives in many other cathedrals. Building began about 1175 at the east end with the choir. Historian John Harvey sees it as Europe's first truly Gothic structure, breaking the last constraints of Romanesque. The stonework of its pointed arcades and fluted piers bears pronounced mouldings and carved capitals in a foliate, "stiff-leaf" style. Its Early English front with 300 sculpted figures is seen as a "supreme triumph of the combined plastic arts in England". The east end retains much ancient stained glass. Unlike many cathedrals of monastic foundation, Wells has many surviving secular buildings linked to its chapter of secular canons, including the Bishop's Palace and the 15th-century residential Vicars' Close It is a Grade I listed building.
The earliest remains of a building on the site are of a late-Roman mausoleum, identified during excavations in 1980. An abbey church was built in Wells in 705 by Aldhelm, first bishop of the newly established Diocese of Sherborne during the reign of King Ine of Wessex. It was dedicated to St Andrew and stood at the site of the cathedral's cloisters, where some excavated remains can be seen. The font in the cathedral's south transept is from this church and is the oldest part of the present building. In 766 Cynewulf, King of Wessex, signed a charter endowing the church with eleven hides of land. In 909 the seat of the diocese was moved from Sherborne to Wells.
The first bishop of Wells was Athelm (909), who crowned King Æthelstan. Athelm and his nephew Dunstan both became Archbishops of Canterbury. During this period a choir of boys was established to sing the liturgy. Wells Cathedral School, which was established to educate these choirboys, dates its foundation to this point. There is, however, some controversy over this. Following the Norman Conquest, John de Villula moved the seat of the bishop from Wells to Bath in 1090. The church at Wells, no longer a cathedral, had a college of secular clergy.
The cathedral is thought to have been conceived and commenced in about 1175 by Reginald Fitz Jocelin, who died in 1191. Although it is clear from its size that from the outset, the church was planned to be the cathedral of the diocese, the seat of the bishop moved between Wells and the abbeys of Glastonbury and Bath, before settling at Wells. In 1197 Reginald's successor, Savaric FitzGeldewin, with the approval of Pope Celestine III, officially moved his seat to Glastonbury Abbey. The title of Bishop of Bath and Glastonbury was used until the Glastonbury claim was abandoned in 1219.
Savaric's successor, Jocelin of Wells, again moved the bishop's seat to Bath Abbey, with the title Bishop of Bath. Jocelin was a brother of Hugh (II) of Lincoln and was present at the signing of the Magna Carta. Jocelin continued the building campaign begun by Reginald and was responsible for the Bishop's Palace, the choristers' school, a grammar school, a hospital for travellers and a chapel. He also had a manor house built at Wookey, near Wells. Jocelin saw the church dedicated in 1239 but, despite much lobbying of the Pope by Jocelin's representatives in Rome, did not live to see cathedral status granted. The delay may have been a result of inaction by Pandulf Verraccio, a Roman ecclesiastical politician, papal legate to England and Bishop of Norwich, who was asked by the Pope to investigate the situation but did not respond. Jocelin died at Wells on 19 November 1242 and was buried in the choir of the cathedral; the memorial brass on his tomb is one of the earliest brasses in England. Following his death the monks of Bath unsuccessfully attempted to regain authority over Wells.
In 1245 the ongoing dispute over the title of the bishop was resolved by a ruling of Pope Innocent IV, who established the title as the "Bishop of Bath and Wells", which it has remained until this day, with Wells as the principal seat of the bishop. Since the 11th century the church has had a chapter of secular clergy, like the cathedrals of Chichester, Hereford, Lincoln and York. The chapter was endowed with 22 prebends (lands from which finance was drawn) and a provost to manage them. On acquiring cathedral status, in common with other such cathedrals, it had four chief clergy, the dean, precentor, chancellor and sacristan, who were responsible for the spiritual and material care of the cathedral.
The building programme, begun by Reginald Fitz Jocelin, Bishop in the 12th century, continued under Jocelin of Wells, who was a canon from 1200, then bishop from 1206. Adam Locke was master mason from about 1192 until 1230. It was designed in the new style with pointed arches, later known as Gothic, which was introduced at about the same time at Canterbury Cathedral. Work was halted between 1209 and 1213 when King John was excommunicated and Jocelin was in exile, but the main parts of the church were complete by the time of the dedication by Jocelin in 1239.
By the time the cathedral, including the chapter house, was finished in 1306, it was already too small for the developing liturgy, and unable to accommodate increasingly grand processions of clergy. John Droxford initiated another phase of building under master mason Thomas of Whitney, during which the central tower was heightened and an eight-sided Lady chapel was added at the east end by 1326. Ralph of Shrewsbury followed, continuing the eastward extension of the choir and retrochoir beyond. He oversaw the building of Vicars' Close and the Vicars' Hall, to give the men who were employed to sing in the choir a secure place to live and dine, away from the town and its temptations. He had an uneasy relationship with the citizens of Wells, partly because of his imposition of taxes, and he surrounded his palace with crenellated walls, a moat and a drawbridge.
John Harewell raised money for the completion of the west front by William Wynford, who was appointed as master mason in 1365. One of the foremost master masons of his time, Wynford worked for the king at Windsor, Winchester Cathedral and New College, Oxford. At Wells, he designed the western towers of which north-west was not built until the following century. In the 14th century, the central piers of the crossing were found to be sinking under the weight of the crossing tower which had been damaged by an earthquake in the previous century. Strainer arches, sometimes described as scissor arches, were inserted by master mason William Joy to brace and stabilise the piers as a unit.
By the reign of Henry VII the cathedral was complete, appearing much as it does today (though the fittings have changed). From 1508 to 1546, the eminent Italian humanist scholar Polydore Vergil was active as the chapter's representative in London. He donated a set of hangings for the choir of the cathedral. While Wells survived the Dissolution of the Monasteries better than the cathedrals of monastic foundation, the abolition of chantries in 1547 resulted in a reduction in its income. Medieval brasses were sold, and a pulpit was placed in the nave for the first time. Between 1551 and 1568, in two periods as dean, William Turner established a herb garden, which was recreated between 2003 and 2010.
Elizabeth I gave the chapter and the Vicars Choral a new charter in 1591, creating a new governing body, consisting of a dean and eight residentiary canons with control over the church estates and authority over its affairs, but no longer entitled to elect the dean (that entitlement thenceforward belonged ultimately to the Crown). The stability brought by the new charter ended with the onset of the Civil War and the execution of Charles I. Local fighting damaged the cathedral's stonework, furniture and windows. The dean, Walter Raleigh, a nephew of the explorer Walter Raleigh, was placed under house arrest after the fall of Bridgwater to the Parliamentarians in 1645, first in the rectory at Chedzoy and then in the deanery at Wells. His jailor, the shoe maker and city constable, David Barrett, caught him writing a letter to his wife. When he refused to surrender it, Barrett ran him through with a sword and he died six weeks later, on 10 October 1646. He was buried in an unmarked grave in the choir before the dean's stall. During the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell no dean was appointed and the cathedral fell into disrepair. The bishop went into retirement and some of the clerics were reduced to performing menial tasks.
In 1661, after Charles II was restored to the throne, Robert Creighton, the king's chaplain in exile, was appointed dean and was bishop for two years before his death in 1672. His brass lectern, given in thanksgiving, can be seen in the cathedral. He donated the nave's great west window at a cost of £140. Following Creighton's appointment as bishop, the post of dean went to Ralph Bathurst, who had been chaplain to the king, president of Trinity College, Oxford and fellow of the Royal Society. During Bathurst's long tenure the cathedral was restored, but in the Monmouth Rebellion of 1685, Puritan soldiers damaged the west front, tore lead from the roof to make bullets, broke the windows, smashed the organ and furnishings, and for a time stabled their horses in the nave.
Restoration began again under Thomas Ken who was appointed by the Crown in 1685 and served until 1691. He was one of seven bishops imprisoned for refusing to sign King James II's "Declaration of Indulgence", which would have enabled Catholics to resume positions of political power, but popular support led to their acquittal. Ken refused to take the oath of allegiance to William III and Mary II because James II had not abdicated and with others, known as the Nonjurors, was put out of office. His successor, Richard Kidder, was killed in the Great Storm of 1703 when two chimney stacks on the palace fell on him and his wife, while they were asleep in bed.
By the middle of the 19th century, a major restoration programme was needed. Under Dean Goodenough, the monuments were moved to the cloisters and the remaining medieval paint and whitewash removed in an operation known as "the great scrape". Anthony Salvin took charge of the extensive restoration of the choir. Wooden galleries installed in the 16th century were removed and the stalls were given stone canopies and placed further back within the line of the arcade. The medieval stone pulpitum screen was extended in the centre to support a new organ.
In 1933 the Friends of Wells Cathedral were formed to support the cathedral's chapter in the maintenance of the fabric, life and work of the cathedral. The late 20th century saw an extensive restoration programme, particularly of the west front. The stained glass is currently under restoration, with a programme underway to conserve the large 14th-century Jesse Tree window at the eastern terminal of the choir.
In January 2014, as part of the Bath film festival, the cathedral hosted a special screening of Martin Scorsese's The Last Temptation of Christ. This provoked some controversy, but the church defended its decision to allow the screening.
In 2021, a contemporary sculpture by Anthony Gormley was unveiled on a temporary plinth outside the cathedral.
Since the 13th century, Wells Cathedral has been the seat of the Bishop of Bath and Wells. Its governing body, the chapter, is made up of five clerical canons (the dean, the precentor, the canon chancellor, the canon treasurer, and the archdeacon of Wells) and four lay members: the administrator (chief executive), Keeper of the Fabric, Overseer of the Estate and the chairman of the cathedral shop and catering boards. The current bishop of Bath and Wells is Peter Hancock, who was installed in a service in the cathedral on 7 June 2014. John Davies has been Dean of Wells since 2016.
Employed staff include the organist and master of choristers, head Verger archivist, librarian and the staff of the shop, café and restaurant. The chapter is advised by specialists such as architects, archaeologists and financial analysts.
More than a thousand services are held every year. There are daily services of Matins, Holy Communion and Choral Evensong, as well as major celebrations of Christian festivals such as Christmas, Easter, Pentecost and saints' days. The cathedral is also used for the baptisms, weddings and funerals of those with close connections to it. In July 2009 the cathedral undertook the funeral of Harry Patch, the last British Army veteran of World War I, who died at the age of 111.
Three Sunday services are led by the resident choir in school terms and choral services are sung on weekdays. The cathedral hosts visiting choirs and does outreach work with local schools as part of its Chorister Outreach Project. It is also a venue for musical events such as an annual concert by the Somerset Chamber Choir.
Each year about 150,000 people attend services and another 300,000 visit as tourists. Entry is free, but visitors are encouraged to make a donation towards the annual running costs of around £1.5 million in 2015.
Construction of the cathedral began in about 1175, to the design of an unknown master-mason. Wells is the first cathedral in England to be built, from its foundation, in Gothic style. According to art historian John Harvey, it is the first truly Gothic cathedral in the world, its architects having entirely dispensed with all features that bound the contemporary east end of Canterbury Cathedral and the earlier buildings of France, such as the east end of the Abbey of Saint Denis, to the Romanesque. Unlike these churches, Wells has clustered piers rather than columns and has a gallery of identical pointed arches rather than the typically Romanesque form of paired openings. The style, with its simple lancet arches without tracery and convoluted mouldings, is known as Early English Gothic.
From about 1192 to 1230, Adam Lock, the earliest master-mason at Wells for whom a name is known, continued the transept and nave in the same manner as his predecessor. Lock was also the builder of the north porch, to his own design.
The Early English west front was commenced around 1230 by Thomas Norreys, with building and sculpture continuing for thirty years. Its south-west tower was begun 100 years later and constructed between 1365 and 1395, and the north-west tower between 1425 and 1435, both in the Perpendicular Gothic style to the design of William Wynford, who also filled many of the cathedral's early English lancet windows with delicate tracery.
The undercroft and chapter house were built by unknown architects between 1275 and 1310, the undercroft in the Early English and the chapter house in the Geometric style of Decorated Gothic architecture. In about 1310 work commenced on the Lady Chapel, to the design of Thomas Witney, who also built the central tower from 1315 to 1322 in the Decorated Gothic style. The tower was later braced internally with arches by William Joy. Concurrent with this work, in 1329–45 Joy made alterations and extensions to the choir, joining it to the Lady Chapel with the retrochoir, the latter in the Flowing Decorated style.
Later changes include the Perpendicular vault of the tower and construction of Sugar's Chapel, 1475–1490 by William Smyth. Also, Gothic Revival renovations were made to the choir and pulpitum by Benjamin Ferrey and Anthony Salvin, 1842–1857.
Wells has a total length of 415 feet (126 m). Like Canterbury, Lincoln and Salisbury cathedrals, it has the distinctly English arrangement of two transepts, with the body of the church divided into distinct parts: nave, choir, and retro-choir, beyond which extends the Lady Chapel. The façade is wide, with its towers extending beyond the transepts on either side. There is a large projecting porch on the north side of the nave forming an entry into the cathedral. To the north-east is the large octagonal chapter house, entered from the north choir aisle by a passage and staircase. To the south of the nave is a large cloister, unusual in that the northern range, that adjacent the cathedral, was never built.
In section, the cathedral has the usual arrangement of a large church: a central nave with an aisle on each side, separated by two arcades. The elevation is in three stages, arcade, triforium gallery and clerestory. The nave is 67 feet (20 m) in height, very low compared to the Gothic cathedrals of France. It has a markedly horizontal emphasis, caused by the triforium having a unique form, a series of identical narrow openings, lacking the usual definition of the bays. The triforium is separated from the arcade by a single horizontal string course that runs unbroken the length of the nave. There are no vertical lines linking the three stages, as the shafts supporting the vault rise above the triforium.
The exterior of Wells Cathedral presents a relatively tidy and harmonious appearance since the greater part of the building was executed in a single style, Early English Gothic. This is uncommon among English cathedrals where the exterior usually exhibits a plethora of styles. At Wells, later changes in the Perpendicular style were universally applied, such as filling the Early English lancet windows with simple tracery, the construction of a parapet that encircles the roof, and the addition of pinnacles framing each gable, similar to those around the chapter house and on the west front. At the eastern end there is a proliferation of tracery with repeated motifs in the Reticulated style, a stage between Geometric and Flowing Decorated tracery.
The west front is 100 feet (30 m) high and 147 feet (45 m) wide, and built of Inferior Oolite of the Middle Jurassic period, which came from the Doulting Stone Quarry, about 8 miles (13 km) to the east. According to the architectural historian Alec Clifton-Taylor, it is "one of the great sights of England".
West fronts in general take three distinct forms: those that follow the elevation of the nave and aisles, those that have paired towers at the end of each aisle, framing the nave, and those that screen the form of the building. The west front at Wells has the paired-tower form, unusual in that the towers do not indicate the location of the aisles, but extend well beyond them, screening the dimensions and profile of the building.
The west front rises in three distinct stages, each clearly defined by a horizontal course. This horizontal emphasis is counteracted by six strongly projecting buttresses defining the cross-sectional divisions of nave, aisles and towers, and are highly decorated, each having canopied niches containing the largest statues on the façade.
At the lowest level of the façade is a plain base, contrasting with and stabilising the ornate arcades that rise above it. The base is penetrated by three doors, which are in stark contrast to the often imposing portals of French Gothic cathedrals. The outer two are of domestic proportion and the central door is ornamented only by a central post, quatrefoil and the fine mouldings of the arch.
Above the basement rise two storeys, ornamented with quatrefoils and niches originally holding about four hundred statues, with three hundred surviving until the mid-20th century. Since then, some have been restored or replaced, including the ruined figure of Christ in the gable.
The third stages of the flanking towers were both built in the Perpendicular style of the late 14th century, to the design of William Wynford; that on the north-west was not begun until about 1425. The design maintains the general proportions, and continues the strong projection of the buttresses.
The finished product has been criticised for its lack of pinnacles, and it is probable that the towers were intended to carry spires which were never built. Despite its lack of spires or pinnacles, the architectural historian Banister Fletcher describes it as "the highest development in English Gothic of this type of façade."
The sculptures on the west front at Wells include standing figures, seated figures, half-length angels and narratives in high relief. Many of the figures are life-sized or larger. Together they constitute the finest display of medieval carving in England. The figures and many of the architectural details were painted in bright colours, and the colouring scheme has been deduced from flakes of paint still adhering to some surfaces. The sculptures occupy nine architectural zones stretching horizontally across the entire west front and around the sides and the eastern returns of the towers which extend beyond the aisles. The strongly projecting buttresses have tiers of niches which contain many of the largest figures. Other large figures, including that of Christ, occupy the gable. A single figure stands in one of two later niches high on the northern tower.
In 1851 the archaeologist Charles Robert Cockerell published his analysis of the iconography, numbering the nine sculptural divisions from the lowest to the highest. He defined the theme as "a calendar for unlearned men" illustrating the doctrines and history of the Christian faith, its introduction to Britain and its protection by princes and bishops. He likens the arrangement and iconography to the Te Deum.
According to Cockerell, the side of the façade that is to the south of the central door is the more sacred and the scheme is divided accordingly. The lowest range of niches each contained a standing figure, of which all but four figures on the west front, two on each side, have been destroyed. More have survived on the northern and eastern sides of the north tower. Cockerell speculates that those to the south of the portal represented prophets and patriarchs of the Old Testament while those to the north represented early missionaries to Britain, of which Augustine of Canterbury, St Birinus, and Benedict Biscop are identifiable by their attributes. In the second zone, above each pair of standing figures, is a quatrefoil containing a half-length angel in relief, some of which have survived. Between the gables of the niches are quatrefoils that contain a series of narratives from the Bible, with the Old Testament stories to the south, above the prophets and patriarchs, and those from the New Testament to the north. A horizontal course runs around the west front dividing the architectural storeys at this point.
Above the course, zones four and five, as identified by Cockerell, contain figures which represent the Christian Church in Britain, with the spiritual lords such as bishops, abbots, abbesses and saintly founders of monasteries on the south, while kings, queens and princes occupy the north. Many of the figures survive and many have been identified in the light of their various attributes. There is a hierarchy of size, with the more significant figures larger and enthroned in their niches rather than standing. Immediately beneath the upper course are a series of small niches containing dynamic sculptures of the dead coming forth from their tombs on the Day of Judgement. Although naked, some of the dead are defined as royalty by their crowns and others as bishops by their mitres. Some emerge from their graves with joy and hope, and others with despair.
The niches in the lowest zone of the gable contain nine angels, of which Cockerell identifies Michael, Gabriel, Raphael and Uriel. In the next zone are the taller figures of the twelve apostles, some, such as John, Andrew and Bartholomew, clearly identifiable by the attributes that they carry. The uppermost niches of the gable contained the figure of Christ the Judge at the centre, with the Virgin Mary on his right and John the Baptist on his left. The figures all suffered from iconoclasm. A new statue of Jesus was carved for the central niche, but the two side niches now contain cherubim. Christ and the Virgin Mary are also represented by now headless figures in a Coronation of the Virgin in a niche above the central portal. A damaged figure of the Virgin and Christ Child occupies a quatrefoil in the spandrel of the door.
The central tower appears to date from the early 13th century. It was substantially reconstructed in the early 14th century during the remodelling of the east end, necessitating the internal bracing of the piers a decade or so later. In the 14th century the tower was given a timber and lead spire which burnt down in 1439. The exterior was then reworked in the Perpendicular style and given the present parapet and pinnacles. Alec Clifton-Taylor describes it as "outstanding even in Somerset, a county famed for the splendour of its church towers".
The north porch is described by art historian Nikolaus Pevsner as "sumptuously decorated", and intended as the main entrance. Externally it is simple and rectangular with plain side walls. The entrance is a steeply arched portal framed by rich mouldings of eight shafts with stiff-leaf capitals each encircled by an annular moulding at middle height. Those on the left are figurative, containing images representing the martyrdom of St Edmund the Martyr. The walls are lined with deep niches framed by narrow shafts with capitals and annulets like those of the portal. The path to the north porch is lined by four sculptures in Purbeck stone, each by Mary Spencer Watson, representing the symbols of the Evangelists.
The cloisters were built in the late 13th century and largely rebuilt from 1430 to 1508 and have wide openings divided by mullions and transoms, and tracery in the Perpendicular Gothic style. The vault has lierne ribs that form octagons at the centre of each compartment, the joints of each rib having decorative bosses. The eastern range is of two storeys, of which the upper is the library built in the 15th century.
Because Wells Cathedral was secular rather than monastic, cloisters were not a practical necessity. They were omitted from several other secular cathedrals but were built here and at Chichester. Explanations for their construction at these two secular cathedrals range from the processional to the aesthetic. As at Chichester, there is no northern range to the cloisters. In monastic cloisters it was the north range, benefiting most from winter sunlight, that was often used as a scriptorium.
In 1969, when a large chunk of stone fell from a statue near the main door, it became apparent that there was an urgent need for restoration of the west front. Detailed studies of the stonework and of conservation practices were undertaken under the cathedral architect, Alban D. R. Caroe and a restoration committee formed. The methods selected were those devised by Eve and Robert Baker. W. A. (Bert) Wheeler, clerk of works to the cathedral 1935–1978, had previously experimented with washing and surface treatment of architectural carvings on the building and his techniques were among those tried on the statues.
The conservation was carried out between 1974 and 1986, wherever possible using non-invasive procedures such as washing with water and a solution of lime, filling gaps and damaged surfaces with soft mortar to prevent the ingress of water and stabilising statues that were fracturing through corrosion of metal dowels. The surfaces were finished by painting with a thin coat of mortar and silane to resist further erosion and attack by pollutants. The restoration of the façade revealed much paint adhering to the statues and their niches, indicating that it had once been brightly coloured.
The particular character of this Early English interior is dependent on the proportions of the simple lancet arches. It is also dependent on the refinement of the architectural details, in particular the mouldings.
The arcade, which takes the same form in the nave, choir and transepts, is distinguished by the richness of both mouldings and carvings. Each pier of the arcade has a surface enrichment of 24 slender shafts in eight groups of three, rising beyond the capitals to form the deeply undulating mouldings of the arches. The capitals themselves are remarkable for the vitality of the stylised foliage, in a style known as "stiff-leaf". The liveliness contrasts with the formality of the moulded shafts and the smooth unbroken areas of ashlar masonry in the spandrels. Each capital is different, and some contain small figures illustrating narratives.
The vault of the nave rises steeply in a simple quadripartite form, in harmony with the nave arcade. The eastern end of the choir was extended and the whole upper part elaborated in the second quarter of the 14th century by William Joy. The vault has a multiplicity of ribs in a net-like form, which is very different from that of the nave, and is perhaps a recreation in stone of a local type of compartmented wooden roof of which examples remain from the 15th century, including those at St Cuthbert's Church, Wells. The vaults of the aisles of the choir also have a unique pattern.
Until the early 14th century, the interior of the cathedral was in a unified style, but it was to undergo two significant changes, to the tower and to the eastern end. Between 1315 and 1322 the central tower was heightened and topped by a spire, which caused the piers that supported it to show signs of stress. In 1338 the mason William Joy employed an unorthodox solution by inserting low arches topped by inverted arches of similar dimensions, forming scissors-like structures. These arches brace the piers of the crossing on three sides, while the easternmost side is braced by a choir screen. The bracing arches are known as "St Andrew's Cross arches", in a reference to the patron saint of the cathedral. They have been described by Wim Swaan – rightly or wrongly – as "brutally massive" and intrusive in an otherwise restrained interior.
Wells Cathedral has a square east end to the choir, as is usual, and like several other cathedrals including Salisbury and Lichfield, has a lower Lady Chapel projecting at the eastern end, begun by Thomas Witney in about 1310, possibly before the chapter house was completed. The Lady Chapel seems to have begun as a free-standing structure in the form of an elongated octagon, but the plan changed and it was linked to the eastern end by extension of the choir and construction of a second transept or retrochoir east of the choir, probably by William Joy.
The Lady Chapel has a vault of complex and somewhat irregular pattern, as the chapel is not symmetrical about both axes. The main ribs are intersected by additional non-supporting, lierne ribs, which in this case form a star-shaped pattern at the apex of the vault. It is one of the earliest lierne vaults in England. There are five large windows, of which four are filled with fragments of medieval glass. The tracery of the windows is in the style known as Reticulated Gothic, having a pattern of a single repeated shape, in this case a trefoil, giving a "reticulate" or net-like appearance.
The retrochoir extends across the east end of the choir and into the east transepts. At its centre the vault is supported by a remarkable structure of angled piers. Two of these are placed as to complete the octagonal shape of the Lady Chapel, a solution described by Francis Bond as "an intuition of Genius". The piers have attached shafts of marble, and, with the vaults that they support, create a vista of great complexity from every angle. The windows of the retrochoir are in the Reticulated style like those of the Lady Chapel, but are fully Flowing Decorated in that the tracery mouldings form ogival curves.
The chapter house was begun in the late 13th century and built in two stages, completed about 1310. It is a two-storeyed structure with the main chamber raised on an undercroft. It is entered from a staircase which divides and turns, one branch leading through the upper storey of Chain Gate to Vicars' Close. The Decorated interior is described by Alec Clifton-Taylor as "architecturally the most beautiful in England". It is octagonal, with its ribbed vault supported on a central column. The column is surrounded by shafts of Purbeck Marble, rising to a single continuous rippling foliate capital of stylised oak leaves and acorns, quite different in character from the Early English stiff-leaf foliage. Above the moulding spring 32 ribs of strong profile, giving an effect generally likened to "a great palm tree". The windows are large with Geometric Decorated tracery that is beginning to show an elongation of form, and ogees in the lesser lights that are characteristic of Flowing Decorated tracery. The tracery lights still contain ancient glass. Beneath the windows are 51 stalls, the canopies of which are enlivened by carvings including many heads carved in a light-hearted manner.
Wells Cathedral contains one of the most substantial collections of medieval stained glass in England, despite damage by Parliamentary troops in 1642 and 1643. The oldest surviving glass dates from the late 13th century and is in two windows on the west side of the chapter-house staircase. Two windows in the south choir aisle are from 1310 to 1320.
The Lady Chapel has five windows, of which four date from 1325 to 1330 and include images of a local saint, Dunstan. The east window was restored to a semblance of its original appearance by Thomas Willement in 1845. The other windows have complete canopies, but the pictorial sections are fragmented.
The east window of the choir is a broad, seven-light window dating from 1340 to 1345. It depicts the Tree of Jesse (the genealogy of Christ) and demonstrates the use of silver staining, a new technique that allowed the artist to paint details on the glass in yellow, as well as black. The combination of yellow and green glass and the application of the bright yellow stain gives the window its popular name, the "Golden Window". It is flanked by two windows each side in the clerestory, with large figures of saints, also dated to 1340–45. In 2010 a major conservation programme was undertaken on the Jesse Tree window.
The panels in the chapel of St Katherine are attributed to Arnold of Nijmegen and date from about 1520. They were acquired from the destroyed church of Saint-Jean, Rouen, with the last panel having been purchased in 1953.
The large triple lancet to the nave west end was glazed at the expense of Dean Creighton at a cost of £140 in 1664. It was repaired in 1813, and the central light was largely replaced to a design by Archibald Keightley Nicholson between 1925 and 1931. The main north and south transept end windows by James Powell and Sons were erected in the early 20th century.
The greater part of the stone carving of Wells Cathedral comprises foliate capitals in the stiff-leaf style. They are found ornamenting the piers of the nave, choir and transepts. Stiff-leaf foliage is highly abstract. Though possibly influenced by carvings of acanthus leaves or vine leaves, it cannot be easily identified with any particular plant. Here the carving of the foliage is varied and vigorous, the springing leaves and deep undercuts casting shadows that contrast with the surface of the piers. In the transepts and towards the crossing in the nave the capitals have many small figurative carvings among the leaves. These include a man with toothache and a series of four scenes depicting the "Wages of Sin" in a narrative of fruit stealers who creep into an orchard and are then beaten by the farmer. Another well-known carving is in the north transept aisle: a foliate corbel, on which climbs a lizard, sometimes identified as a salamander, a symbol of eternal life.
Carvings in the Decorated Gothic style may be found in the eastern end of the buildings, where there are many carved bosses. In the chapter house, the carvings of the 51 stalls include numerous small heads of great variety, many of them smiling or laughing. A well-known figure is the corbel of the dragon-slaying monk in the chapter house stair. The large continuous capital that encircles the central pillar of the chapter house is markedly different in style to the stiff-leaf of the Early English period. In contrast to the bold projections and undercutting of the earlier work, it has a rippling form and is clearly identifiable as grapevine.
The 15th-century cloisters have many small bosses ornamenting the vault. Two in the west cloister, near the gift shop and café, have been called sheela na gigs, i. e. female figures displaying their genitals and variously judged to depict the sin of lust or stem from ancient fertility cults.
Wells Cathedral has one of the finest sets of misericords in Britain. Its clergy has a long tradition of singing or reciting from the Book of Psalms each day, along with the customary daily reading of the Holy Office. In medieval times the clergy assembled in the church eight times daily for the canonical hours. As the greater part of the services was recited while standing, many monastic or collegiate churches fitted stalls whose seats tipped up to provide a ledge for the monk or cleric to lean against. These were "misericords" because their installation was an act of mercy. Misericords typically have a carved figurative bracket beneath the ledge framed by two floral motifs known, in heraldic manner, as "supporters".
The misericords date from 1330 to 1340. They may have been carved under the direction of Master Carpenter John Strode, although his name is not recorded before 1341. He was assisted by Bartholomew Quarter, who is documented from 1343. They originally numbered 90, of which 65 have survived. Sixty-one are installed in the choir, three are displayed in the cathedral, and one is held by the Victoria and Albert Museum. New stalls were ordered when the eastern end of the choir was extended in the early 14th century. The canons complained that they had borne the cost of the rebuilding and ordered the prebendary clerics to pay for their own stalls. When the newly refurbished choir opened in 1339 many misericords were left unfinished, including one-fifth of the surviving 65. Many of the clerics had not paid, having been called to contribute a total sum of £200. The misericords survived better than the other sections of the stalls, which during the Protestant Reformation had their canopies chopped off and galleries inserted above them. One misericord, showing a boy pulling a thorn from his foot, dates from the 17th century. In 1848 came a complete rearrangement of the choir furniture, and 61 of the misericords were reused in the restructured stalls.
The subject matter of the carvings of the central brackets as misericords varies, but many themes recur in different churches. Typically the themes are less unified or directly related to the Bible and Christian theology than small sculptures seen elsewhere within churches, such as bosses. This applies at Wells, where none of the misericord carvings is directly based on a Bible story. The subjects, chosen either by the woodcarver, or perhaps by the one paying for the stall, have no overriding theme. The sole unifying elements are the roundels on each side of the pictorial subject, which all show elaborately carved foliage, in most cases formal and stylised in the later Decorated manner, but with several examples of naturalistic foliage, including roses and bindweed. Many of the subjects carry traditional interpretations. The image of the "Pelican in her Piety" (believed to feed her young on her own blood) is a recognised symbol for Christ's love for the Church. A cat playing with a mouse may represent the Devil snaring a human soul. Other subjects illustrate popular fables or sayings such as "When the fox preaches, look to your geese". Many depict animals, some of which may symbolise a human vice or virtue, or an aspect of faith.
Twenty-seven of the carvings depict animals: rabbits, dogs, a puppy biting a cat, a ewe feeding a lamb, monkeys, lions, bats, and the Early Christian motif of two doves drinking from a ewer. Eighteen have mythological subjects, including mermaids, dragons and wyverns. Five are clearly narrative, such as the Fox and the Geese, and the story of Alexander the Great being raised to Heaven by griffins. There are three heads: a bishop in a mitre, an angel, and a woman wearing a veil over hair arranged in coils over each ear. Eleven carvings show human figures, among which are several of remarkable design, conceived by the artist specifically for their purpose of supporting a shelf. One figure lies beneath the seat, supporting the shelf with a cheek, a hand and a foot. Another sits in a contorted manner supporting the weight on his elbow, while a further figure squats with his knees wide apart and a strained look on his face.
Some of the cathedral's fittings and monuments are hundreds of years old. The brass lectern in the Lady Chapel dates from 1661 and has a moulded stand and foliate crest. In the north transept chapel is a 17th-century oak screen with columns, formerly used in cow stalls, with artisan Ionic capitals and cornice, set forward over the chest tomb of John Godelee. There is a bound oak chest from the 14th century, which was used to store the chapter seal and key documents. The bishop's throne dates from 1340, and has a panelled, canted front and stone doorway, and a deep nodding cusped ogee canopy above it, with three-stepped statue niches and pinnacles. The throne was restored by Anthony Salvin around 1850. Opposite the throne is a 19th-century octagonal pulpit on a coved base with panelled sides, and steps up from the north aisle. The round font in the south transept is from the former Saxon cathedral and has an arcade of round-headed arches, on a round plinth. The font cover was made in 1635 and is decorated with the heads of putti. The Chapel of St Martin is a memorial to every Somerset man who fell in World War I.
The monuments and tombs include Gisa, bishop; † 1088; William of Bitton, bishop; † 1274; William of March, bishop; † 1302; John Droxford; † 1329; John Godelee; † 1333; John Middleton, died †1350; Ralph of Shrewsbury, died †; John Harewell, bishop; † 1386; William Bykonyll; † c. 1448; John Bernard; † 1459; Thomas Beckington; † died 1464; John Gunthorpe; † 1498; John Still; † 1607; Robert Creighton; † 1672; Richard Kidder, bishop; † 1703; George Hooper, bishop; † 1727 and Arthur Harvey, bishop; † 1894.
In the north transept is Wells Cathedral clock, an astronomical clock from about 1325 believed to be by Peter Lightfoot, a monk of Glastonbury. Its mechanism, dated between 1386 and 1392, was replaced in the 19th century and the original moved to the Science Museum in London, where it still operates. It is the second oldest surviving clock in England after the Salisbury Cathedral clock.
The clock has its original medieval face. Apart from the time on a 24-hour dial, it shows the motion of the Sun and Moon, the phases of the Moon, and the time since the last new Moon. The astronomical dial presents a geocentric or pre-Copernican view, with the Sun and Moon revolving round a central fixed Earth, like that of the clock at Ottery St Mary. The quarters are chimed by a quarter jack: a small automaton known as Jack Blandifers, who hits two bells with hammers and two with his heels. At the striking of the clock, jousting knights appear above the clock face.
On the outer wall of the transept, opposite Vicars' Hall, is a second clock face of the same clock, placed there just over seventy years after the interior clock and driven by the same mechanism. The second clock face has two quarter jacks (which strike on the quarter-hour) in the form of knights in armour.
In 2010 the official clock-winder retired and was replaced by an electric mechanism.
The first record of an organ at this church dates from 1310. A smaller organ, probably for the Lady Chapel, was installed in 1415. In 1620 an organ built by Thomas Dallam was installed at a cost of £398 1s 5d.
The 1620 organ was destroyed by parliamentary soldiers in 1643. An organ built in 1662 was enlarged in 1786 and again in 1855. In 1909–1910 an organ was built by Harrison & Harrison of Durham, with the best parts of the old organ retained. It has been serviced by the same company ever since.
Since November 1996 the cathedral has also had a portable chamber organ, by the Scottish makers, Lammermuir. It is used regularly to accompany performances of Tudor and baroque music.
The first recorded organist of Wells was Walter Bagele (or Vageler) in 1416. The post of organist or assistant organist has been held by more than 60 people since. Peter Stanley Lyons was Master of Choristers at Wells Cathedral, and Director of Music at Wells Cathedral School in 1954–1960. The choral conductor James William Webb-Jones, father of Lyons's wife Bridget (whom he married in the cathedral), was Headmaster of Wells Cathedral School in 1955–1960. Malcolm Archer was the appointed Organist and Master of the Choristers from 1996 to 2004. Matthew Owens was the appointed organist from 2005 to 2019.
There has been a choir of boy choristers at Wells since 909. Currently there are 18 boy choristers and a similar number of girl choristers, aged from eight to fourteen. The Vicars Choral was formed in the 12th century and the sung liturgy provided by a traditional cathedral choir of men and boys until the formation of an additional choir of girls in 1994. The boys and girls sing alternately with the Vicars Choral and are educated at Wells Cathedral School.
The Vicars Choral currently number twelve men, of whom three are choral scholars. Since 1348 the College of Vicars had its own accommodation in a quadrangle converted in the early 15th century to form Vicar's Close. The Vicars Choral generally perform with the choristers, except on Wednesdays, when they sing alone, allowing them to present a different repertoire, in particular plainsong.
In December 2010 Wells Cathedral Choir was rated by Gramophone magazine as "the highest ranking choir with children in the world". It continues to provide music for the liturgy at Sunday and weekday services. The choir has made many recordings and toured frequently, including performances in Beijing and Hong Kong in 2012. Its repertoire ranges from the choral music of the Renaissance to recently commissioned works.
The Wells Cathedral Chamber Choir is a mixed adult choir of 25 members, formed in 1986 to sing at the midnight service on Christmas Eve, and invited to sing at several other special services. It now sings for about 30 services a year, when the Cathedral Choir is in recess or on tour, and spends one week a year singing as the "choir in residence" at another cathedral. Although primarily liturgical, the choir's repertoire includes other forms of music, as well as performances at engagements such as weddings and funerals.
The cathedral is home to Wells Cathedral Oratorio Society (WCOS), founded in 1896. With around 160 voices, the society gives three concerts a year under the direction of Matthew Owens, Organist and Master of the Choristers at the cathedral. Concerts are normally in early November, December (an annual performance of Handel's Messiah) and late March. It performs with a number of specialist orchestras including: Music for Awhile, Chameleon Arts and La Folia.
The bells at Wells Cathedral are the heaviest ring of ten bells in the world, the tenor bell (the 10th and largest), known as Harewell, weighing 56.25 long hundredweight (2,858 kg). They are hung for full-circle ringing in the English style of change ringing. These bells are now hung in the south-west tower, although some were originally hung in the central tower.
The library above the eastern cloister was built between 1430 and 1508. Its collection is in three parts: early documents housed in the Muniment Room; the collection predating 1800 housed in the Chained Library; and the post-1800 collection housed in the Reading Room. The chapter's earlier collection was destroyed during the Reformation, so that the present library consists chiefly of early printed books, rather than medieval manuscripts. The earlier books in the Chained Library number 2,800 volumes and give an indication of the variety of interests of the members of the cathedral chapter from the Reformation until 1800. The focus of the collection is predominantly theology, but there are volumes on science, medicine, exploration, and languages. Books of particular interest include Pliny's Natural History printed in 1472, an Atlas of the World by Abraham Ortelius, printed in 1606, and a set of the works by Aristotle that once belonged to Erasmus. The library is open to the public at appointed times in the summer and presents a small exhibition of documents and books.
Three early registers of the Dean and Chapter edited by W. H. B. Bird for the Historical Manuscripts Commissioners – Liber Albus I (White Book; R I), Liber Albus II (R III) and Liber Ruber (Red Book; R II, section i) – were published in 1907. They contain with some repetition, a cartulary of possessions of the cathedral, with grants of land back to the 8th century, well before hereditary surnames developed in England, and acts of the Dean and Chapter and surveys of their estates, mostly in Somerset.
Adjacent to the cathedral is a large lawned area, Cathedral Green, with three ancient gateways: Brown's Gatehouse, Penniless Porch and Chain Gate. On the green is the 12th-century Old Deanery, largely rebuilt in the late 15th century by Dean Gunthorpe and remodelled by Dean Bathurst in the late 17th century. No longer the dean's residence, it is used as diocesan offices.
To the south of the cathedral is the moated Bishop's Palace, begun about 1210 by Jocelin of Wells but dating mostly from the 1230s. In the 15th century Thomas Beckington added a north wing, now the bishop's residence. It was restored and extended by Benjamin Ferrey between 1846 and 1854.
To the north of the cathedral and connected to it by the Chain Gate is Vicars' Close, a street planned in the 14th century and claimed to be the oldest purely residential street in Europe, with all but one of its original buildings intact. Buildings in the close include the Vicars Hall and gateway at the south end, and the Vicars Chapel and Library at the north end.
The Liberty of St Andrew was the historic liberty and parish that encompassed the cathedral and surrounding lands closely associated with it.
The English painter J. M. W. Turner visited Wells in 1795, making sketches of the precinct and a water colour of the west front, now in the Tate gallery. Other artists whose paintings of the cathedral are in national collections are Albert Goodwin, John Syer and Ken Howard.
The cathedral served to inspire Ken Follett's 1989 novel The Pillars of the Earth and with a modified central tower, featured as the fictional Kingsbridge Cathedral at the end of the 2010 television adaptation of that novel. The interior of the cathedral was used for a 2007 Doctor Who episode, "The Lazarus Experiment", while the exterior shots were filmed at Southwark Cathedral.
An account of the damage to the cathedral during the Monmouth Rebellion is included in Arthur Conan Doyle's 1889 historical novel Micah Clarke.
The cathedral provided scenes for the 2019–2020 television series The Spanish Princess.
The lower floor features a living room, foyer, kitchen, and dining room while the upper floor features a bedroom. The first floor worked out well design-wise, but the second floor is an absolute mess due to all the supports / arches / beams needed to hold the roof together. Speaking of the roof, both sections aren't very pretty, but it works... at the cost of taking a whole bunch of upstairs space on the inside, as you can see.
GBRf Class 69, No. 69016 “British Transport Police” Seen at Litchurch Lane at Derby’s Greatest Gathering.
The GB Railfreight Class 69 is in a livery promoting rail safety via a collaboration with the British Transport Police.
The livery, which features the BTP logo and traditional police colours, was unveiled on No 69016 in a ceremony at London Waterloo on 30 May 2025 which saw the Type 5 named British Transport Police. The locomotive is the penultimate Class 69 to enter traffic and was rebuilt from No 56097.
The idea for the livery came from PC Ian Kennerley of the BTP and GBRf Train Manager Bessie Smith, who felt that the 016 identity of the locomotive aligned with the BTP text number for reposting non-emergency incidents – 61016. The BTP said that in 2024 it received around 250,000 text messages from concerned users.
At the ceremony, GBRf CEO John Smith OBE and Assistant Chief Constable Sean O’Callaghan of BTP highlighted the impact that network disruption has for everyone - passengers, businesses and even those at home waiting for online deliveries are affected by delays.
The BTP said criminal disruption, in its many forms from trespass to theft to vandalism cost the rail industry over £150 million last year. The hope is that the Class 69 will act as a visual deterrent for trespass and criminality.
A short walk from the Italian Gardens of the Forest Glade Gardens and you will find yourself in a very different style of garden. The Japanese Garden, although smaller than its European neighbour, is no less beautiful. It features a round gateway entrance, a reflection pool and many beautiful pieces of garden statuary including foo dogs, pagoda lanterns, a whimsical bridge and a splendid painted red gateway.
The Forest Glade Gardens are well established European inspired landscaped gardens of six hectares that are to be found on the Mount Macedon Road in the hill station town of Mount Macedon.
The Forest Glade Gardens are just shy of one hundred years old. The gardens were originally two adjoining properties that comprised orchards and lush grazing paddocks. In 1941 local family the Newtons purchased and extended the property and set about creating one of Mount Macedon's most stunning gardens.
In 1971 the Forest Glade Gardens were acquired by Melbourne property developer Mr. Cyril Stokes who together with his partner Trevor Neil Bell, developed the gardens even further. Cyril was a great collector of European antiques, and his love of European antiquity is reflected in the gardens, particularly in the many classical marble and bronze statues dotted about the grounds.
Unfortunately the Forest Glade Gardens were partly destroyed by the tragic Ash Wednesday bushfires of 1983. However, after many years of hard labour put in by Cyril and Trevor, The Forest Glade Gardens were reborn from the ashes. The gardens are built on a sloping block and consist of a range of terraces all of which offer wonderful vistas. A garden designed to give pleasure all year round, the Forest Glad Gardens contain several heritage listed trees and are made up of smaller themed gardens including; the Italian Garden, the Japanese Garden, the Daffodil Meadow, the Peony Walk, Hydrangea Hill, the Topiary Gardens, the Bluebell Meadow, the Fern Gully and the Laburnum Arch.
In 2011 the property was gifted to a registered charity - The Stokes Collection Limited - with the intention of keeping the Forest Glade Gardens maintained and open to the public.
The Mount Macedon township is located east of the Mount Macedon summit, which is approximately 60 km north-west of Melbourne.
The name of Mount Macedon is apparently derived from Philip II, who ruled Macedon between 359 and 336BC. The mountain was named by Thomas Mitchell, the New South Wales Surveyor General.
Settled in the 1850s by gold miners and timber cutters, the railway arrived at the Mount Macedon township in 1861, providing a vital connection to Melbourne, and sealing the town's future as a 'hill station' resort for wealthy Melburnians escaping the summer heat in the 1870s. With the land deforested, large blocks were sold and beautiful and extensive gardens were planted around the newly built homes. The rich soil and good rainfall also made the area suitable for large orchards and plant nurseries who could send fruit and flowers back to Melbourne. Newspaper owner, David Syme, built a house, "Rosenheim" in 1869. It was acquired in 1886 for Victorian Governors to use as a country retreat, making Mount Macedon an attractive destination for the well heeled of Melbourne society. A primary school was built in Mount Macedon in 1874, and as the decades progressed, hotels, guest houses, shops, a Presbyterian Church and Church of England were built. In 1983, Mount Macedon was devastated by the Ash Wednesday Bush Fires. A large portion of the town was raised, and a number of lives were lost. However, like a phoenix from the ashes, Mount Macedon has risen and rebuilt. Today it is still a popular holiday destination, particularly during spring time when the well established gardens flourish with flowers and in autumn when the exotic trees explode in a riot of reds and yellows.
Marina City, completed in 1964, were the tallest residential buildings and reinforced concrete structures in the world. Both identical in height and floor plans, they have a number of unique features including: they only use electricity (no natural gas or propane is used in the buildings) and they have high speed elevators (only 35 seconds from ground to 61st floor), and a marina for personal boats.
Looking at this picture, you would think that it was taken in December with all the balconies light up. However, it was taken in April. As a side note, the "star" to the left in the picture is Venus.
Press L for the full effect!
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ATLANTA, GEORGIA - OCTOBER 26: Lee "Gumayusi" Min-hyeong (L) and Ryu "Keria" Min-seok of T1 pose at the League of Legends World Championship Semifinals Features Day on October 26, 2022 in Atlanta, GA. (Photo by Fernando Decillis/Riot Games)
I love the green plants along the white picket fence
7 Days of Shooting - Week 15 (w/b 15th October) Barrier: What barriers divide the area where you live, work or visit? Perhaps you have a garden wall, or an ornamental gate. For this week, show us those barriers, including fences, walls, & gates.
TopGear 2002 Season 1 (Episode 6): Renault AVANTIME on the Cool Wall: Jeremy Clarkson places the Renault AVANTIME on the very edge of the Sub-Zero section!
TopGear 2008 Season 12 (Episode 3) a used AVANTIME was recognized by the presenters Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May as one of the few cars that they all three liked.
www.flickr.com/photos/halfbyte/3040409681/
This is my 2002 Renault AVANTIME 2.0 16V TURBO 'NOIR NOCTURNE' photographed on our driveway.
No other car in the world has these ingenious doors and I'm sure this feature will be one of the most remembered features of this AVANTGARDE LOOKING FUTURE CLASSIC.
Detail ingenious doors: www.autoreview.ru/new_site/year2001/n13/avantime/avant-19...
THE AVANTIME HISTORY RETOLD
Renault suffered from over-capacity at their factories, and rather than letting people off, they wanted to take over the manufacture of the hugely successful Espace. So, they made the agreement with Matra that if Matra was given the task of developing this new high-spec topmodel, Renault could bring the Espace production in-house. Since Renault don't have the knowhow and expertise to produce cars like Matra do, they had to redesign the Espace, making it the conventional steel car we see marketed as "Espace IV". Matra took on the task and they came up with a series of design-ideas, all based on the "Espace III".
The Geneva motor show in March 1999 saw the unveiling of a new Renault concept car - where it was called a "Coupéspace" - which leads the way in opening up a long forgotten niche - that of a luxurious Grand Tourer Coupé with space for four adults to relax in comfort.
Poster AVANTIME 1999: www.flickr.com/photos/m_and_jiji/6920221965/
In the 1920's and '30's Renault's main products were luxurious sports models like the 1929 eight-cylinder Reinastella and 1930 Nervastella, driven by Royalty and Europe's aristocracy. The AVANTIME takes some inspiration from these powerful Grand Tourers, built to cover large distances in great comfort and style, whilst focusing firmly on the future. The AVANTIME, illustrates in a forthright manner Renault's ability to shape the future of the motor car. The manufacturer is convinced that there is room in the market for a new breed of coupe, targeted at a customer group seeking the visual distinction, rarity and driving enjoyment of a coupe with the luxury of space and comfort found in a large car or monospace, all wrapped up in a vehicle which is technologically advanced and forward looking. Styled by Patrick Le Quément, the AVANTIME was intended to combine the space of an MPV with four-place pillarless qualities of a coupé. Regarding the styling, Thierry Metroz, design project manager, said, "We wanted someone walking around the car to be continually astonished."
You sit high up, with glass all around you. The AVANTIME has no B-pillars - one thing that certainly delayed the project was getting the pillar-less design safety-approved - which adds a roadster feel to it, with windows down.
It was named the AVANTIME, which is not pronounced fully in French, but a combination 'AVANT' as in French for "ahead" and 'TIME' pronounced in english. In other words "Ahead of its time". They are quite probably right, and it will not be the first time Matra have been ahead of their time, and have spotted a niche almost before it appeared. It is an avantgarde looking car, the target group were people (former Espace-owners) whose kids have left home, but who still prefer the style and flexibility of the Espace, spiced up with a more luxurious interior and some decent performance. Very similar to the Espace the AVANTIME uses a warm-galvanized chassis in the lower part, but with the upper structure done in aluminium, to get the centre of gravity even lower than the Espace. The bodywork is still polyester, which is bonded in place. The doors are now a (galvanized) steel construction with polyester bodypanels bonded to it, making them much stronger than standard Espace doors, which were all fibreglass, with a metal frame, and in later models (J63 and JE) a side-impact steel bar about halfway up, on the inside. The frontend design is developed from the Espace, with the air-con intake moved to above the headlights, rather than the sidemirrors. The sidemirrors, on the other hand, have moved towards the door-windows again, as on the early Espace models.
Matra's engineers have avoided the top-heaviness of a minivan or SUV by fitting a lightweight aluminum superstructure to the Espace chassis. The track has been widened, the suspension lowered, and the wheels and brakes enlarged. Careful development has produced a car that feels stable at high speed on the autobahn, steers accurately, rolls only a little when cornered hard, yet smoothes all but the roughest roads. This is an impressive achievement and makes the AVANTIME fun for the driver and calm and secure for the passengers.
Renault has enlisted the services of French fashion designer Jean-Paul Gaultier to front its first-ever cross-brand advertising campaign "Créateur d'automobiles" (a one-minute spot with music by Etienne de Crécy). The pan-European ad aims to position the French motor brand as being creative and innovative, paving the way for forthcoming launches such as the new AVANTIME GT Coupe in 2001. TV advertising, by incumbent agency Publicis, breaks on October 17 (2000) and shows Gaultier designing and producing a new dress, from sketches to the finished product on the catwalk. After the fashion show, the model sees a Renault AVANTIME and is captivated by it. The ad then shows the process by which the car was created, in reverse from the completed car back to the production line. The designer's sketch is reduced to a blank piece of paper, mirroring Gaultier's process. Eric Bernard, Renault's worldwide advertising director, said: 'We're going to cause a stir with this campaign, and we hope to surprise and interest those who only think of Renault as a brand for small and medium-sized cars. 'It will trigger awareness and help us develop the new message in preparation for the launch of our new large cars.' The TV campaign's launch is being timed to coincide with the Birmingham International Motor Show, where Renault is unveiling its production version of the AVANTIME. It is being supported by press and poster activity.
Link Renault AVANTIME spot commercial 2001: www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FS3V-akz-c
In the meantime - there was a considerable delay in launching the AVANTIME - Renault had tested their design studio VEL SATIS with the public at car-shows and put the VEL SATIS into production, and hit the marked about the same time as the Avantime was finally ready. This means that Renault had two different approaches to the high-end luxury car, one being almost entirely Renault, the other a Matra. The Renault VEL SATIS has 4 doors, which should appeal to less adventurous (or more conservative) people. The AVANTIME was a two-doors only car (well, Matra did have a prototype 4-door version, but it never made it to production), but the doors are "huge" to allow for easy access, and are novel in the way they open, as they are internally hinged, making them sort of fold when you open them. Hereby even these huge doors will only require the same parkingspace as any other car, but at the same time offering excellent access. Having the AVANTIME compete with its Renault sibling obviously was not a good thing for Matra, who must have felt that Renault had not kept their part of the deal. To add insult to injury, its no secret that Renault urged their sales-organisation to push the VEL SATIS before the AVANTIME (by offering higher bonuses to the sales-people). This caused the AVANTIME to sell suficciently poor, to drain Matra for funds, and since there were no hopes for Renault helping them out, Matra decided in december 2002 that enough was enough and in April 2003 they shut down Matra Automobile and closed the factory in Romorantin. The last AVANTIME left the Matra assembly lines 18th of April 2003.
The following production figures have been published (Source: Matra France, L.Thimonner, 2003 ):
2001 : 2067
2002 : 5097
2003 : 1286
HISTORY REPEATING
Only 8450 Renault AVANTIME's were eventually built, before its abrubt end-of-life...
In the science fiction movie 'Children of men' (released 2006), the AVANTIME prototype 4-door version was seen in the cinema, Clive Owen and Julianne Moore travel in the AVANTIME until a breathtaking action sequence disrupt the journey...
Avantime has retained its feeling of novelty!
www.google.nl/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=renault%20icons%20...
The tale of Renault's short lived but stunning coupé is brought to life using interviews with the key players in the cars development, including ex Renault Head of Design Patrick Le Quement and Matra's Phillipe Guedon. With a colourful gathering of over 200 of the iconic cars at the famous Montlhery race track, the Avantime's 10th anniversary is the centre piece of this programme. Enthusiasts and experts swap opinions about what prevented this car becoming as much of a success as it perhaps should have been. Even more of the car's story is provided by Renault Avantime insiders Thierry Metroz and Carole Hurel, while current boss of Renault design, Laurens Van Den Acker gives his verdict on what makes this unique car so special.
Official Video Renault 10 Years AVANTIME, the "Coupéspace"
www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCXHroaxg8w&feature=feedu
Explore Renault AVANTIME
This Miami Beach beach-front resort features a full-service spa and 6 restaurants and lounges. The honored Guests can lounge at the outdoor pool and hot tub or visit the Art Deco District, which is just a 5-minute walk away.
This hotel offers a city or ocean view in all rooms; a flat-screen cable TV, small refrigerator, and sofa bed are also provided. Room service is available 24 hours a day.
The front desk is open 24 hours a day for added convenience to the Guests. The Loews Miami Beach Hotel guests can also stay in touch with free public Wi-Fi. Shops are on site as well.
The Loews Miami Beach Hotel was designed by Nichols Architects (formerly known as Nichols Brosch Sandoval & Associates or NBWW).
The project, completed in 1998, involved the construction of a new 800-key tower and the restoration of the historic 1939 Art Deco St. Moritz building.
Key details regarding the design team include:
Original Architecture: John Nichols served as the founder and lead designer. The architectural team also included partners Don Wolfe, Patrick Busteed, and Henry Paredes.
Recent Renovations (2025): A major $55 million guestroom transformation, completed in late 2025, was designed by the New York-based firm Meyer Davis.
Specialty Design: Interior architecture for specific hospitality areas has previously involved Cass Calder Smith, with Design Principal Cass Calder Smith and Project Architect Taylor Lawson leading the team.
Credit for the data above is given to the following websites:
www.loewshotels.com/miami-beach
apps.miamidadepa.gov/PropertySearch/#/?address=1601%20col...
www.google.com/search?q=who+was+the+architect+of+the+loew...
© All Rights Reserved - you may not use this image in any form without my prior permission.
Beaghmore is a complex of early Bronze Age megalithic features, stone circles and cairns, 8.5 miles north west of Cookstown, County Tyrone in Northern Ireland, on the south-east edge of the Sperrin Mountains.
Mackay's Dictionary of Ulster Place-names says that it is from Irish an Bheitheach Mhór, meaning "big place of birch trees", a name that reflects the fact that the area was a woodland before being cleared by Neolithic farmers.
Beaghmore stone circles, alignments and cairns are State Care Historic Monuments in the townland of Beaghmore, in the Cookstown District Council area.
The site was discovered by George Barnett in the late 1930s during peat cutting when 1,269 stones were uncovered, and partially excavated in 1945–1949 when it was taken into state care. It was also excavated again in 1965. Hearths and deposits of flint tools were discovered and have been carbon dated to 2900-2600BC. Several of the stone rows run over the tumbled walls of field structures which also date from the Neolithic period. Excavation of one of the cairns revealed a polished porcellanite axe, which may have originated from the Tievebulliagh axe factory, some 70 miles away in County Antrim. The largest cairn featured a central pit containing an oak branch.
There are seven low stone circles of different sizes, six of which are paired, twelve cairns and ten stone rows. The circles are between 10 and 20m in diameter, and are associated with earlier burial cairns and alignments of stone rows lead towards them. The stones are small with few more than 0.5m in height and the circles are distorted, suggesting they are related to kerbs surrounding some megalithic tombs. A typical feature of the stone rows is a high and low arrangement where short rows of tall stones run beside much longer rows of small stones. The stone rows radiate from the circles in a roughly north-east direction.
Excavation has revealed that the site overlays a Neolithic cultivation site, and it is thought that the stones may have been erected in response to deteriorating soil fertility and the encroachment of peat.(Wikipedia)
This Miami Beach beach-front resort features a full-service spa and 6 restaurants and lounges. The honored Guests can lounge at the outdoor pool and hot tub or visit the Art Deco District, which is just a 5-minute walk away.
This hotel offers a city or ocean view in all rooms; a flat-screen cable TV, small refrigerator, and sofa bed are also provided. Room service is available 24 hours a day.
The front desk is open 24 hours a day for added convenience to the Guests. The Loews Miami Beach Hotel guests can also stay in touch with free public Wi-Fi. Shops are on site as well.
The Loews Miami Beach Hotel was designed by Nichols Architects (formerly known as Nichols Brosch Sandoval & Associates or NBWW).
The project, completed in 1998, involved the construction of a new 800-key tower and the restoration of the historic 1939 Art Deco St. Moritz building.
Key details regarding the design team include:
Original Architecture: John Nichols served as the founder and lead designer. The architectural team also included partners Don Wolfe, Patrick Busteed, and Henry Paredes.
Recent Renovations (2025): A major $55 million guestroom transformation, completed in late 2025, was designed by the New York-based firm Meyer Davis.
Specialty Design: Interior architecture for specific hospitality areas has previously involved Cass Calder Smith, with Design Principal Cass Calder Smith and Project Architect Taylor Lawson leading the team.
Credit for the data above is given to the following websites:
www.loewshotels.com/miami-beach
apps.miamidadepa.gov/PropertySearch/#/?address=1601%20col...
www.google.com/search?q=who+was+the+architect+of+the+loew...
© All Rights Reserved - you may not use this image in any form without my prior permission.
"Casa Cuseni is a house-garden-museum, with countless delightful works of art of all shapes and types: here a table lamp with the features of a beautiful girl, in Art Nouveau style."
“Casa Cuseni è una casa-giardino-museo, con innumerevoli deliziose opere d'arte di ogni foggia e tipo: qui una lampada da tavolo con le fattezze di una bella fanciulla, in stile liberty.”
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click to activate the icon of slideshow: the small triangle inscribed in the small rectangle, at the top right, in the photostream;
or…. Press the “L” button to zoom in the image;
clicca sulla piccola icona per attivare lo slideshow: sulla facciata principale del photostream, in alto a destra c'è un piccolo rettangolo (rappresenta il monitor) con dentro un piccolo triangolo nero;
oppure…. premi il tasto “L” per ingrandire l'immagine;
www.worldphoto.org/sony-world-photography-awards/winners-...
www.fotografidigitali.it/gallery/2726/opere-italiane-segn...
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A history of Taormina: chronicles of a forbidden love and its great secret (not only Paolo and Francesca) with an unexpected "scoop".
This story is an integral part of the story previously told, the historical period is the same, the place is the same, the various characters often meet each other because they know each other; Taormina, between the end of the 1800s and the beginning of the 1900s, in an ever increasing growth, became the place of residence of elite tourism, thanks to the international interest aroused by writers and artists, such as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe , or great personalities like Lady Florence Trevelyan: Taormina becomes so famous, thanks to the paintings of the painter Otto Geleng and the photographs of the young Sicilian models by Wilhelm von Gloeden; in the air of Taormina there is a sense of libertine, its famous and histrionic visitors never fail to create scandal, even surpassing the famous Capri, in which, to cite just one example, the German gunsmith Krupp, trying to recreate the he environment of Arcadia that one breathed in Taormina (thanks to the photos of von Gloeden) was overwhelmed by the scandal for homosexuality, and took his own life. Taormina thus becomes a heavenly-like place, far from industrial civilizations, where you can freely live your life and sexuality; this is the socio-cultural environment in which the two protagonists of this story move, the British painter Robert Hawthorn Kitson (1873 - 1947) and the painter Carlo Siligato (born in Taormina in 1875, and died there in 1959). Robert H. Kitson, born in Leeds in England, belonged to a more than wealthy family, as a young engineer he had begun to replace his father in the family locomotive construction company (Kitson & Co.), on the death of his father in 1899 sells everything and decides to move very rich in Sicily to Taormina (he had been there the previous year with a trip made with his parents, here he had met, in addition to Baron von Gloeden, also the writer and poet Oscar Wilde who came to Italy, immediately after having served two years in prison in forced labor, on charges of sodomy); Kitson settled there because he was suffering from a severe form of rheumatic fever (like von Gloeden was advised to treat himself in the Mediterranean climate milder), and because as a homosexual, he leaves England because the Labouchere amendment considered homosexuality a crime. The other protagonist of this story is Carlo Siligato, he was from Taormina, he had attended the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice, a very gifted painter, he was very good at oil painting (he exhibited his paintings in an art workshop, even now existing, in via Teatro Greco in Taormina), the meeting with the painter Robert Kitson, led him to adopt the watercolor technique: almost to relive Dante's verses on Paolo and Francesca "Galeotto was the book and who wrote it" the common passion for painting led the two artists to live an intense love story. Kitson built his home in the "Cuseni" district of Taormina, called for this "Casa Cuseni", the house was built between 1900 and 1905, its decorations were entrusted to the artists Alfred East (realist landscape painter, president of the Royal Society ), and Frank Brangwyn (painter, decorator, designer), he was a pupil of William Morris, leader of the English movement "Arts and Crafts" which spread to England in the second half of the nineteenth century (the Arts and Crafts was a response to the industrialization of Europe, of mass production operated by factories, all this at the expense of traditional craftsmanship, from this movement originated the Art Nouveau, in Italy also known as Liberty Style or Floral Style, which distinguished itself for having been a artistic and philosophical movement, which developed between the end of the 19th century and the first decade of the 20th century, whose style spread in such a way as to be present everywhere). Casa Cuseni has kept a secret for 100 years that goes far beyond the forbidden love lived by Robert and Carlo, a secret hidden inside the "secret room", that dinning room that was reopened in 2012; entering the dining room, you can witness a series of murals painted on the four walls by Frank Brangwyn, in Art Nouveau style, which portray the life and love story between the painter Robert Kitson, and his life partner, the Carlo Siligato from Taormina, but the thing that makes these murals even more special, full of tenderness and sweetness, is that "their secret" (!) is represented in them, it is described visually, as in an "episodic" story that really happened in their lives: Messina (and Reggio Calabria) are destroyed by the terrible earthquake with a tsunami on December 28, 1908, Carlo Siligato, Robert Kitson, Wilhelm von Gloeden and Anatole France leave for Messina, to see and document in person the tragedy, the city was a pile of rubble, many dead, Robert and Carlo see a baby, Francesco, he is alone in the world, without parents who died in the earthquake, abandoned to a certain and sad destiny, a deep desire for protection is born in the two of them, a maternal and paternal desire is born, they decide to takes that little child with them even knowing that they are risking a lot ... (!), what they want to do is something absolutely unthinkable in that historical period, they are a homosexual couple, what they are about to do is absolutely forbidden ..(!) but now there is Francesco in their life, thus becoming, in fact, the first homogenitorial family (with a more generic term, rainbow family) in world history: hence the need to keep the whole story absolutely hidden, both from an artistic point of view , represented by the murals (for more than 100 years, the "dinning room" will be kept hidden), both of what happens in real life, with little Francesco cared for lovingly, but with great risk or. I have allegorically inserted, in the photographic story, some photographs of the artists of the company "Casa del Musical", who came to Taormina to perform during the Christmas period: today as yesterday, Taormina has always been (starting from the last 20 years of the 19th century) center of a crossroads of artists and great personalities, Casa Cuseni also in this has an enormous palmares of illustrious guests, too long to state. The young boys painted on the murals of Casa Cuseni, wear white, this is a sign of purity, they wanted to represent their ideal homosexual world, fighting against the figure dressed in black, short in stature, disturbing, which acquires a negative value, an allegorical figure of the English society of the time, indicating the Victorian morality that did not hesitate to condemn Oscar Wilde, depriving him of all his assets and rights, even preventing him from giving the surname to his children. The boys are inspired by the young Sicilian models photographed by Wilhelm von Gloeden, dressed in white tunics, with their heads surrounded by local flowers. The only female figure present has given rise to various interpretations, one could be Kitson's detachment from his motherland, or his detachment from his mother. On the third wall we witness the birth of the homogenitorial family, both (allegorically Carlo and Kitson with the child in their arms) are in profile, they are walking, the younger man has a long, Greek-style robe, placed on the front, next to him behind him, the sturdier companion holds and gently protects the little child in his arms, as if to spare the companion the effort of a long and uncertain journey, there is in the representation of the family the idea of a long journey, in fact the man holding the child wears heavy shoes, their faces are full of apprehension and concern: in front of them an empty wall, so deliberately left by Frank Brangwin, since their future is unknown, in front of them they have a destiny full of unknowns (at the same time, their path points east, they go towards the rising sun: opening the large window the sun floods everything in the room). In the "secret room" there is the picture painted in 1912 by Alfred E. East, an oil on canvas, representing Lake Bourget. Carlo Siligato later married Costanza, she was my father's grandmother's sister, they had a son, Nino, who for many years lived and worked as a merchant in his father's art workshop. I sincerely thank my colleague Dr. Francesco Spadaro, doctor and esteemed surgeon, owner and director of the "Casa Cuseni" House-Garden-Museum, who, affectionately acting as a guide, gave me the precious opportunity to create "this photographic tour" inside the house- museum and in the "metaphysical garden" of Casa Cuseni. … And the scoop that I announced in the title ..? After photographing the tomb of Carlo Siligato, in the Catholic cemetery of Taormina, I started looking for that of Robert Kitson, in the non-Catholic cemetery of Taormina: when I finally found it (with him lies his niece Daphne Phelps, buried later in 2005) ... I felt a very strong emotion, first of all I was expecting a mausoleum, instead I found a small, very modest tomb on this is not a photo of him, not an epitaph, not a Cross, not a praying Angel to point it out, but ... unexpectedly for a funerary tombstone ... a small bas-relief carved on marble (or stone) depicting ... the Birth ... (!), obviously , having chosen her could have a very specific meaning: a desire to transmit a message, something very profound about him, his tomb thus testified that in his soul, what was really important in life was having a family, with Carlo and baby Francesco, certainly beloved, saved from a certain and sad fate, in the terrible Messina earthquake-tsunami of 28 December 1908 ... almost recalling in an absolute synthesis, at the end of his life, what had already been told in the "secret murals" of Casa Cuseni.
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Una storia di Taormina: cronache di un amore proibito e del suo grande segreto (non solo Paolo e Francesca) con inaspettato “scoop”.
Questa storia fa parte integrante della storia precedentemente raccontata, il periodo storico è lo stesso, il luogo è lo stesso, i vari personaggi spesso si frequentano tra loro poiché si conoscono; Taormina, tra la fine dell’800 e l’inizio del’900, in un sempre maggiore crescendo, diventa luogo di residenza del turismo d’élite, grazie all’interesse internazionale suscitato ad opera di scrittori ed artisti, come Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, o grandi personalità come Lady Florence Trevelyan: Taormina diventa così famosa, complici i quadri del pittore Otto Geleng e le fotografie dei giovani modelli siciliani di Wilhelm von Gloeden; nell’aria di Taormina si respira un che di libertino, i suoi famosi ed istrionici frequentatori non mancano mai di creare scandalo, superando persino la famosa Capri, nella quale, per citare solo un esempio, l’armiere tedesco Krupp, cercando di ricreare l’ambiente dell’Arcadia che si respirava a Taormina (grazie alle foto di von Gloeden) viene travolto dallo scandalo per omosessualità, e si toglie la vita. Taormina diviene quindi un luogo simil-paradisiaco, lontana dalle civiltà industriali, nella quale poter vivere liberamente la propria vita e la propria sessualità; questo è l’ambiente socio-culturale nel quale si muovono i due protagonisti di questa vicenda, il pittore britannico Robert Hawthorn Kitson (1873 – 1947) ed il pittore Carlo Siligato (nato a Taormina nel 1875, ed ivi morto nel 1959). Robert H. Kitson, nacque a Leeds in Inghilterra, apparteneva ad una famiglia più che benestante, da giovane ingegnere aveva cominciato a sostituire il padre nell’impresa familiare di costruzioni di locomotive (la Kitson & Co.), alla morte del padre nel 1899 vende tutto e decide di trasferirsi ricchissimo in Sicilia a Taormina (vi era stato l’anno precedente con un viaggio fatto coi suoi genitori, qui aveva conosciuto, oltre al barone von Gloeden, anche lo scrittore e poeta Oscar Wilde venuto in Italia, subito dopo aver scontato due anni di prigione ai lavori forzati, con l’accusa di sodomia); Kitson vi si stabilisce perché affetto da una grave forma di febbre reumatica (come von Gloeden gli fu consigliato di curarsi nel clima mediterraneo più mite), sia perché in quanto omosessuale, lascia l’Inghilterra perché l’emendamento Labouchere considerava l’omosessualità un crimine. L’altro protagonista di questa storia è Carlo Siligato, egli era taorminese, aveva frequentato l’Accademia di Belle Arti di Venezia, pittore molto dotato, era bravissimo nel dipingere ad olio (esponeva i suoi quadri in una bottega d’arte, ancora adesso esistente, in via Teatro Greco a Taormina), l’incontro col pittore Robert Kitson, lo portò ad adottare la tecnica dell’acquarello: quasi a rivivere i versi di Dante su Paolo e Francesca “Galeotto fu ‘l libro e chi lo scrisse” la comune passione per la pittura condusse i due artisti a vivere una intensa storia d’amore. Kitson costruì nel quartiere “Cuseni” di Taormina la sua abitazione, detta per questo “Casa Cuseni”, la casa fu costruita tra il 1900 ed il 1905, le sue decorazioni furono affidate agli artisti Alfred East (pittore verista paesaggista, presidente della Royal Society), e Frank Brangwyn (pittore, decoratore, designer, progettista), egli era allievo di William Morris, leader del movimento inglese “Arts and Crafts” (Arti e Mestieri) che si diffuse in Inghilterra nella seconda metà del XIX secolo (l’Arts and Crafts era una risposta alla industrializzazione dell’Europa, della produzione in massa operata dalle fabbriche, tutto ciò a scapito dell’artigianato tradizionale, da questo movimento ebbe origine l’Art Nouveau, in Italia conosciuta anche come Stile Liberty o Stile Floreale, che si distinse per essere stata un movimento artistico e filosofico, che si sviluppò tra la fine dell’800 ed il primo decennio del ‘900, il cui stile si diffuse in tal modo da essere presente dappertutto). Casa Cuseni ha custodito per 100 anni un segreto che va ben oltre quell’amore proibito vissuto da Robert e Carlo, segreto celato all’interno della “stanza segreta”, quella dinning room che è stata riaperta nel 2012; entrando nella sala da pranzo, si assiste ad una serie di murales realizzati sulle quattro pareti da Frank Brangwyn, in stile Art Nouveau, che ritraggono la vita e la storia d’amore tra il pittore Robert Kitson, ed il suo compagno di vita, il pittore taorminese Carlo Siligato, ma la cosa che rende questi murales ancora più particolari, carichi di tenerezza e dolcezza, è che in essi viene rappresentato “il loro segreto” (!), viene descritto visivamente, come in un racconto “ad episodi” quello che è realmente avvenuto nella loro vita: Messina (e Reggio Calabria) vengono distrutte dal terribile sisma con maremoto il 28 dicembre del 1908, partono per Messina, Carlo Siligato, Robert Kitson, Wilhelm von Gloeden ed Anatole France, per vedere e documentare di persona la tragedia, la città era un cumulo di macerie, moltissimi i morti, Robert e Carlo vedono un piccolo bimbo, Francesco, egli è solo al mondo, privo dei genitori periti nel terremoto, abbandonato ad un certo e triste destino, nasce in loro due un profondo desiderio di protezione, nasce un desiderio materno e paterno, decidono di prende quel piccolo bimbo con loro pur sapendo che stanno rischiando moltissimo…(!) , quello che vogliono fare è una cosa assolutamente impensabile in quel periodo storico, loro sono una coppia omosessuale, quello che stanno per fare è assolutamente proibito..(!) ma oramai c’è Francesco nella loro vita, divenendo così, di fatto, la prima famiglia omogenitoriale (con termine più generico, famiglia arcobaleno) nella storia mondiale: da qui la necessità di tenere assolutamente nascosta tutta la vicenda, sia dal punto di vista artistico, rappresentata dai murales (per più di 100 anni, la “dinning room” verrà tenuta nascosta), sia di quanto accade nella vita reale, col piccolo Francesco accudito amorevolmente, ma con grandissimo rischio. Ho inserito allegoricamente, nel racconto fotografico, alcune fotografie degli artisti della compagnia “Casa del Musical”, giunti a Taormina per esibirsi durante il periodo natalizio: oggi come ieri, Taormina è sempre stata (a partire dagli ultimi 20 anni dell’800) al centro di un crocevia di artisti e grandi personalità, Casa Cuseni anche in questo ha un enorme palmares di ospiti illustri, troppo lungo da enunciare. I giovani ragazzi dipinti sui murales di Casa Cuseni, vestono di bianco, questo è segno di purezza, si è voluto in tal modo rappresentare il loro mondo ideale omosessuale, in lotta contro la figura vestita di nero, bassa di statura, inquietante, che acquista un valore negativo, figura allegorica della società inglese dell’epoca, indicante la morale Vittoriana che non ha esitato a condannare Oscar Wilde, privandolo di tutti i suoi beni e diritti, impedendogli persino di dare il cognome ai suoi figli. I ragazzi sono ispirati ai giovani modelli siciliani fotografati da Wilhelm von Gloeden, vestiti con tuniche bianche, col capo cinto dei fiori locali. L’unica figura femminile presente, ha dato spunto a varie interpretazioni, una potrebbe essere il distacco da parte di Kitson dalla sua madre patria, oppure il distacco da sua madre. Sulla terza parete si assiste alla nascita della famiglia omogenitoriale, entrambi (allegoricamente Carlo e Kitson col bimbo in braccio) sono di profilo, sono in cammino, l’uomo più giovane ha una veste lunga, alla greca, posto sul davanti, accanto a lui, alle sue spalle, il compagno più robusto sostiene in braccio e protegge con dolcezza il piccolo bimbo, quasi a voler risparmiare al compagno la fatica di un lungo ed incerto percorso, vi è nella rappresentazione della famiglia l’idea di un lungo percorso, infatti l’uomo che regge il bimbo indossa delle calzature pesanti, i loro volti sono carichi di apprensione e preoccupazione: davanti a loro una parete vuota, così volutamente lasciata da Frank Brangwin, poiché il loro futuro è ignoto, davanti hanno un destino pieno di incognite (al tempo stesso, il loro cammino indica l’est, vanno verso il sole nascente: aprendo la grande finestra il sole inonda ogni cosa nella stanza).
Nella “stanza segreta” c’è il quadro dipinto nel 1912 da Alfred E. East, un olio su tela, rappresentante il lago Bourget.
Carlo Siligato, successivamente si sposò con Costanza, una sorella della nonna di mio padre, da lei ebbe un figlio, Nino, il quale per tantissimi anni ha vissuto e lavorato come commerciante nella bottega d’arte del padre. Ringrazio di cuore il mio collega dott. Francesco Spadaro, medico e stimato chirurgo, proprietario e direttore della Casa-Giardino-Museo “Casa Cuseni”, il quale, facendomi affettuosamente da cicerone, mi ha dato la preziosa opportunità di realizzare “questo tour fotografico” all’interno dell’abitazione-museo e nel “giardino-metafisico” di Casa Cuseni.
…E lo scoop che ho annunciato nel titolo..? Dopo aver fotografato la tomba di Carlo Siligato, nel cimitero cattolico di Taormina, mi sono messo alla ricerca di quella di Robert Kitson, nel cimitero acattolico di Taormina: quando finalmente l’ho trovata (insieme a lui giace sua nipote Daphne Phelps, seppellita successivamente nel 2005)…ho provato una fortissima commozione, innanzitutto mi aspettavo un mausoleo, invece ho trovato una tomba piccola, molto modesta, su questa non una sua foto, non un epitaffio, non una Croce, non un Angelo pregante ad indicarla, ma … inaspettatamente per una lapide funeraria…un piccolo bassorilievo scolpito su marmo (o su pietra) raffigurante…la Natalità…(!), evidentemente, l’averla scelta potrebbe avere un significato ben preciso: un desiderio di trasmettere un messaggio, qualcosa di molto profondo di lui, la sua tomba testimoniava così che nel suo animo, ciò che in vita fu davvero importante fu l’aver avuto una famiglia, con Carlo e col piccolo Francesco, certamente amatissimo, salvato da un molto probabile triste destino, nel terribile terremoto-maremoto di Messina del 28 dicembre del 1908…quasi rievocando in una sintesi assoluta, al termine della sua vita, ciò che era già stato raccontato nei “murales segreti” di Casa Cuseni.
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www.caranddriver.com/features/g15086450/leaders-of-the-pa...
Conceived as an Edsel, orphaned at birth, and officially adopted at the age of two by Mercury (1960 and ’61 model years were sold only as the Comet, without any branding), the Comet emerged from its 1966 redesign with a kind of well-toned sharp-edged physique that people today refer to as “cut.” Based on Ford Fairlane underpinnings, the Comet was arguably more handsome than its main-market cousin as a coupe, and in top-of-the-line convertible Cyclone GT guise it was no contest. Anxious to share it with the public at large, Mercury put the 1966 Comet Cyclone GT convertible into service as the pace car for the 50th running of the Indy 500.
Powered by a 390-cubic-inch FE engine producing 335 horsepower (gross), the pace car included twin hood scoops, dual exhaust, and a limited-slip rear differential. Although reports vary, most experts agree that 100 “tribute” cars were made, with 33 of these being commissioned for parade duty. Unfortunately, the race was tarnished by a major accident on the first lap that took out 11 of the 33 starters; rookie Graham Hill took the checkered flag with only four cars completing the entire 500-mile distance. —Andrew Wendler
This is a Neo-Ice-Planet spaceship MOC. True (old enough) spacers must recognize which classic Lego spaceship inspired me :)
As always - packing as much interior as possible, including Ice Planet satellites and rockets and some key features of the inspiration ship - boxes on side and little vehicle mounted on front. Combining classic and neo Ice Planet colors.
One of the NU.Face Heirloom Collection’s main features is Heiress Erin Salston. Erin has been everywhere lately and she is unstoppable! I have to say this is the best time to be a doll collector, specifically an Integrity Toys doll collector. With Jessy Ayala onboard this is a new era for the toy company. Integrity Toys really kicked it up a few notches with their offerings in the last season. Not only the designs have been spectacular but the quality has improved as well. Each of the dolls I have received lately has been flawless in the face paint department. There was a time where I would go through multiple copies of a doll just to find the perfect face. Not this time. With FR’s La Femme and NU.Face’s Heirloom each of the dolls I have received were perfect. I am definitely shook!
The Heirloom Collection is the follow-up to 2016’s Reckless which we can all agree was (with no exaggeration) the best collection not only for NU.Face but for the entire Fashion Royalty brand. It was a collection that was definitely hard to top off as designer Jessy has set the bar so high for himself. Heirloom has taken us to a different route from where NU.Face left off and it stands on its own as a collection. This time the theme was all about turn-of-the-last-century silhouettes with an athletic twist. Heiress’ top is inspired by Mugler Spring 2017 Ready-to-Wear with a bit of a modification as the sleeves of the original design were cocoon-like. The modified cut-out sleeves actually made this top wearable. Mugler has got to be one of my favorite fashion labels today as they’re all about sleek, sexy and sporty bordering into futuristic aesthetic an idea which I think Fashion Royalty should steal for a moment. To balance the look Jessy paired the athletic top with a pleated tulle skirt with an emerald green lame underneath. I wished there was a black wetsuit pant with white piping details somewhere in the collection to mix and match just like in the Mugler runway show.
Like with every single doll in the Heirloom Collection, Heiress is loaded with detailed accessories. For a change we have a Victorian inspired lace overlay boots with ribbon laces. The spider ring is also an unexpected touch and of course the must-have accessory here is the real working Vuitton inspired mini trunk which I think is the real star in this look. Her nail polish is similar to Bergdorf Goodman Evening Wear Elyse’s taking inspiration from Jason Wu’s Fall 2011 Ready-to-Wear. They are in dark ruby with gold chrome at the tip of the nails. Erin’s hairstyle is very simple. It is similar to Haute Societe Veronique’s and Fame by Frame Imogen’s razor cut hair. The Talking Drama Adele inspired face design has become Erin 2.0’s best screening yet. It’s refreshing to actually see something new for her since they’ve been using the Lady In Red screening and the problematic Chrome Noir screening for her since the debut of her new face sculpt in 2012. While we see an improvement in the quality of IT’s products one thing remains unresolved and that is the color of the heads not matching well with the color of the body. I think they need to pay closer attention to this issue and find out where the problem is stemming from. A light test I feel needs to be done before and after the dolls are produced. While I do like to find a body with a skin tone that matches well with her head it’s hard for me to do so because I do love the nail polish and it’s perfect for her look. Oh doll collector problems!!!
Belgian e-card by Boomerang, no. 1022832, 2007. Photo: Cinéart / Universal / Focus Features. Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger in Brokeback Mountain (Ang Lee, 2005).
The career of American actor Jake Gyllenhaal (1980) has spanned more than three decades. He is the son of film director Stephen Gyllenhaal and screenwriter Naomi Foner, and the younger brother of actress Maggie Gyllenhaal. He had his breakthrough in the cult film Donnie Darko (2001). He earned praise for his performance as Jack Twist in Ang Lee's gay drama Brokeback Mountain (2005), including the BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actor and an Academy Award nomination. Gyllenhaal starred in various action films and thrillers, including David Fincher's Zodiac (2007) and Nightcrawler (2014).
Posthumously, Australian actor Heath Ledger (1979–2008) won an Oscar for his portrayal of the Joker as the psychopathic clown prince of crime in The Dark Knight (2008). In 2006, he was Oscar-nominated for his role as a gay cowboy in Brokeback Mountain (2005). In his short career, Ledger acted in 19 films and won 39 awards, including a BAFTA Award and a Golden Globe.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
I have finally decided to post these photos. I made them for a proposal for--well obviously for this set. Unfortunately, I was not aware that Star Trek is a restricted IP and that Lego would not allow the proposal to go public because of course, what would be the point?
There's no point in keeping the photos and description to myself though, especially with the work that went into them. Description below:
'Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the Lego starship Enterprise. Its continuing mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no minifigure has gone before.'
Thrown through a spatial anomaly to a universe of modular building bricks, the crew of Starfleet's famous flagship find themselves sitting on your desk! With around 1800 parts, this UCS scaled Enterprise-D from Star Trek: The Next Generation is lovingly detailed and mounts on an elegant display stand complete with dedication plaque. But the Enterprise-D is hardly the first ship to bear her name. Display the original Constitution class Enterprise from the 1960s TV classic alongside and at the same scale.
And of course, it isn't a Galaxy class starship without a separating saucer. With the secondary display stand--mounted with a Starfleet badge and the nanofigures of the main bridge crews of both the original series and The Next Generation--you can show off both the saucer and the stardrive sections at once! The nanofigures aren't just for display; act out some of your favorite scenes or make up your own story when you remove the saucer plates to access the main bridge.
Features:
-Prepare for saucer separation: When facing a highly dangerous threat, Captain Picard decides to split the saucer off into its own ship. With the secondary stand, you can mount the saucer and display it right alongside the stardrive section. Just swap the saucer for the battle bridge attachment and you suddenly have two ships!
-Control the action yourself: Remove the panel on the saucer section and access the main bridge. With the detailed nanofigures, the bridge crew is ready for anything. Place Data at Ops, Worf at Tactical, and Picard in his Captain's chair and 'Engage' at warp 6!
-Time for a temporal anomaly: Display the Constitution class Enterprise from the original series alongside its successor. Built to the same scale and detailed with a deflector array, impulse engines, and shuttle bay doors; you can command this highly swooshable starship on its five year mission of exploration and adventure.
-Assemble the senior staff: The nanofigures inlcude The Next Generation's Captain Picard, Commander Riker, Lt. Commander La Forge, Lt. Commander Data, Lieutenant Worf, Dr. Crusher, Counselor Troi, and the original series' Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock, Dr. "Bones" McCoy, Chief Engineer Scotty, Lieutenant Uhura, Lieutenant Sulu, and Ensign Chekov.
Built for play or display, these two starships are sure to be popular with all ages. Whether you are a young fan of great Lego sets, or a nostalgic collector of Star Trek memorabilia, please support this project and help us to bring the knowledge of the galaxy to everyone.
'Make it so!'
Pacific Fair Shopping Centre in Broadbeach,Gold Coast, Queensland Australia. August 2018.
The shopping centre has been done up since we were last here and it is amazing.
Note the accumulation of iron (redox feature) and areas of reduction (gray color) from the lower subsoil of an Augusta soil.
For a detailed description of the soil, visit:
soilseries.sc.egov.usda.gov/OSD_Docs/A/AUGUSTA.html
Redoximorphic features (RMFs) consist of color patterns in a soil that are caused by loss (depletion) or gain (concentration) of pigment compared to the matrix color, formed by oxidation/reduction of iron and/or manganese coupled with their removal, translocation, or accrual.
For more information about describing and sampling soils, visit:
www.nrcs.usda.gov/resources/guides-and-instructions/field...
or Chapter 3 of the Soil Survey manual:
www.nrcs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/2022-09/The-Soil-Su...
For additional information on "How to Use the Field Book for Describing and Sampling Soils" (video reference), visit:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_hQaXV7MpM
For additional information about soil classification using USDA-NRCS Soil Taxonomy, visit:
www.nrcs.usda.gov/resources/guides-and-instructions/keys-...
or;
www.nrcs.usda.gov/resources/guides-and-instructions/soil-...
For more information about Hydric Soils and their Field Indicators, visit:
www.nrcs.usda.gov/resources/guides-and-instructions/field...
Just playing around with the mask features of the LRC update. The transitions look a bit harsh between sky and skyline but otherwise very effective.
BLM Winter Bucket List #23: Vermilion Cliffs National Monument, Arizona, for Spectacular Geologic Features and Superbowl 49
This month, Phoenix, Arizona, is a buzz with #superbowl news. As the state prepares for the big event, we’ll share information about beautiful public lands just outside of the city and others worth a day trip - like Vermilion Cliffs.
Located on the Colorado Plateau in northern Arizona, the Vermilion Cliffs National Monument includes the Paria Canyon-Vermilion Cliffs Wilderness. This remote and unspoiled 280,000-acre Monument - a part of the BLM’s National Conservation Lands - is a geologic treasure, containing a variety of diverse landscapes from the Paria Plateau, Vermilion Cliffs, Coyote Buttes, and Paria Canyon.
Visitors enjoy scenic views of towering cliffs and deep canyons. The colorful swirls of cross-bedded sandstone in Coyote Buttes are an international hiking destination. A permit is required for hiking in Coyote Buttes North (the Wave), Coyote Buttes South, and for overnight trips within Paria Canyon.
Whether you’re heading to the #superbowl or just want an unforgettable outdoor experience, Vermilion Cliffs is a must see! bit.ly/vermilioncliffs
Photos by Bob Wick, BLM Wilderness Specialist
Striking features on this gorgeous girl. 😊
Opisthoncus quadratarius. 💛
Victoria Point SE QLD Australia.
Adult Female that lives in my grandma's pot plant on the balcony. She's a little shy at first but friendly. With patientce and a gentle touch I managed to get her in position for a couple of snaps. She sat pretty chilled for the whole time.
Nikon D810, AF-S 60mm f/2.8G ED, Neewer LED with diffuser. 📷
This Reserve is dedicated under the Crown Lands Act (1929–1985) for the preservation of the scenic and natural features of the breakaways landscape.
An unusual picture in that it features a Hounslow Garage bus on loan to Stamford Brook at the Queens Gate Terrace bus stand which was rarely used by Route 27 on account of it being quite pointless.
Coming from the west, if curtailed at Kensington High Street Station, the procedure for turning around (officially) involved going so far off the 27 route that by the time this had been done it would have been just as quick to have carried on to Notting Hill Gate thus covering a bit more of the normal route. So a 27 at this location was fairly rare and even more so once I had proved that it was possible to do a U turn (unofficial) in Kensington High Street and other drivers dared to do likewise!
Queens Gate Terrace was then, and certainly is now, a very expensive residential address. To have an almost constantly used bus stand (73`s were there all through the day) in the middle of the road was unusual and it could obviously not be used by passengers on safety grounds so the nearest bus stop was some distance away on the main road. RM 1170 and RM 1034 are seen on 1 July 1982.
The basket cars or tobogan run, remains one of the most popular features of Monte for the visitors. This enables visitors to be transported 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) downhill to Livramento through the streets at fairly high speeds in large wicker baskets, conducted by two drivers wearing the traditional white uniform with straw boaters.
One of the main features of the May 1978 timetable change was the improved Birmingham suburban services introduced by the West Midlands Passenger Transport Executive. The main focus was on the new through services from Litchfield/Four Oaks to Redditch, however there were also improvements to services into Moor Street. These improvements required significant infrastructure alterations and on the weekend 22/23rd April 1978 I was one of four Nottingham Division S & T Engineers loaned to the Birmingham Division to assist in the testing and commissioning of the signalling alterations. We were allocated to works associated with the improvements to services into Moor Street and during a short lull on the Sunday I was able to put my feet up for half an hour or so and have a cup of tea in Bentley Heath Crossing Signal Box.
The box was built by the Great Western Railway as part of the quadrupling of the Birmingham Main line between Olton and Lapworth, which was completed in May 1933. The new signal box was opened in 1932. This type 28b signal box design had been introduced at the turn of the century and over a hundred were constructed by the Great Western Railway, however only a few were built after 1924. The design had several distinctive features; including horizontal boarding, three up and two down sliding windows, a gabled roof with no finals and a plain gabled end. The box was fitted with a 49 lever Great Western Railway vertical tappet, three bar mechanical frame. The box was reduced to a crossing box when Saltley Power Signal Box was commissioned in 1968 and finally closed and was demolished in February 2008.
Praktica LTL, Ektachrome 200
Features and Funcions:
- Engines Rotate for Vertical Landing
- Turret can Rotate 180 Degrees
- Turret is Accessible from the Command Deck
- Finished Interiors
- Rotating Side Mounted Guns
- Foldable Landing Gear
- Loading Ramp
- Jump Seats for Four Man SWAT Team
- Easy Access to Lower Level (Command Deck Floor Folds and Lifts Out)
- Two Prisoner Cells
- Pilot and Navigator Chairs
Credits:
Side-Mounted Turrets: Legohaulic
Command Chairs: Legodrome
Rear Exhaust Grilles: Larry Lars
My latest creation features some Indian paisley print cotton taken from a multi-panel skirt and a paisley silk tie top. I thought about using the same material for the top but it is quite an open fabric, which gives it a lovely transparency, but it doesn't handle so well with a fitted design. My next thought was to use a plain silk fabric as I did with the Chrysalis dress but then I had a look through my stash of silk ties and found this tiny paisley. I really like the fact that both fabrics are paisley but on a very different scale so they combine especially well. Silk is much tougher at withstanding intense shaping and moulding for the top. Finally for the tiny straps I created a crochet chain and threaded it into the top securing it with invisible nylon thread and passed some tiny amber beads onto each end of each strap as a little embellishment.
Rayna Eye Candy is the third of my Raynas to feature in my 'Rayna Retrospective'. One more to go before Wild Feeling arrives!