York (Part 7)

This is the final part of our tour of York, and wraps up all those clocks outside the city centre (and I would be pleased to hear of any I have missed for a revisit sometime in the future).

We start off in the west, at the Lloyds Pharmacy branch on York Road at its junction with Severus Avenue.

This poor clock has seen better days (not a good advert for a pharmacy), with its battered casing and bent hands.

And the completely different time shown on its other face is a giveaway sign that it is not in working condition.

The trip along this road was to visit Acomb School on Front Street. This now appears to be the Gateway Centre, with a new school located nearby in West Bank, but was originally opened as a primary school in 1894.

The clock is by Potts of Leeds, and also dates to 1894.

This is the parish church of Clifton (St Philip and St James) on Clifton, built in 1866/67.

The clock face is magnificent it its striking colours and well-maintained condition.

Another school and another Potts clock. This time we are at New Earswick school to the north of the city.

The clock was commissioned by Messrs Rowntree & Co (see below) and set going on 15 August 1912. (As so often I am indebted to the book  "Potts of Leeds - Five Generations of Clockmakers" by Michael S. Potts).

York is famous for chocolate, so it is time to visit the Rowntree factory (now part of Nestle) on Haxby Road. Two of the entrances have these isolated clocks mounted on columns. This is the northernmost of the two:

The southern clock is slightly different in design, with its inner and outer gold rings.

Both clocks have these panels on top of their housings, so I assume that they are solar powered.

Lets move to the south of the city now, and in particular to Bishopthorpe. This is another ex-school, and is now the Bish Street Kids nursery.

More importantly it has clocks on two of its walls.

The reason for the trip to Bishopthorpe is its palace, and especially its gatehouse.

The palace is the residence of the Archbishop of York, and the gatehouse was added in 1769.

The clock is by Potts of Leeds, and was manufactured in 1913. It replaced a clock dating to 1744 by Henry Hindley. It has recently been restored by Smiths of Derby, and set going again in March 2013. It certainly looks rather splendid.

More chocolate factories (surely there can never be enough of them), this time the Terry's factory along Bishopthorpe Road.

The factory was built in 1926, and produced such products as the chocolate apple (yes, I am familiar with the chocolate orange, but apparently a chocolate apple was produced between 1926 and 1954).

The factory closed in September 2005, and the site is being redeveloped, including the inevitable new housing. But it is nice to see the clock recognised in the promotional banner. Bet they took a long time to come up with that name!

Nearby is York racecourse. This has two clocks, the first by the local manufacturer Newey.

The second, and rather faded, clock is on the main grandstand.

 

And with that we say farewell to York and gallop off to pastures new.

York (Part 4)

For Part 4 we are concentrating on the city centre.

Today's first clock is that on the premises of Yeoman's, a clothing / camping shop on Blake Street.

I understand that this shop was once House & Sons, an electrical retailer, hence the name on the clock face. Note also the unusual design of the "8".

Next, we are around the corner in Lendal Street, where the Post Office has a fairly standard design in its window.

The Browns store is in Davygate has a prominent clock on the corner of the building.

This looks to me like a modern replacement, which slightly jars with the surrounding architecture (dating from 1900 you will note).

But if it is prominent clocks you are after, look no further than St Martins le Grand on Coney Street. This is a massive clock mounted on a highly ornate bracket which projects it across the street. You would be hard-pressed to miss this one.

A sense of scale is better understood from the photo below. The church was rebuilt in the 15th century, but was almost totally destroyed by fire on 29 April 1942 during an air raid. It was then rebuilt again in 1961 - 68. The fire also heavily damaged the clock, and so a new movement was built by Geoffrey Newey in 1966. This movement is housed in the tower which is set back from the main street, and the hands are driven by 20 metre rods.

The figure on top of the clock is called the Little Admiral and dates from 1778. The figure rotates so that it is always facing the sun.

Just around the corner in New Street is the branch of All Bar One, with its standard clock design.

St the other end of New Street we turn into Spurriergate, where we find this rather nice clock at TK Maxx (although previously it was a branch of Boots).

Parliament Street now, and as usual you can rely on Marks and Spencer to have a nice looking clock, painted in the rather tasteful green and gold livery.

What is not as well expected is that M&S has another clock at the rear of the store that faces Newgate Market. This is a much more contemporary design, installed directly onto the brickwork façade.

 

The next example is easy to miss as it is tucked away in a little courtyard off Grape lane, which itself is one of the smaller streets in the city centre.

Onwards and upwards to Barnitts on Colliergate.

Not only does this clock tell us that Barnitts was founded in 1896, but also that Ian Thompson completed 50 years of service for the company. That is a nice touch.

 

 

 

And finally, after tramping (or perhaps flaneuring) all around the main shopping area of the city centre we come to DIG on St Saviourgate. DIG is  branded as an archaeological adventure, and is housed in the old St Saviour's church. The church dates back to the 11th century, but the current building mainly dates from 1845.

 

 

 The clock was manufactured by GJF Newey, and was installed to honour those who fell in the First World War. It was subsequently restored in 2011.