Brand & Sons, Phillips & Piper,
Grey-Green Coaches
Once neglected and algae-covered, this building at
32-36
Tacket Street embodies several lettering examples in its fabric. Part
of the upper floors were once devoted to the First Floor night club;
the shops below have changed hands many times, but once
belonged
to 'BRAND & SONS' as shown on the
decorative panel below the ornate
balcony. The supporting stone "brackets" supporting the balcony are a
little like ship's prows with their human faces and the ampersand of
the company name slides below the central one. Blocked gutters have
caused staining, moss and algal growth.
The owners of The Opium Lounge/Buddha Bar - later Ice
and Fire -
refurbished
the building in 2001 and cleaned the excellent decoration. One puzzle:
the
date stone high up in the gable (above right) is clearly marked 'IX
AD 90'; to us this reads '990', but the
building
surely dates from 1890 when Mr Brand and his sons operated a sizeable
business in selling stays and corsets.
The capital stone at top left of the
building adjacent to one which dates the fascade to 1875 - shows 'E.B' for E. Brand.
The making of stays (corsets) was an important local
industry for many years, the piecework manufacture being done in people's homes. In 1830 Ipswich
had at least nine staymakers, six of them women, this rose to thirteen
by 1845. At the beginning of the twentieth century there were only two
women listed as corsetmakers, but three companies: the Atlas Corset Co.
in Lower Orwell Street, E. Brand & Sons in Tacket Street and
William Pretty & Son in the large factory with its high chimney on
Tower Ramparts which employed hundreds of women. Pulled down in the
eighties, this last site is now the public car park running behind
Debenhams, All Fired Up (the stabling at the back of the Crown & Anchor Hotel) and Marks
& Spencer,
A similar naming of a business in the fabric of the
building can be found
at the modest entrance at the corner of Pipers Court in St Margarets
Street.
The large, imposing apartment block which straddles the site of the
town
ramparts between that street and Old Foundry Road was, until the
eighties,
a large factory manufacturing sports goods: 'PHILLIPS & PIPER LTD.:
CHRISTCHURCH WORKS'. It is only a short distance from Christchurch
Mansion
and Park; it's also halfway between Ewers Grey-Green (below) and The
Milestone.
-
Entrance on St Margarets Street
The former Grey-Green Coaches depot has large
concertina doors onto both
St Margarets Street and Old Foundry Lane. This view is from the Public
Library's
Lecture Hall entrance on Old Foundry Road; the front entrance carries
similar
lettering stretched in a single line. The modest art deco style of the
building
is well preserved. We can remember travelling in Grey-Green coaches
from
London to Saxmundham in the seventies and, amongst many pauses and
stops,
we pulled into this barn-like building as we paused in Ipswich (the
coaches
used to travel down all sorts of unsuitable roads in those days
including
a two-way Woodbridge Thoroughfare). These days the route is covered by
National
Express coaches which stop at the Old Cattle Market Bus Station. This
spot
would be far too congested with traffic most of the time to use the
Grey-Green
depot. In recent years the building has been used by a taxi company and
car dealer.
-
This part of the building stands on the historic Old
Foundry Road (itself
commemorating the original Robert Ransome foundry which was the start
of
the Ransome's engineering empire, so central to Ipswich - see also the
last vestige of the 'Ransomes' name in Duke
Street), which follows
the line of the Rampart and Town Ditches round the medieval core of the
town. Since a good repair and cleaning job in Spring 2004, this
building
presents a much crisper countenance to the world. But it's still unused.
It faces the 'Lectures'
entranceway to the old
Central (now 'County') Library.
Home
Please email any comments and contributions by clicking here.
©2004 Copyright
throughout the Ipswich
Historic Lettering site: Borin Van Loon
No reproduction of text or images without express written permission