Vestigial lettering in Ipswich
This page includes some of the faint traces of public
(mainly trade)
lettering
to be found in the town. Once again, we include these because they
exist,
even though they may not be clearly readable at the screen resolution
used
on this website. Worry not: the signs are spelt out in the captions.
'H.H. NEARS LTD' (over the central bricked
up entrance -
note the different
brick colour), with ' COACH ... BUILDERS' on either side. The close-up
of
the central panel (below) reveals that the capitals had a drop-shadow.
Although the lettering is not visible in this 1989
photograph (below)
taken
from the Charles Street multi-storey car park (The Arboretum public
house
is at the left on High Street), the coach entrance appears still to be
in
operation, with its ramp onto Charles Street.
[UPDATE (13.2.08): Sadly this building has been
demolished to make way for, inevitably, apartments/flats which at the
time of writing are being completed so close to the road - on the same
building line as the H.H. Nears Ltd workshop - that the road has to be
closed for a prolonged period for the work to be completed.]
Almost not there: 'MI(?)... WAI...' Largely covered by
coloured masonry
paint, these ancient-looking characters are a ghost of previous
businesses
and previous lives. This example comes from the Buttermarket, between
first
storey windows above the Buttermarket Lighting Centre on the opposite
side
to the Past Times shop.
-
And then, high above the street and on the side of the
old Woodplan
shop,
Old Foundry Road (now a restaurant - the new proprietor questioned the
photographer
as why he was photographing his property...). An area of red brick
(pictured
above) which was presumably once covered by a sign and therefore not
painted
cream bears the legend: '...Y(?) ROAD' and a possible '...LS' below it.
We wonder if it once read 'Old Foundry Mills'? It is certainly a tall
mill-type
structure which once had teagle doors over the street. It really is
there.
This was one of the notable shops of Ipswich, now long
gone after a
move
from the 'planning-blighted' Upper Orwell Street to the large building
overlooking
Tower Ramparts (later Yates' Wine Lodge, now The Robert Ransome public
house, see Egertons).
From the Cox Lane car park you can still make out a distant name, the
paint
fading to a peach colour: 'BARNES: of Ipswich Ltd.' (the last part
virtually
indecipherable).
<The lower lettering is visible in the
monochrome
photograph from
a different angle.
At the back of Lamden Gallery and framing/art shop at
137 Felixstowe
Road (several shops knocked into one) is this mysterious cartouche, now
obliterated by fawn paint: the more recently built flat-roofed
extension unfortunately made this operation easy. Ghosts of characters
are visible, but no words readable as yet. This sign faces up Newton
Road to draw attention to what? A grocer, tobacconist, ironmonger at
the corner shop of yore? Or just possibly, another Tolly Cobbold off licence?
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©2004 Copyright
throughout the Ipswich
Historic Lettering site: Borin Van Loon
No reproduction of text or images without express
written permission