English Buildings

  Embarrassment of riches? This is the magnificent railway station building at Needham Market, an impressive Jacobean revival design by Fred...

They have their exits and their entrances I don’t often go to London’s Euston station, because my travels don’t take me along the line that ...

Statement station Railway station architecture developed during the rail boom of the 1840s and its heyday ended as the 19th century came to ...

  Postcard from Switzerland Arriving at Matlock Bath, I parked in the ‘overspill’ area of the full station car park and waded through mud in...

The Worm Years ago, when I started this blog, Great Malvern station was one of the buildings I wanted to include. Its combination of impres...

Job done These are probably the humblest of all railway buildings. They’re lamp huts or tool sheds, and these corrugated iron versions, just...

Halting for a moment One of the consequences of the coronavirus pandemic for our household has been a change in the way we buy our food...

The room now standing on Platform 2 The Resident Wise Woman tells me that in her youth, taking the train home to the Cotswolds from Oxf...

On the tracks of old railways (2): Mosaic The London underground network developed and grew long before Leslie Green designed his disti...

On the tracks of old railways (1): Identity Go on. You know what this is, or what it was, don’t you? If you’ve lived in London, or been...

Southern Electric A while back I renewed my acquaintance with Surbiton station, and was struck again by its white walls and its design th...

The signs of yesteryear In the words of Chard Whitlow , Henry Reed’s amusing parody of T. S. Eliot, ‘As we get older we do not get any ...

Spreading it around The stations on the Morden extension of London’s Northern Line were designed by Charles Holden. They were the archi...

A short afterword Yesterday I did a post about the tiled decoration by Eduardo Paolozzi at Tottenham Court Road underground station in Lon...

Murals on the move One would have to be unobservant (or very lucky) to have spent any time in Central London over the last few years an...

An afternoon on the tiles To London for the day, to have a look at Historic England’s excellent exhibition Out There (post-war public scu...

Bells and railway whistles Before we leave the world of Victorian brickwork, which has been occupying me for the last few posts, may I of...

Happy birthday London's Maida Vale underground station celebrates its one hundredth birthday today, Saturday 6 June 2015. It's ...

Winter warmer I and many of my readers like a good enamel advertising sign, and I’ve not yet tired of seeing old favourites such as sig...

Roundel, deluxe version London’s roundel symbol, conceived for the underground but also used on buses and coaches from the 1930s onward...