Old Strathmore site

All that is left of the old Strathmore School is a large concrete slab.

I have posted pictures of this site before but not previously from this angle where the foundations are more prominent. This is the view from the lane to the German School and Ham Polo.

Broken finial

The side gate to Ham House garden is majestic but slightly damaged.

One of the finials has obvious cracks in it and so the area around it, on both sides of the wall, has been roped of to keep people away.

Scaffolding and more

The maintenance works on Teddington Bridge have entered their final stages.

The works being done now are "replacing the bearings on lockcut bridge" and while the works themselves are not visible an impressive amount of stuff is required to do it.

One minor point, the text quoted above refers to "lockcut bridge" whereas previously it was called "Lock Cut Bridge". This supports my suspicion that the name has been made up for the repairs.

Repainted lines

I was wondering what was going to happen in Locksmeade Road.

I was walking down Dukes Avenue late one night when I saw No Parking cones in Locksmeade Road and Thamesgate Close so I speculated why they might be there. I thought that they might be going to resurface the roads, despite them being in reasonable condition and also being quite roads, so seeing fresh yellow lines was something of a relief.

Another new porch

There seems to have been a flurry of new porches in the Buckingham Road area.

I am something of a fan of the simple original porches but I can see why they are being replaced (they offer very little protection from the weather) and I like that there is a consistency, in this area at least, in what they are being replaced with. The design is simple and is spot-on, brick built with a pitched roof.

Unsafe memorial

Several gravestones in St Andrew's, on Church Road, have been marked as unsafe.

The signs are eye=catching, as they should be, but are not very attractive so I hope that they are just a prelude to some restoration work to make them all safe again.

Pumpkins on display

This impressive display of pumpkins is in the kitchen garden at Ham House.

Second Hand?

I spent too many hours proof reading business documents at work not to spot this.

This should be "secondhand" because it is one word in this context, when written as two words it means part of a clock face. To make matters worse, the very tight kerning of the letters with some even overlapping, e.g. the final "O" and "P", means that the erroneous space between the words is more obvious.

Gunam Cottage

A famous red brick has got some company.

The red brick at 7 Upper Ham Road featured here in 2009 and pops up in local forums from time to time. Following extensive renovations of the property it has been joined by both a house name, Gunam Cottage, and a rather pretty number 7.

Individually all three signs have their merits but I think that they clash more than the compliment each other.