On the way back from Hatfield Colliery, I decided to swing off the M62 at Oldham to take a look at Hartford Mill, a place I’d known about for years but had never made the time to visit. Oldham once had over 360 cotton mills, but like all the mill towns, this number has decreased…
Author: Andy
#559 – Book review – The Last Years of Coal Mining in Yorkshire
In doing some online research for my blog articles I stumbled across a series of books by Steve Grudgings. Two of these cover the last days of the South Wales coalfield, and the other one was this one on Yorkshire. Regrettably, I never got round to photographing the few collieries that remained in Yorkshire until…
Book recommendations
I also post occasional articles on my main website Mechanical Landscapes. And I do mean occasionally – this one I’m linking to is the first one in three years! This one is an evolving list of urbex and industrial landscape books that I recommend. I own them all and some I’ve had for many years…
#558 – Hatfield Colliery 3
As a black and white photographer, I try to start thinking about how I want the final image to look when I am at the location. As I am shooting digital, the file is a colour file and while I know that you can preview and save JPEG’s as black and white in camera, I…
#557 – Hatfield Colliery 2
My drone now accompanies me if I am going somewhere suitable to fly it, and Hatfield seemed a suitable opportunity to give it a fly. As I’m not using the drone regularly (it’s not my primary camera), I’m still getting my head round how to use the drone in my photography and how to compose…
#556 – Hatfield Colliery 1
Britain’s coal mining industry has been in a long slow decline for decades. It’s been well documented elsewhere and is an emotive subject that I have no wish to get bogged down with. But with the recent drive to lower carbon emissions, the closure of the coal fired power stations has seen a dramatic reduction…
#555 – Swan Lane Mills, Bolton
I grew up in Bolton, a Lancashire (or Greater Manchester) mill town, although by the 1980’s – a time when I hit my teenage years and became more aware of the built environment around me – most of the mills had closed and many had been, or were being, demolished. There were well over a…
#554 – Cowling Mill, Chorley
Cowling Mill is one of the few remaining textile mills in Chorley and was a typical South / Central Lancashire red brick mill. It opened in 1906 and ran until 1959, a time when huge numbers of local mills ended production. It got put into multiple usage for many years thereafter and began the inevitable…
#553 – Horwich Loco Works – The End
I first visited here as a child on the last works open day in the early 80’s, and then again ten years later at the weekly car boot sale (wish I’d taken my camera….). I visited again in 2010 when the works was largely intact but gradually the site has been demolished. Before the last…
#552 – A Decade of Industrial Photography – Final Reflections
I always used to worry that I’d run out of places and things to photograph. It’s not so much that I let my photography define my identity, as I enjoy the whole process of research, photographing, and processing my photographs. Over the past decade, my focus has moved away from urban exploration and more into…
Mechanical Landscapes 