Mechanical Landscapes

Tag: Coal Mine

  • #558 – Hatfield Colliery 3

    #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

    #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…

  • #548 – Review of the decade – 2016

    A more stable role at work meant I had more time to focus on photography and an opportunity fell into my lap – a commission from a PR company working for O2 who wanted to use me for a job. I also revisited two sites from a few years back, visited a re-opened Mancunian cotton…

  • #546 – Bernd and Hilla Becher’s Industrial Visions at The National Museum, Cardiff

    I try to go to a few photographic exhibitions a year, normally in the North of England. But when I heard that The National Museum in Cardiff were exhibiting work by Bernd and Hilla Becher, I started to make plans for a trip as their work is rarely exhibited in the U.K. As an added…

  • #470 – Best of 2016 part 3

    #470 – Best of 2016 part 3

    So a (belated) third part to my 2016 retrospective continues with a quick look at Mutual Mills in Heywood – not an explore, more a drive by as I was in the area. I’ve a few more from the Manchester area that I’ve not yet got round to posting up – I’ll put these up some…

  • #461 – Chatterley Whitfield Revisited 2

    #461 – Chatterley Whitfield Revisited 2

    Institute shaft looming overhead. The view from the landscapes slagheap. The Chatterley Whitfield company logo, cast in iron. Platt Shaft headgear. The looming bulk of the Hesketh. And another one, a little further away. I wanted to frame it between some of the surface buildings to give it a little more context. Steam boilers. These weren’t…

  • #460 – Chatterley Whitfield Revisited 1

    #460 – Chatterley Whitfield Revisited 1

    I rarely go and revisit places that I’ve photographed, with only a handful of exceptions e.g. Bailey Mill last week. Partly this is due to sating may curiosity first time round, and partly due to my usual modus operandi of being one step ahead of the demolition crews. In Chatterley Whitfield’s case, my curiosity wasn’t…

  • #338 – Reworked Images 4 – Pleasley Colliery

    Pleasley Colliery is the only preserved coal mine in Nottinghamshire, and is worth a visit if you are in the area.  I don’t think I’ve posted this before and it’s probably the best one I took on my visit. Unfortunately the sun was behind the mine when I was there, which made photographing it from the best vantage points…

  • #308 – Chatterley Whitfield

      This is a photograph that I missed from my post a while back on Chatterley Whitfield Colliery. The image here shows just how much infrastructure is left at the colliery, and the monumental job of upkeep that, well, hasn’t been taking place. When something like this is busy producing coal and making money, then…

  • #260 – Staffordshire Collieries Part 2 – Apedale

    #260 – Staffordshire Collieries Part 2 – Apedale

        Now this was more like it. Someone at Chatterley Whitfield had told us that there was another colliery, Apedale, that we could visit in Stoke, but it was at the other end of town. As I didn’t have a satnav, I had to follow Bungle at breakneck speed across town to find the…

  • #259 – Staffordshire Collieries Part 1 – Chatterley Whitfield

      Another one from the archives here, this was an ‘official’ visit to this crumbling edifice on a so-called open day. Actually, that’s being harsh and doing a disservice to our guides from the Friends of Chatterley Whitfield, who are probably more disappointed about the condition of this place than anyone else, and I’m sure…

  • #159 – Bargoed Colliery 1977 Part 3

    Final selection of scans from Bargoed, this time it’s of the workers. From what I can make out, the photos are by Kjell-Ake Andersson and Mikael Wistrom.  

  • #158 – Bargoed Colliery 1977 Part 2

     More from Bargoed. I’ve always thought that colliery headstocks / headgears are massively symbolic, more than any other industrial structure. Their great height meant they loomed over their communities as a constant reminder to everyone of their working lives. This selection of photos is about men and machines. The industrial revolution resulted in a huge…

  • #157 – Bargoed Colliery 1977 Part 1

    For a change (as I’ve not even picked up my camera for a month!), I thought I’d post a few scans from a fascinating Swedish book that a friend of mine sent me, which is a photo essay on the Welsh mining industry.  Unfortunately, I don’t speak a word of Swedish, but from what I…

  • #34 – mechanical landscape

    The smell was what took me by surprise at Welbeck Colliery. I didn’t think there would be a smell for some reason, but there was a not unpleasant one for an industrial site. I suppose it smelt, to my nose, a bit like a steam railway, perhaps not surprising with the great piles of coal. But…

  • #20 – Dial ‘M’ For Mining

    #20 – Dial ‘M’ For Mining

    One I took a while back but I still really like – Clipsone Colliery in Nottinghamshire. Despite being listed, these impressive artefacts of our industrial heritage are seemingly doomed due to a concerted campaign from a local councillor. Shame.