Streets of Stockport
The important thing about having a hobby is that it keeps you off the streets. Except when it is photography it doesn’t as you tramp round looking for subjects.
During my foot-slogging I came to admire the many old street signs that I came across which have a lot more character than the more modern variety, so I hatched a plan to photograph them over the summer and create a montage from them.
This wasn’t an original idea, but one that I plagiarised from the People’s History Museum that had a display of old Salford street signs which I photographed last year.
You can see the result above. There is no particular significance to the streets I chose, except the School Brow sign which is quite close to where I live.
And although I intended to only photograph old street signs, a few of recent vintage crept in, like the no waiting sign and Mersey Square. I also included Gas Street as an example of the once utilitarian nature of street naming.
I haven’t decided whether this will be the final version or whether I should go in search of more signs. Which when I think about it isn’t the most exciting way of spending my time.
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The odd thing about our local street signs is that they are in at least three styles. Brown and yellow for the College of St. Rose. And a pair of green and white, bur some of the lettering is in CAPS, and the others in Lower Case.
What exactly is a brow?
My town has a Railroad Street.
Roger: There is quite a collection of styles depending on how old the signs are. I’ve no idea of their exact age, but the School Brow sign for example must have been there for many years.
Mr Plague: And on the subject of brows, in this part of the world brow is another word for a hill.
Great collection but one of my favourite Stockport street names is Avenue Street http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1405455
Thanks Gerald. That is annoying because I was on Brewery Street yesterday, but I’m in Stockport later so I will hopefully grab a shot of Avenue Street!
Great idea and I’m impressed by how you were able to “mount” the signs on the brick wall background. Interesting that you chose not to include “Back Passage” which is of course regularly frequented by Stockport and Hazel Grove’s Tory gentlemen…. Over in Hull, there is of course the famous “Land of Green Ginger” – a street which refers back to the city’s maritime trading links.
YP: In brief, the way I did it was to find the background on the web through an image search for ‘seamless brick background’. I then copied and pasted it in Photoshop to create my ‘brick wall’.
The signs then took a bit of editing to remove their actual background, leaving them transparent. Then I copied them onto the wall and resized and arranged them as you see.
I’ve also since followed Gerald’s tip and included Avenue Street in the montage.