St James Avenue, Kemptown, Brighton

These lovely covers are from my old stomping ground of the St James Street area of Kemptown. The area has changed a lot for the better (no doubt connected to my departure) but St James Avenue remains one is its most attractive residential streets.

The Clark and Hunt design is one of my favourites and the other one with a surround is a rare original.

Celebrity coalhole cover #2

This well worn Phoenix cover is in front of 32 Hamilton Road, Brighton. On the front of the house is a plaque commemorating the fact that Eric Gill,  inventor of the Gills sans font, fine sculptor and sexual deviant, was born and lived at the house and would have trod upon the coal hole cover. (Although  Wikipedia says he was born in Steyning).

In the neighbouring Brigden St there were several covers like this and also from Every and Newman.

Right royal coalhole cover, Hampton Court Palace

This is one of my favourite finds.  On a recent trip to Hampton Court Palace I found this cover in a yard outside the kitchens. An obvious place to put one,  presumably well after Henry VIII's days.

Rubbings are go

Montage

Star Foundry from TW Porter

J Every from Lewes

C+J Reed from Brighton

Flower

Another Every and Newman

Large Haywards

Modern stars

At last, I've located and photoed my coal hole cover rubbings from 2002 or 2003. There's a fine selection of foundries, styles and even sizes. All rubbings are from the North Laine and Old Steine in Brighton. The rubbings were done on a large A3 pad of artist's paper with black rubbing crayon from the now-disappeared artist supply shop on the corner of Richmond Parade.

Kemptown glories

I've been told that Kemptown has many good coal holes, and so it should - being stuffed with fine Regency and Victorian homes needing copious amounts of coal. I had half an hour to kill the other evening and did a quick circuit of the streets to the south of the County Hospital.

I encountered a fine mix of people - skinny dodgy-looking yoofs with big scary dogs, large shaven-headed middle-aged men with small yappy dogs, ladies of leisure drinking red wine on their doorsteps and smooth couples in matching dressing gowns on their Regency balconies.

I also encountered a fine mix of coal hole covers, including some larger-than-normal ones and some from manufacturers not encountered further west.  Feast your eyes on this lot.

First up, in Sudeley Terrace - a trio of Haywards covers in nice iron surrounds.

Moving on down to the seafront, on Chichester Terrace we find these great ones - some supersize like this Haywards with 19 glazed hexagonal panels.

And this nice chevron flower design.

And this very pleasing 'bullseye' Woodrow design.

this beautiful Clare, Hunt design from Shoreditch...

this unnamed design with slots in, and

a larger version of a fairly common design.

Round the corner, in Chichester Place there is this Haywards self-locking patent design 'D' model.

Maunsell Street, London SW1

Three fine covers from around the corner of the august Royal Horticultural Society in the quiet backstreets of Westminster. I particularly like the Haywards concentric circles. The floral design is from Burt and Potts of Westminster and the one split into quarters is a Luxfer Prisms, from 16 Hill Street, London EC. Unfortunately, the glass prisms have been replaced by concrete.