WALKING WITH ARCHITECTURE (AND CARS)

 And so we went to Frinton on Sea, in Essex, and not for the first time.

Like many people I usually go there to walk around and stare at the modernist architecture in the Frinton Park Estate and although we certainly did do that, I thought I needed a new angle, or at least variation on an old one.  So I continued my comparatively recent obsession with circular windows, of which there was no shortage. 

 

That was fine, but then I noticed there were also quite a few cool old cars on the street, which I hadn’t been expecting.

 

It’s an odd thing isn’t it, any walk, every walk, is improved by the presence of interesting or curious architecture and any street is improved by the presence of cool old cars

 

This is why American Street Photographers of the 1960s and 70s, most of them walkers by necessities, had life so easy in one sense.  Point your camera towards a mid of mine-period architecture or even a garage, and include a car with fins, and it’s hard to go wrong.

 

Winogrand

Maier

But times change, I find modern architecture, whether good or bad, infinitely fascinating, whereas modern cars rarely look like anything at all.  And it must be said that in Frinton I never found a cool car and a cool piece of architecture in the same frame, unless a marquee counts as architecture.

 

 And I see there’s also a new book forthcoming from the modernist titled A Time ⋅ A Place, a book in which 'every "Car of the Year" (1964-1982) is paired with a building completed in the same year' - photographed by Daniel Hopkinson, researched and written by John Piercy Holroyd.  

 

OMG, I can barely imagine the amount of work that went into that and I certainly didn’t put that amount of work into a day trip to Frinton, obviously.

 

There used to be a trope that said ‘Harwich for the Continent, Frinton for the Incontinent’ a sneer directed at old and weak-bladdered Essex holidaymakers.  But insult or not, I found Frinton to be very well supplied with toilets, and just as important, very well signposted.

 

And the architecture of the main toilet on the sea front is understatedly epic – though you do have to pay 20 pence to get in there.  A small price to pay.

FRISKING IN FRINTON

New Year’s Day was spent walking in Frinton on Sea. Once upon a time people used to say Harwich for the Continent (because that’s where the ferries go from) and Frinton for the incontinent (because of the number of retirees). These days you have to be a pretty well-heeled retiree to live there.  I can’t speak for the level of incontinence, but you’re seldom far from a defibrillator.

 

These days I (and all the other hipsters) tend to go there to gawp at the very cool mid-century architecture of the Frinton Park Estate:

It’s great stuff, though it seems to me that a white building against a pale grey sky is a lot less attractive than a white buildings against a blue sky.  This may be why white buildings aren’t as popular in Britain compared with, say, Greece or California.

 

But if, like me, you’re fascinated by suburbia in all its manifestations, it’s a lot of fun to find an example of mid century modern right next to an archetypal suburban bungalow.  I wonder if the neighbouring inhabitants have much in common on.

 

But it’s not all modernity in Frinton. It’s also home to St Mary’s Old Church (aka St Mary the Virgin) which is a very old church indeed, parts of it (very small parts I think) dating back to 1199.

 

It is also apparently the smallest church in Essex. It looks as though the pews would accommodate maybe 50 people at a pinch.

 

There’s some good stained glass which the handy leaflet in the church says was designed by Edward Burne-Jones and installed by William Morris and Co., and no I’m not sure what ‘installed’ means in this context.  I mean, I assume old William didn’t pop round with a bucket of putty.

The church also has two, yes two, keyboards:

Very Keith Emerson:

 

Try as I might I can’t find any connection between Keith Emerson and Essex, much less Frinton, but should you be looking for famous connections and find yourself walking past McGrigor Hall, home to the Frinton Repertory Theatre, you’ll find a blue plaque commemorating the life of Lynda Bellingham, star of the Oxo ads, Confessions of a Driving Instructor, and much more besides.  Here she is walking for charity:

INFIDELS

This week, for one reason or another, I found myself walking in Frinton, part of the ‘Essex Riviera.’  It was sufficiently packed that we had to drive around for a very long time before we found a parking spot, though on a hot day in the August holidays was not in itself a big surprise.

The beach was busy, but people tended to be walking or seated or sunbathing at least a couple of meters apart. I didn’t feel at risk, but maybe I was naïve. I picked up a stone from the sand that looked at least somewhat like a skull.

Now, I don’t know much about religion but I do know that while I was at the seaside many believers were undertaking Haj, the Islamic pilgrimage to the Kabba in Mecca, a serious walking event, which I gather has been rather different this year than previously.

In past years it's looked like this:

Now apparently this year it looks like this:

 

The latter seems much actually pleasanter, though  I don’t suppose people go there because it’s pleasant.

Apparently stones, skull-shaped or otherwise, play a part in Haj.  As I understand it, I mean I read it in the paper, pilgrims usually pick up stones from the ground as they walk, which they then ‘symbolically’ hurl at the devil.  These are now being provided by the religious authorities, washed and sterilized, in ‘haj kits’ Mine was just washed by the sea. I do hope that’s enough.

Here’s a picture of our hero Sir Richard Francis Burton, dressed for his trip to Mecca.