As I write, the much loved ‘Bishy Road’ in York, is decked out in bunting and yellow bikes to greet the Tour de France this Sunday 6th July 2014. The street will be full to bursting with visitors and cycling fans, myself included, and once the Tour has passed through, a street party will kick off.
It’s not the first time this great community has hosted a party and I hope there will be many more.
So here are the buildings from the 1.8m streetscape drawing. I have cropped them in pairs so you can see some of the detail. To see the drawing as a whole, please click over to www.drawingthestreet.co.uk and for a great full street length photographic view visit York360 over on www.york360.co.uk/panoramas-of-york/bishopthorpe-road
Clements Hall Local History Group is another aspect of this lively community. The group is building an archive of the history of this area and there is a fascinating set of photos already gathering on their blog. If you are interested to see how this street has changed in living memory – go and have a look. If you have any old photos of the Bishopthorpe Road – why not add them to the archive? The Pig and Pastry used to be a post office, McBrides was formerly Enterprise 33 and Hopscotch was once home to the Halifax Building Society.
Trinicria is well remembered by local resident Bruce as formerly being Leeming & Salisbury, the place to go for ‘Teddy Boy drapes, brothel creepers (suede shoes) and lariats (neckties)’. Laura remembers ‘lovely gloves, those knitted cotton layered ones, from wooden drawers under the glass counter’. The elegant shop front joinery has long gone but there are still some details remaining.
Written on the Bishy Road memory wall Johnny writes: ‘When we moved into Pextons, we had boxes full of railway toilet locks that had the engaged signe on. There were lots of 1920’s window catches beautifully wrapped in tissue paper…we had blanks for church keys 9″ long…’beaver stones’ to wash the front doorstep…carbolic soap…People would come to us from all over York to buy black lead. Everything had to be cut…just on the counter…you would just make do and mend…essentially it was a very old fashioned place and remains that…”
The dog outside Puddin and Pie is the one that was flagged up as found on the Bishy Road Facebook page. I was very happy to see that Blue found her way back home.
(Update note: April 2016 news from the Clementshall History Blog on change of owners at Puddin and Pie)
Secrets and Surprises is a new shop on the Bishy Road – the sign has only just gone up. What great timing to open up now – good luck Secrets!
There’s my Norman, top mouser. He is a complete figment on this street but always present as I draw. Interesting for me to read over on the Clements Hall site that there has been a betting shop here since the year I was born – 1959!
Limited edition, fine art quality giclee signed prints are available at three different sizes. First two (large) prints are donations: 1/199 to Sir Bradley Wiggins a thank you on behalf of the whole Bishy community for the part he played in bringing the Tour over here, 2/199 up for sale and the proceeds to go to Crohn’s and Colitis UK. Any questions, please email me at RonnieCruwys.drawingthestreet.co.uk
Large signed print 1600x 360 £155 inc post and packing
Medium signed print 1200×300 £99 inc post and packing
Small signed print 600×200 £45 inc post and packing
A4 size prints set in mounts (280 x 360mm overall) at £20 each:
1 Millies /Pig & Pastry
2 Trinacria/Thomas’s/Frankie and Johnny’s
3 Lal Quila and Pextons
4 Puddin and Pie and Churchills.
Thanks for reading!
Drawing the Detail 
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