Category Archives: Architecture

Old Industry

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Behind the new apartments and Discovery Centre in the Millennium Coastal Park at Llanelli, there is another discovery to be made. Llanelli has recently been seeing some significant developments and they are good to see.

However, just because something is old and unused does not mean it has no interest. Walking back towards the Discovery Centre, the remains of industry in the area can be seen and I was drawn over to take a closer look. All photos taken on my iPhone.

Llanelli Old Industry-1

Llanelli Old Industry-2

Llanelli Old Industry-3

Llanelli Old Industry-4

Llanelli Old Industry-5

This last shot is of one of the old hydraulic rams used with the dock gates in the old Llanelli dock yard.

Llanelli Old Industry-6

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Llanelli Beach – Landscape and Architecture

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It seems evident from these photos, that the buildings along Llanelli sea front were not built using the material that can be found on the beach. The worn brick in the foreground of the first image is one example of the wide array of fascinating stone like materials that can be found (see yesterday’s post).

The apartments beside the Millennium Coastal Park Discovery Centre seem to me to be out on a bit of a limb from the rest of the town but the residents have an excellent view of the wider part of the Loughor Estuary and across to the Gower Peninsula and the old Victorian cast iron attraction of Whitford Lighthouse.

The Millennium Coastal Park is a popular place at the weekend and in fact, you will see people enjoying the walks there on any day of the week. People do not generally feature in the StillWalks videos I produce but that is not always the case and more coincidental than deliberate. However, if I am to produce a StillWalk of this area, I think I will need to include both sound and images of people if it is to reflect what the place honestly. That said, there will be fewer people there on a blustery Autumn day than on a beautiful Summers day but it is strange that the photos below have not one person in them as it was relatively busy on the day. All photos were taken on my iPhone.

Llanelli Beach Landscape-2

Llanelli Beach Landscape-4

Llanelli Beach Landscape-6

Llanelli Beach Landscape-1

You can use the new Donate button below to help StillWalks. Pay how much you want and receive a high quality download of this week’s featured StillWalks video. Click the image below to watch the video.

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Three Cliffs Bay – Step 4, Pennard Castle

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It was a hot and bright day when I went to Three Cliffs Bay and Pennard Castle on the Gower Peninsula in South Wales and this can sometimes pose problems for the photographer. I hope I have managed to deal with the issues of light and shade reasonable effectively in these shots. There was some adjustment needed in Lightroom, particularly in the last shot, but not too much.

A sense of scale – These photos are, more than anything else, an attempt to describe the different scales of the surroundings and features. Don’t miss the figure in the first image, which, more than anything else, proves the actual size of the castle ruins.

The three other shots give a good sense of how difficult the castle would have been to attack at least from the seaward side but for me,  I like the framing of the different elements of the landscape with the castle windows and entrance.

Pennard Castle Pennard Castle Pennard Castle Three Cliffs Bay

All photos are available for sale on the StillWalks Photography website.

Watching Over the Winds

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The statue atop the Marina Towers Observatory on Swansea Seafront looks out over  Swansea Bay and was no doubt keeping an eye on those land wind surfers I posted about  yesterday.

The statue was made by Swansea artists Rob Conybear and Uta Molling and has the title “Ecliptica”. You can see many more examples of public art in Swansea here. The architect Robin Campbell was responsible for much of the architectural art work in Swansea’s Maritime Quarter where we used to have a studio – it was a great place to work!

Watching Over the Bay

When is a video not a video?

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When it’s a DVD! It seems some people have been confused as to what they will get if they click the buy now button to get a StillWalks video. The lesson to me – never make assumptions!

If you buy a video or videos on StillWalks, you will be sent a link to allow you to download and play those videos on your computer or mobile device.

You will only receive a DVD (containing eight StillWalk videos) if you click to buy one of the DVD collections.

The sample video below is “City Walk” and takes place on Boxing Day in Belfast in Northern Ireland. Click the Buy Now button to go direct to the list of StillWalks in Winter and select it and/or any others you would like. Don’t forget to also select the size you would like for each StillWalks video.

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A frosty walk through Belfast, Northern Ireland on Boxing Day. This is a low resolution 2:30 minute sample of this StillWalks video. The full video is 5:38 minutes and is best viewed in high definition (HD).

Buy Now

Buy now to download and enjoy full length and high quality. Please complete the form on the Buy Now page to buy this video and other Winter StillWalks. Please also read the Purchases notice below the form.

Pylons in the Hills

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Coming down from the hills at the end of the day and heading into the sunlight can provide some remarkable views of the landscape – dependant, of course,  on the weather conditions and time of year.

The end of my journey home from Felindre brought me down from the hills towards Pontarddulais in South Wales where there is a vast network of metal giants criss-crossing the land as part of the National Grid.

Electricity pylons seen against the light and the land need not be a blot, but rather a fascinating part of the composition, creating patterns and networks of lines that may not be natural, but are something we are happy to live with in order to have the power we need for modern life.

These and more photos can be seen and purchased at StillWalks PhotoShelter.

Bont Landscape Pylons Pylons detail

Abertawe Walk

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A few weeks ago I started writing a short blog style article for the online version of our local newspaper, the South Wales Evening Post. The articles are about some of the walks I take in the Swansea area and many of them are a little off the beaten track.

My contribution to the paper today (read here) features the River Tawe at Ynystawe but here, on this blog I want to present another part of the river. The StillWalks, “Abertawe Walk”, takes you along the cycle path between the Liberty Stadium and the bridges at SA1 and the Maritime Quarter in Swansea.

The production for this walk was done in the Autumn and the walk takes you through the woods along side the river as well as the cycle path.

The video can be seen here and the photos below are taken from that production.

abertawe walk

from Abertawe Walk – Autumn

from Abertawe Walk

from Abertawe Walk