AND HERE ON THE THRESHOLD WE STAND [269]

Liminality is a concept associated with thresholds and rites of passage. As I understand it, a “liminal space” is a kind of transitional space: you have left one area, and you have not reached your destination, and you don’t know how to feel about where you are – even more, the destination may itself be unknown. Others may feel safe there, and you may come to feel safe with time, but until then, something feels a bit “off” about your experience.

I usually try to avoid places where I may feel unwelcome, but I have come to realise that one place I often walked through was, before it was demolished, almost a textbook definition of a liminal space, if not by design, then definitely in execution.

The Tricorn Centre was a shopping and entertainment complex opened in Portsmouth in 1965. It stood as a prime example of Brutalist architecture, and one of the first privately-built examples of its type built in Europe. Driving into Portsmouth city centre, it always came across as a grey carnival of living concrete, but its imposition on the landscape was not what prevented you from ultimately looking inside.

Looking closer exposed decades of neglect and missed chances, caused by missed opportunities that could have made it Portsmouth’s ultimate destination, and by unintentional difficulty to actually get to the place. The centre was ultimately demolished in 2005, the culmination of a city’s reckoning with itself over whether to keep and renovate a part of its landscape, or push away what had been left to become one of the ugliest buildings in Britain.

Designed by Owen Luder and Rodney Gordon - they of Trinity Square, Gateshead and Eros House, Catford - the Tricorn, standing on its triangular plot of land, was intended to incorporate a department store, a supermarket, a bazaar of smaller shops incorporated into a market square, a pub, a nightclub, warehouse units, and eight luxury apartments with views across Portsmouth.

HOWEVER – and this is a very large “however” – the department store, most likely Marks & Spencer, chose not to move in, leading to the space being used as a covered market for smaller vendors, and other big names choosing not to move to the other shops; the existing Charlotte Street market largely stayed outside; the apartments leaked and whistled with the wind, ultimately boarded up by 1980; some warehouse units were never leased, although lorries would have found navigating the spiral road to the rooftop car park extremely difficult; lack of revenue led to decay in the concrete, from rusted metal struts to the formation of stalactites; and the bazaar-type layout proving ideal for muggers.

Most of all, the road layout had not been changed to provide easy entrance to the Tricorn, and no thoroughfare was made to the centre from Commercial Road, the traditional shopping street in Portsmouth – even if it was a location for an early Virgin Megastore, you had to go out of your way to get there. When a thoroughfare finally appeared, in 1989, it was through the Cascades, a more modern, more traditionally-designed shopping centre built alongside one already deemed to have failed.

Most of the memories I have of the Tricorn were from its perimeter – “Charlotte’s Superstore,” the name given to the indoor market; Mr Clive, a suede and leatherware shop; a very large Laser Quest; and a covered area that I walked through as it was the quickest way to get from a nearby Sainsbury’s back to Commercial Road. Some of this last section still survives, as it forms a shop’s fire escape, but before the Tricorn was demolished in 2005, it was much darker and foreboding, flanked by a spiral car park ramp and a petrol station, creating a literal threshold between one area of Portsmouth and the other. If I ever walked through the centre of the complex, it must have been quickly, and with someone.

The Tricorn was demolished in 2005, by which time the liminality of the boarded-up, neglected but still (because of the car park) fully accessible centre was unfortunately associated with suicide. To this day, the levelled triangle plot has remained a car park while successive attempts to regenerate the area have been announced, reformulated, postponed, and thrown out, while Commercial Road is in danger of becoming a liminal space itself through the loss of retail – the only decision already made is to change the road layout.

However, nothing could be bolder than what stood there before, and perhaps, like the new Elephant & Castle development, what may be built in its place will not generate as strong an opinion – although the intent of avoiding offence may cause its own alienation.

I’M GIVING UP ON TRYING TO SELL YOU THINGS THAT YOU AIN’T BUYING [202]

A direct link to the video is here: https://youtu.be/7v9vB0SNG6I

Below is the script for the video: 

Hello there, this is Leigh Spence is Dancing with the Gatekeepers, I’m Leigh Spence, and this is Fratton Road, one of the main shopping streets in Portsmouth, on a rainy, windy morning in October 2019 - my umbrella had already broken by this point. It was quite early, and most shops hadn’t opened yet. This video will look around a shopping mall I made a video about two years ago, mostly because I kept getting requests to film an update, and because people like watching videos about dead malls over videos about calculators. 

Incidentally, my video about the INTERESTING HP-12C calculator is available on this channel.

Fratton Road is receiving money from a Government fund to revitalise high streets, provide better transport links, and find new uses for vacant buildings. However, I don’t see much of a future for the former Troxy cinema, a building so derelict that the porthole windows have been filled in with deckchairs.

Anyway, in July 2017, I made a video about The Bridge Shopping Centre, a mall I knew was pretty empty, left acting as a, well, bridge, between Fratton Road and the giant Asda supermarket. And when I say giant, I do mean giant. A Co-Op department store used to stand on this site, before the Co-Op replaced it with a more modern supermarket and shopping mall, opening in 1989. Asda took over both in 2001. I really do like this travelling shot, so I’ll just keep it going a bit longer.

Asda continue to own The Bridge, but apart from it acting as another entrance for themselves, the feeling I got two years ago was that the mall was done, the bigger brands having moved on, or gone out of business themselves. Sure, some stores were left, but even they couldn’t last much longer. I wish they would put back the neon sign they used to have outside.

Here is some of the original video I shot two years ago. According to the foundation stone, this mall was built back when people still made time capsules.

I believe the pet shop closed about a year later. Fashion stores that used to be on the left-hand side were Select, New Look and Ethel Austin. The jewellery store has seemingly always been here. You will find I like the red tiling and glass roof in this place, very Eighties indeed. The Savers chain of budget health stores is owned by Superdrug, and that store used to be a Superdrug. The flickering light suggests some level of decline, but the place was still kept clean. This central platform was used as seating for the café, last known as Rebecca’s Pantry. When the Co-Op was here they also had a travel agent and a shoe shop, Shoefayre, in the mall. You do get the feeling that, if the café had remained open, this place wouldn’t feel half as dead. I don’t know why I didn’t go through these barriers, only myself was there to stop me. And there is the entrance to Asda.

Back to October 2019, and not much has changed outside, apart from the weather. There is a new tenant on the right, Cubano Beach Club, which hosts children’s birthday parties and other events.

Making my way across the road, I see a new games arcade, including virtual reality and escape rooms, both growing areas at the moment. The pet shop has a replacement too. Like I said, I wish they would put the neon back.

The automatic doors have obviously seen me coming today. I’m still coming in... and in we go. There isn’t much difference to begin, except for more signs. The time capsule is obviously still there. If you want to rent this space, ring the number on your screen. They were playing music in here two years ago, but I’ve never heard it this loud – perhaps they’ve bought new speakers. The jewellers, will always be there. Ethel Austin closed down in 2006, by the way.

Now this is something I wish happened more often – using vacant store space for showing art works, like this former New Look store. This one here is provided by the Aspex gallery in Portsmouth, and was made by an established artist along with local residents. Here is display on the store front, and you can visit the gallery’s website for more information.

Savers and Iceland will always be here, by the looks of things. This former charity shop is now being used to sell home brewing kits. They’ve also fixed the light. The travel agent is now a beauty store – “People will stare, make it worth their while.” And, crucially, the café is back open, which gave the mall its atmosphere back, and is enticing more businesses to set up here again. The former Asda photo store is now operated by Max Spielmann, with a Timpsons sharing the space. An Olan Mills studio once operated in the mall, if anyone remembers them. Asda have also opened an opticians next to the post office.

Yes, there is still space to fill, but there is more hope now than there was two years ago. It’s a good place to come in, not least to keep you out of the rain. Give it another two years, and The Bridge may have left its dead mall past far behind.

Thank you for watching. As ever, the nostalgia culture crisis continues at [www.leighspence.net].

ON A PIECE OF PAPER I CAN SHOW IT TO YOU [15]

Don’t worry, I will explain what these five symbols mean later.

Last Saturday, I returned from a trip to Winchester, ready to write about semi-detached houses, still overwhelmed by the surprise I came across there, while walking to the shops.

From 2005 to 2007, I worked at the Portsmouth branch of Mail Boxes Etc., a business offering mailing, shipping and printing services, where I also designed business cards, menus, posters, and anything that needed a bit of design. Surrounded by university buildings, there was a brisk trade in printing end-of-year essays, and sending belongings back home.

In 2006, to make our student shipping prices clear and simple, I designed a colour-coded map of Europe, with prices listed by colour. The colours I used – red, green, pink and amber - where to avoid confusion as much as possible, not because they were the nicest choices.

After changing the top of the design, posters and flyers were printed up, and the word was spread. I remember we used it the following year too. It does its job better than any lists and tables of prices would have done. I’m just glad it worked.

Meanwhile, ten years later, I walked past the Winchester branch of Mail Boxes Etc., and I see my past looking back at me.

Going into the shop later, the lady behind the counter told me it had been placed there two and a half years ago, and people are often seen looking at it, or tapping the window when pointing at it.

I still don’t know what to make of this because, of course, having designed it for a business, they can use it for as long as they want – I just never expected something I did would ever last so long. Perhaps, it’s better to concentrate on what I can do now.

I now work at a healthcare company, which recently introduced a set of Core Values, setting up a competition to design pictures for these values, to put them at the front of colleagues’ minds.

It hadn’t been mentioned how they would be used, so I sketched out something that could be adapted as much as possible. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a winner, but I think the ideas still hold up.

The five symbols created symbolised, from left to right, the Core Values of Innovation, Business Responsibility, Professionalism, Adaptability and Mutual Respect. All the symbols are based within the same app icon-style frame, which represents the business itself. For “Innovation,” I needed anything but a light bulb, but lightning striking the existing turning cogs of the business was perfect. For “Business Responsibility,” all eyes are meant to be on the prize of new work, so we have arrows all pointing to a prospective new contract. For “Professionalism,” which you should bring to work with you, becomes the person that you are, and it is as simple as that – the snorkel then shows the “Adaptability” angle, and some waves would have later been added in the background. Finally, “Mutual Respect” is simply that, from one person to another.

All the symbols were in black and white, with no greyscales, meaning they could be used in anything from forms to posters, in whatever colour was required, while always remaining the same. Ultimately, a good symbol will be one that creates its own meaning, and it would have been interesting to see what would have been made of them, but there will always be another time – I’ll see what they look like in another ten years or so.