York, Feasegate

Iron on displayLook up in central York and, above the shopfronts, you’ll see all kinds of evidence of the city’s architectural and social history. Georgian brickwork and sash windows are quite frequent (I think there are some Georgian sash windows reflected in the upper-level glazing of the building in my photograph). Tudor or earlier timber framing can also be found with ease – with great ease as its black and white patterns readily catch the eye. Here’s something different, a legacy of York’s later history. Above the frontages of the Yorkshire Building Society and Motto Sushi is a facade that’s nearly all glass, held together with iron beams and slender columns and punctuated with still more slender glazing bars. The generous iron eaves cornice at the top allies the building to classical culture, but the proportions of the rest are not at all classical – this is a structure of the industrial age, and it shows. Its builders have put the technology of the railways and factories to use…