Posts tagged “West Bay”
February 2, 2012

Bridport by Night: An alternative tourism video by Stephen Banks

So, it has been over a week since I uploaded my ‘labour of love’, Bridport by Night, to YouTube. The video really took off in the first four days, accumulating some 8,000 views in that period alone. Hits from technology site Gizmodo and Anglotopia helped it along its way, but the majority of views were picked up by an organic sharing frenzy on Facebook and Twitter.

Throughout last week, I had people who I didn’t know from the local area following me on Twitter and adding me on Facebook. Many of them commented expressing their praise for the video. To date, the video on YouTube has had about 75 comments (and the same number of replies by me), 206 likes and 2 dislikes – a comment reading “Two dislikes for this video? The pair of you: YOU ARE DEAD INSIDE” made me chuckle.

Interest has died down at the moment. A few people have quietly complained about how much I was mouthing off about it, so I haven’t been sharing it around so much. But the other night, ITV West Country Tonight came to West Bay and filmed me for a piece they are running. And this Saturday, the film is being shown at the Bridport Arts Centre as part of a Spirit of Bridport event.

My target number of views for the video is 12,977 (which is Wikipedia‘s listed population for Bridport). It should soon surpass that. I already have plans to make a second, improved version of the video. Difficult second album?
August 27, 2011 1 Comment

Bridport Town Hall’s golden weathervane restored

The golden weathervane on top of Bridport Town Hall, regilded in 2011 by Bridport artist Jemma Thompson, pictured on the right.

YOU'RE SO VANE: The weathervane on top of Bridport Town Hall, resplendent in its new coat of gold. Bridport artist Jemma Thompson is pictured right.

THE WEATHERVANE on top of Bridport Town Hall has been re-gilded – and very fine it looks too.

Bridport artist Jemma Thompson applied sheet gold in her studio on St Michael’s trading estate in the South West Quadrant.

The weathervane is much bigger – and heavier – than it looks from down on the ground.

It’s 2.4 metres long and is made from lead and copper, so it weighs around 100kg.

It took 10 men to get it back up on top of the Town Hall’s cupola.

Bob Gillis, clerk to Bridport Town Council, said: “The dome of the cupola has also been cleaned and the columns repainted. The clock face and surrounding slates are now being repaired and restored and as work is completed from the top down we will be lowering the scaffolding.” 

The weathervane and cupola on top of Bridport Town Hall before re-gilding and restoration, with a view over the town towards the West Dorset countryside.

LACKLUSTRE: Bridport Town Hall weathervane and cupola before re-gilding and restoration.

Bridport Town Hall is being restored as part of a £1.2 million Heritage and Conservation Project funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, Bridport Town Council, Dorset County Council, and West Dorset District Council.

Weathervane was stuck in Somerset cart wheel hub

Bridport Town Hall is Grade 1 Listed but that doesn’t mean it was constructed with impeccable skills and materials first time round.

I was talking about it in The Loders Arms the other evening to structural engineer Simon Brody of Brody Forbes Partnership in West Bay.

He was saying that a key part of the structure supporting the weathervane (the bit the pole was stuck into, in very non-technical terms) had been found to be the hub of an old Somerset cart wheel. He knew it was Somerset because there was a name inscribed which he’d traced back as far as 1823.

Mr Brody wondered whether a cart had come down from somewhere like Taunton or Shepton Mallett and broken down and, rather than try to repair it, they’d salvaged the wheel hub for re-use.

And you have to say: it may have been improvised back in the 19th century, but no one could say that it hadn’t lasted, given that it’s now 2011.

Editor’s Note: Jemma Thompson also gilded the fine golden bull hanging outside The Bull Hotel in Bridport. Pretty cool to have two gold artefacts in Bridport town centre. I can only think of the King George III statue in (say) Weymouth. The statue’s mason, incidentally, was James Hamilton – who also worked on Bridport Town Hall…
August 17, 2010 2 Comments

Dorset pub to sell beer for Euros

THE Bridport Arms in West Bay is to start accepting payment in Euros for beer in response to the record-breaking numbers of German and Dutch tourists visiting West Dorset this summer.
The seaside pub will sell pints of Dorset Gold and Palmers IPA beer for 3.90 Euros and 3.60 Euros respectively, as well as £3.35 and £3.10, during the August bank holiday fortnight – traditionally the busiest time of year for the tiny harbour resort (23 August to 5 September).
West Dorset has seen a huge rise in the number of Dutch and German tourists this summer.
Bridport Arms licensee, Jenny Connolly, said: ‘Everyone has noticed how many people from Europe are over here at the moment. We get so many people asking if they can pay in Euros, especially the Dutch and Germans that I decided to join the Eurozone temporarily!
‘I can’t think of a better way to build on the traditional West Dorset welcome than showing our Continental neighbours that we value their custom in any currency.
‘West Bay has been a harbour since the 13th century, so it has a long history of welcoming people from abroad.’
Bridport Tourist Information Centre Manager Terri Foxwell confirmed that the area had seen an influx of tourists from the Continent this summer. She said: ‘Feedback from our tourist information centres shows that there has been a big rise in the number of visitors from Europe, particularly German and Dutch.’
South West Tourism records reveal that the total number of visits made by Germans to Dorset has nearly doubled in recent years – leaping from 34,000 in 2008 to 60,000 in 2009.
Palmers’ Tenanted Trade Director Tim Woodrow said: ‘This is a first for Palmers and we hope we get the chance to say ‘bienvenue’ and ‘guten abend’ to many more international visitors who can enjoy a pint of Palmers’ beer whether they pay in Euros or Sterling.’

Editor’s Note: From a press release issued on behalf of Palmers Brewery by the wife of the editor of this site. Reproduced here because it is interesting – I didn’t know so many Dutch and German people were now visiting – and as a technical test of new website arrangements.
August 6, 2010

Bridport Museum curator leaves for Chartwell

BRIDPORT Museum curator Alice Martin is leaving to become house and collections manager at Sir Winston Churchill’s old house, Chartwell in Kent.

“I went there once when I was a kid,” she said.

“Now I get to live in the house. It will be fantastic.

“I’m also looking forward to working for the National Trust.”

Ms Martin has been in charge of Bridport Museum for almost five years and is universally liked and respected for her enterprise and verve. Visitor numbers have doubled during her tenure, in part thanks to last year’s move towards free admission. Money raised through an auction of promises earlier this year enabled the museum’s free entrance policy to continue, and visitor numbers for 2010 have so far been good.

Ms Martin also helped to secure backing for a project exploring the links between Bridport / West Bay and Newfoundland, and the museum’s currently got extra young staff (such as fundraising officer Emily Weeks) working through the Future Jobs Fund.

Ms Martin has also been heavily involved with Bridport Museum’s proposed move to the Literary & Scientific Institute in East Street, Bridport (more of her thoughts on this should appear on this site soon).

In short, Chartwell’s gain will be Bridport’s loss. Ms Martin said she would miss Bridport but the chance to manage Chartwell was a fabulous opportunity.

She will leave Bridport Museum on September 21 and start at Chartwell on October 12.

Her job is advertised here.

Ms Martin said: “There’s a lot of bright people out there and curators’ jobs are quite sought after. I’m sure there will be somebody comes down to Bridport – or there could be somebody already in Bridport. You know what a range of wonderful people there is around here.”
May 16, 2010 1 Comment

Bridport: Much ado about Bucky-Doo

BRIDPORT’S first gig Bucky-Doo has been launched at West Bay.

The weather was drizzly, and the sky was overcast, but the chairman of Bridport Gig Rowing Club Mike Carter was thrilled – even if he didn’t get to go out on the water himself.

“It’s been a fantastic event,” he said, “a year’s achievement has been delivered today, it’s just great to see.”

Mr Carter had to stay on the slipway and pontoon because he hasn’t actually been rowing in a gig before.

“I’m looking forward to pulling my weight in future,” he said.

His novice-status is a sign of how new the Bridport club is – and as a Philip Colfox comments on another story on this site –

It is truly incredible that with only one season’s hard work Bridport Gig Rowing Club has come from zero to lots of members and a boat on the water. Next target is a wooden boat and a boatshed. Then we must set our sights after an all-singing, all-dancing clubhouse with a good view of the water.

The club is indeed now planning for the future.

Five club members are being trained as coxes and gig rowing lessons are scheduled to start in June.

Six new members have joined in the last week, but more are still being sought, and there’s a meeting at The Ropemakers in Bridport this Thursday at 7pm.

Membership secretary Jim Binning was hopeful that the launch at West Bay would inspire more people to join, so taking the number up past 50.

The launch

The launch began in classic Bridport fashion with lots of milling about, and lots of photographs of inanimate objects being taken.

Here’s one of the oars, which only came on Thursday:

Then the Rev Peter Edwards arrived from St Swithun’s in Bridport, with holy water in a cleaned-out plastic milk container, and sidekick Duncan Wilson, a Deacon, who previously served in the Army for 24 years.

Bucky-Doo was moved to the top of the slipway, Mr Carter made a speech, and the Deacon read from the Bible in a stirring voice that suggested he knew how to make it carry across parade grounds. 

The Vicar spoke of Our Lord Jesus Christ being Master of the Sea, and he sprinkled Bucky-Doo with holy water, now transferred into a more religious-looking vessel.

Next it was the turn of Bridport’s Mayor Martin Ray to open a bottle of Cava and wet the nose of the gig.

This took longer than expected…

But the deed was done, to a pop of applause, and Bucky-Doo was carefully manoeuvred down the slipway.

First sitting in the boat with an oar was Lawrence Shillingford, soon joined by other Bridport rowers, with two from Weymouth who’d come to help out and a cox who’d come down specially from Bristol.

And out they went to row off the Jurassic Coast, accompanied by other Bridport members – and some rowers from Lyme Regis – in one of Lyme’s gigs called Revenge.

It’s hoped soon to start a Jurassic League, when Bridport has raised enough money for a wooden gig that enables the club to race against Lyme Regis and Weymouth. There are strict rules governing gig racing and Bucky-Doo is only fibre-glass.

Bridport Gig Rowing Club is being sponsored by Palmers Brewery to the tune of £7,000 and £10,000 will be given by Sport England, if £10,000 of match-funding can be found by August. Planned events include an auction of pledges at The Bull Hotel in Bridport in July.

But for now – after a year – Bridport Gig Rowing Club is a club that has a gig that’s been rowed through the sea. And that is indeed an achievement.
April 22, 2010

Bridport: Children’s gigs to brighten beach

FIFTY ONE cardboard gigs have been painted by children at Symondsbury School near Bridport, and they’ll all be displayed at West Bay this Sunday (April 25).

Bridport’s new Gig Rowing Club has organised the Beach Boats event on East Beach between 11am and 2pm.

Club chair Mike Carter will present a model gig to the maker of the judges’ favourite boat  at 12.30pm.

Club member Nancy Clemance said: ‘This is going to be a lovely, colourful spectacle for East Beach, and completely in keeping with the community nature of the club.

“I hope we meet lots of children and their families on the day.”

The event is being staged partly because the Bridport Club is due to get its first training gig very soon. This gig, made of fibreglass, will be called Bucky Doo. The club also wants to get a proper Cornish wooden racing gig.

More members would be nice too.

Ms Clemance said: “If we can recruit a few mums, dads, grandparents, aunts, uncles or friends to row Bucky Doo this summer then we’ll be in excellent shape for the arrival of our first racing gig next year.”

Ms Clemance, a freelance curator and arts outreach worker, moved to Bridport from Cambridge last year. She’s been rowing four times in gigs borrowed from other clubs.

She said: “If I can do it, anyone can.”

Gig racing is a fast-growing sport. Bridport’s club is the 55th in the South West.

Its informative website can be seen by clicking on this link. Photographs of the Beach Boats events taken by students at Mountjoy School in Bridport should soon be posted on there as well.