On Friday I climbed the Wrekin Hill, as did many other local people. The Wrekin was a good vantage point to watch the controlled demolition of the iconic cooling towers that have been prominent in the Ironbridge Gorge since the 1960s.

I am sad to see them go, they were part of our industrial history. The valley will not be replanted with trees but filled with houses, so not really an improvement to the landscape.

The photos of the towers collapsing were taken by Mr C, I just wanted to soak up the atmosphere of the historic moment in time.

Photo taken by Mr C

Photo taken by Mr C

The Ironbridge cooling towers were demolished at 11 am on the 6th of December 2019. This photo is from a similar viewpoint (of the photo above) from the last time I climbed the Wrekin. It was taken at a similar time of day in early December 2005 before the power station had been decommissioned.

Yesterday Mr C and I had an afternoon in Ironbridge so that I could photograph the iconic cooling towers from Dale End Park. They are scheduled for demolition at the end of this week. I wasn’t the only one taking photos, many others had the same idea. I could tell that some of the photographers with their exclamations of how large they were had never stood beneath the towers before.

After our walk along the river bank we drove towards Buildwas and the elevated viewpoints at the bend of the River Severn which I always refer to as ‘The Oxbow’. From those viewpoints the cooling towers and the power station can be seen clearly in their woodland setting. Once again I wasn’t the only one to stop and take photos from those viewpoints.

The towers were built with concrete mixed with a red pigment to allow them to blend in with the local soil and as a photographer and walker I have always loved the cooling towers (although not the power station buildings). Within the valley they tease the eye, sometimes they are there and sometimes they are hidden from view. Soon to be a memory…

I have written previously about the care that was taken to blend the power station into the landscape. You can find my post here and in the comments section my personal opinion about what I would have liked to happen to this industrial site.

This photograph depicts the  cooling towers of Ironbrige B power station, which was designed to blend in with it’s surroundings:

Project architect Alan Clark worked closely with landscape architect Kenneth Booth, in order to ensure that the station merged as seamlessly as possible into its natural surroundings.^[1] In this respect, the power station is unique amongst British coal-fired stations. When viewed from Ironbridge, the surroundings of the station are hidden by wooded hills. The cooling towers were deliberately constructed using concrete to which a red pigment had been added, to blend with the colour of the local soil. This had cost £11,000 in the 1960s. The towers cannot be seen at all from the world famous landmark, The Iron Bridge. The station’s single 205 m (673 ft) high chimney is fifth tallest chimney in the UK. It is the tallest structure in Shropshire, as well as being taller than Blackpool Tower and London’s BT Tower.^[5]

The station’s turbine hall is decoratively clad in chipped granite faced concrete panels, aluminium sheeting, and glazing. The turbine hall obscures the rather more functional metal clad boiler house from view. A free-standing administration block continues the theme of concrete panelling, albeit with extensive use of large floor to ceiling windows.^[1] Period fittings within the administration block include a board room, containing murals that reference the industries of the Ironbridge Gorge, and a grand entrance hall with a metallic mural.

So impressive were the measures taken to ensure that the power station was an asset to the gorge and not an eyesore, that it was short listed for a Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors/The Times conservation award in 1973.^[1]

Click here for a photograph that I took a few years ago that shows the complete power station from the other direction.  I will let you judge for yourselves whether or not the architect achieved his aim in merging the structure into the surrounding landscape.