Beautiful Decay.

The older, more broken down and derelict, the better.

I live in a city. But a city in Northern Ireland is like a large town anywhere else in the world. It’s on the coast and has a Marina, where wealthy people keep their big boats and some not so wealthy people live on their small boats. The city was very prosperous at a time but has fallen into decline due to various factors. The suburbs are really nice and out of town shopping centres are doing well. There is a huge, empty shopping centre in the middle of it. It has a multi storey car park attached to it that’s still open to the public but nobody uses it because its dark and covered in graffiti and looks like it could be used as a set for a post apocalyptic horror movie. There’s not much night life.

A few long established bars still exist on the main street. Barely. Thats pretty much it. There’s a big open space overlooking the Marina that’s used by a travelling fairground a couple of times a year and another car park that would have been impressive at a time. Water features, steps and little bridges over the entrance, flower beds between the rows of parking spaces. Now the water features are dry, have cracked blue tiles, graffiti and weeds. The flower beds don’t have flowers. More weeds. And the pedestrian bridges have broken glass, litter and yes, more weeds adorning them.

This run down car park and surrounding area of largely derelict and decaying shops is to be re-developed soon, apparently. After years of delays and false starts. The local council will attempt to breathe new life into the city centres carcass. Marine Gardens, external events spaces, cafes, a sheltered promenade and kiosks, seafront lawns, a children’s play area and water feature, a large hotel, a cinema, residential units, office space, courtyard and marketplace squares. I’ve looked at some of the artists impressions and architects plans of what this might look like going as far back as 2017. They are typical of the multitude of other soulless glass and steel monstrosities that pepper the land. And would be a jarring contrast to the beautiful Victorian and Edwardian buildings that still exist in the area.

Local business owners are concerned that new shops and cafes that will spring up as a result of this project will take what little business remains in the area away from them. The council are banking on the idea that this will be an attraction and boost footfall in the area. Maybe it will. But previous initiatives to do exactly the same thing have ended in dereliction. Times, people and the economy have changed drastically over the last 20 years or so. Many town and city centres across Northern Ireland are in terminal decline. And most of them have had huge amounts of money spent on rejuvenation and modernisation that has ultimately made no difference whatsoever to the collapse of long established local businesses.

I played a gig here back in 1993 or 1994. In the YMCA. I was in a Death Metal band and I still remember it vividly. Because it’s difficult to forget playing a gig when you’re in a Death Metal band. Its was buzzing back then. The local music scene was flourishing. There was activity and life in that building, not just at the weekends. It was a youth hub all week long. And they opened their doors to us when many others wouldn’t. So for that I’m eternally grateful.

The building is now a boarded up, derelict shell. It’s not completely beyond saving, I would imagine. But walking the streets now, looking at it 30 years later, I noticed a small blue plaque screwed to the wall outside, stating that in 1995, external renovations to the property were carried out, financed by the European Regional Development Fund and the local council. So, back in ’95, the place was in need of a facelift. Which it received. And now in 2024, it needs more than a facelift. It needs CPR.

So, the question is, why would a new city centre development succeed here, when so many others in so many other similar places have failed? I’m not saying it couldn’t succeed. Just that I feel it’s highly unlikely. And it would be a jarring sight to witness a gleaming new modern space, bordered and surrounded by multitudes of vacant and decaying buildings, a testimony to a once prosperous period that has long since passed. Maybe there’s a part of me that doesn’t want to see this proceed.

Truth be told, I love decay and run down, forgotten places. Weeds and graffiti. Broken glass and rusted grilles over doors and windows. Trees growing inside buildings as well as outside them. I find these things aesthetically beautiful. I love to photograph the vandalised and non-functioning public phone boxes in the area. That’s just my taste. Plus, dereliction seems to keep people away. And that’s always a huge bonus for me. Selfish I know, but I’m just being honest.

If you’ve ever seen a dead body in a coffin, you can normally recognise the deceased person easily enough. You know who it is but there’s something not quite right about them. Yes, I know they are dead. But when the soul leaves a body, the body is changed. Its essence is gone. And rather than try to revive that which is clearly beyond revival, burial or cremation is the next step. Then you visit the cemetery, if you’re the cemetery visiting type. You have a time of quiet reflection and remembrance. Or move on and let the past remain in the past. Another reason I like spending time in old graveyards. Beautiful decay all around and no people. At least, no live ones. Each to their own.