WAYSIDE FURNITURE

WAYSIDE FURNITURE & SLEEP SHOP

My initial pass

I drove by #33 Boston Post Road in Waterford (CT, USA) a week or so and noticed the building was empty.

While this complex is anything but grand nor does it really seem to have historically significant of any particular sort.

Just a single-story brick store shop with a lot of square footage.

But it importantly points out a simple, but poignant story.

There are, after all, stores and there are warehouses.

This is a store, it interacts with the street and potentially people if they chose to do so.

We are now in an era of warehouses.

Big, unadorned warehouses. 

Visibility and sunlight don't really enter into the component anymore.

Oddly enough they are still basically a single-story structure, just a very tall single floor so the goods can be stacked up box on box reaching up to the "flat" roof which is dotted with skylights, ceiling fans, and pennant lights. 

 

       South East oblique color image taken, 07/06/2020 #45C-239a   GRC

This particular building seems to have two adjacent properties, one that comprises of four or so separate Pieces of property are, apparently, for sale.

This has the potential to be the city's biggest nightmare if a big box goes to scrape off the existing structure and replaces it with a far less economical operation.

Parking lots are defiantly not a great source of tax income for the town.

If there is justification for this, take a look at the Strong Towns analysis.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_SXXTBypIg

East Elev. color image taken, 07/06/2020 #45C-239c        GRC

Lest this building disappear I thought I'd document it before it followed so many others.

I am not opposed to progress per se but it's always better that as we go along creating and building things that we realize where we have been and if is there a COMPLETE plan.

One that is economically, historically, and aesthetically. This makes an intelligent move.

  

    East Elev. B&W image taken, 07/06/2020 #45-228a      GRC

This is one of a series of HABS-like 4x5 B&W negatives that I made at the same time I exposed the colour (Ektar) negatives.

I try to take two Black & White Large Format pictures and then take a colour negative at the same time if I feel so inclined.

While there are more document photos I just posted the one here.

The 07-31-2022 images.

This is what inclined me to get the camera out again.

These images are not Large Format images at this point.

I usually try to take some "test" pictures before I drag out the 4x5 or 5x7 camera.

This also has the advantage of giving me backup pictures in case the LF images have problems.

While I prefer film I am also not averse to using a digital camera or even a "cell-'phone" if that's all I have to work with.

There are numerous occasions when the backup or test images are all that I have to show.

I think up particularly a project when I was told by the contractor that he was going to remove a group of thick bushes before I was back to set up the camera again.

Unfortunately, the building had been taken down along with the shrubbery.

I did have some 35mm images that I took which showed a bit of the house along with the plantings.

#313 Pequot Ave. N.L. image #135-180d GRC

A good thing about the Wayside Furniture building(s)is the fact that the place is scrupulously clean.

Usually, properties are just abandoned and the next step is the usually broken windows and the graffiti.

I would love to see this property move forward in a creative, useful sort of way. 

What we're looking at here are some of the aforementioned backup 35mm pictures that are full frame albeit small.

I do use a PC lens (I think a 35mm one on this occasion.) but I rarely use a tripod with the miniature cameras.

Obviously, there was a bit of a light leak toward the end of this roll but for its purposes, this works just fine.

This is part of a trial roll of 120 film that I'm working with. It makes a very nice 6x9 negatives. 

This is a picture of the building behind the major furniture building and a part of the property which seems to run all the way back to Hamast Ave (41.34289, -71.11618)

My plumbs are still a bit rough and since my finder is physically offset to the right a bit I clipped the left side of the image but it will probably be a useful tool once I get better with it.

Baby Graflex w/ 120 film

     I should have a "stick" or ruler to give this camera a sense of          scale, but I forgot about it.  It has about the bulk and weight        of an early Polaroid.

      

I need to take a few more detail images.  I took this "Trypitch" some time back about the string of West facing windows with the 35mm F2 Nikon.

West facing windows main building  #135-85, 09-28-2016 

The last image here was the last negative on the roll and the Cloud in the upper right was actually the light that strike as the film was loaded into the cassette.

I kind of liked the feel of this picture, so I included it here just because...

South East oblique looking up the Boston Post Road     #135-253e  07-31-2022  GRC

FINIS

(For now)