A few signs from Hobart

It's been a mad few weeks in this pre-Xmas rush and there hasn't been much time to document or post - but there'll be more to post very soon.

In the meantime I'm very grateful to our fine friend Alberto for sending me these three ghost signs pix, taken during his recent trip to Hobart:

A cute little yarn about Australasian Radio Productions

It's been ages since I've posted anything about Australasian Radio Productions (a radio serial production company owned by novelist Morris West from 1946 to the early 1950s). As well as the Lewis and Skinner signwriting documentsI found at the Footscray demolition site in February (and that started me on this whole ghost signs adventure), I also found a series of books of correspondence to and from ARP - they were found together because both companies were bought out by UK advertising company Frank Mason which ended up in Footscray in 1960.

Anyway, today I was passing by the former ARP studio in Smith Steet, Collingwood - it's now the Travellers' Bookshop - and went in and spoke to the owner. I was telling the story in West's biography of him hauling endless bags of sawdust (for sound proofing) up the stairs to the soon-to-be first floor radio studio, which was constructed very much on the cheap by a then-penniless West. She answered that she had been wondering why sawdust kept falling inside an internal wall cupboard reaching up to the first floor...she hadn't seen or heard any building works. :)

Latest batch of ghost signs

Some more to add to the collection...

Firstly, Hawthorn, around the Glenferrie Road shopping area. There wasn't a lot to find in this preened and painted part of the world - more hints than vistas of signs:

See the Robur sign underneath the peeling paint?

One of the few surviving wooden sign I've seen

And now for some others:

Preston milk bar

Reservoir

Reservoir 2

Richmond building site

Richmond

Richmond - taken from the car when stopped in Punt Road traffic

Sunshine

Amazing what you find when you're replacing a kitchen bench top

Not ghost signs, but ghostly signs of the everyday lives of the people who built our house :)

Destroyed ghost sign in Thornbury

I've found a couple of online photos of a brilliant sign in Thornbury that, a few years, was subject to an extended tussle between the new building owner (who wanted to paint over it) and local residents (who wanted to keep it). Seems that Creamoata was a NZ company.

The owner won - Creamoata sign, RIP. Here are some pics of how it used to look:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/doctor_keats/164825737/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/bonitoclub/2439234447/

Ghost sign intensive - a few days of riding through the inner north

Over the last few days I've made my way through the side streets of the inner north. Along the way I found a few ghost signs I'd seen on others' blogs, as well as many others. So here they are.

Firstly, a trip to North Fitzroy and into North Carlton. Starting with a few low-key ones in North Fitzroy, things got more spectacular in North Carlton. First, North Fitzroy:

The famous repair place with surly but brilliant owners...has been there forever.

 

The window...

And now, North Carlton:

hard to see...can make out the words 'vegetable' and 'grocery'

Robur Tea sign...can hardly be seen now

 The next four are of a spectacular Robur sign that's been preserved in a development. Important for me because it wasn't painted by Lewis & Skinner (see Taylor Publicity signature). This means that L&S didn't hold the Robur contract throughout the decades.

Side wall sign for a primary school, uncovered through some renovation work.

The next day, I rode through Fitzroy on the way to work, including along George Street. Here's what I found:

ghost sign of a different sort...Keith Haring mural on a house wall

I used to work in this building

One of the four former MacRobertson sweets factories in Fitzroy, named after their charismatic founder

From the side...

From the front.

And again,,,

Then north to Clifton Hill:

Plus a couple from the CBD that day:

ghost sign and street art, mixing it up in Hosier Lane

an uncovering on Flinders Street

 And some more in North Fitzroy, on the way back home:

 

Then back to Fitzroy the next day, this time down Gore Street:

And lastly, a couple from Footscray today, and one in Eltham yesterday: