Skulferatu #126 - Coastal Turret, Ravenscraig Park, Kirkcaldy

 

It was one of those days made for walking, cool and sunny with no wind.  So, I jumped on a train and headed over to Kirkcaldy, a town in Fife.  I have always meant to do a bit of exploring around Kirkcaldy, as I don’t think I’ve had a serious wander about there since I was in my early teens.  All I can really remember from then is going to a swimming pool somewhere near the sea front, and that there was a big ugly shopping centre, now demolished.  There was also a café, which may have been part of the swimming pool complex, that had a really good jukebox.  I have memories of drinking cups of tea to Bowie, Blondie, The Undertones, and lots of other stuff that blew my mind at that age.

 

Arriving in Kirkcaldy, I wandered down through the town, down the High Street to the seafront.  Though lively, the town seemed almost to have a bit of a split personality with trendy sushi places and cafés sitting next to run down looking betting shops, charity shops, bargain shops and derelict buildings.  The town centre is one of those places full of potential and screaming out for a bit of investment.  Maybe one day it will get some.

 

Wandering along the seafront I passed by old industrial buildings, new industrial buildings, and a few rather bland housing estates.  After cutting down by a rather ancient graveyard I ended up on the beach along from the castle at Ravenscraig, and just down from Ravenscraig Park.  There I spotted a small turret on a wall reaching out towards the sea.  It looked like it should be part of some grand Disney style castle, so intrigued I decided to go and explore. 

 

Ravenscraig Beach

 

View along to the Coastal Turret

 

The Coastal Turret

 

Bathing…at this point

A view of the Costal Turret

 

A view of the Costal Turret

 

Leaving the beach, I wandered up some stairs past an old Doocot and moseyed on to the little tower.  There was no castle, just this little turret on the curve of a sea wall.  It was nothing more than at attractive little folly to add a bit of interest to the wall.  The wall that runs around Ravenscraig Park and overlooks the Forth.  The park was originally part of the grounds of Dysart House and was gifted to the people of Kirkcaldy in 1929 by Sir Michael Nairn, an industrialist who owned several linoleum factories in the area.

 

A view of the Costal Turret and the Forth

 

Doorway into the Coastal Turret

 

View out from the Coastal Turret

 

View along the coast from the Coastal Turret

 

The Lookout Tower was built in the early 19^th Century, it serves no real purpose and was built as a folly or a gazebo.  It is however quite an aesthetically pleasing little building, especially when viewed from the beach.

 

After taking in the views, I left the Skulferatu that had accompanied me, in a gap in the wall by the tower.

 

Skulferatu #126

 

Skulferatu #126 in a gap in the wall by the Coastal Turret

 

Map showing the location of Skulferatu #126

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are -

 

Latitude 56.118922

Longitude -3.136093

 

what3words: decent.orange.reduce

 

I used the following sources for information on the Coastal Turret –

 

Historic Environment Scotland - Ravenscraig Park Lookout Tower

Skulferatu #125 - The Banana Flats (Cables Wynd House), Cables Wynd, Leith, Edinburgh

Ah, I do love a bit of Brutalism, that is as in the architectural movement rather than some sort of savage violence.  I know it is not everyone’s cup of tea, but for me I find there is a sort of Sci-Fi utopian appeal to it.  Even now, some of the buildings in that style look like something from the future.  So, being in the mood for a look at some heavy concrete, I took a walk through Leith to probably the most famous Brutalist building in Scotland, Cables Wynd House, locally known as the Banana Flats. 

 

View down to Cables Wynd House

 

Concrete and cloudy skies

 

View along Cables Wynd House

 

Big Brother is watching you

 

The Banana Flats is one of those buildings that I remember having a certain mythology around it in the 1980s.  It was a place where some of my teenage acquaintances ended up being housed after being made homeless, having escaped violent and/or dysfunctional families.  Bumping into them in the pub on a Friday or Saturday night, they would regale me with tales of drug dealing, suicide, prostitution, and strange and bizarre happenings around the building.  And though I listened with fascination to their tales, I grew to be terrified of the place, thinking of it as some Sodom and Gomorrah, and hurrying past it if I was out in that area.   Then one drunken night I ended up at a party there, and it wasn’t that bad.  Fair enough, some kid did try to threaten me into giving him money as I was leaving, but he was about twelve and gave up when I just ignored him.

 

Cables Wynd House

 

Concrete in blue

 

BEWAR

 

Though the building has had, and still has, a bit of a reputation, it was built with the ideal of improving the quality of life for many of those living in substandard housing around Leith.  Between the 1950s and 1970s, there was a huge slum clearance project in Leith that resulted in the construction of several large public housing schemes. Cables Wynd House was part of this project and was completed in 1965.  The building is of a Brutalist design and was designed by Alison & Hutchison & Partners.  The design was influenced by the ideas of the architect, Le Corbusier and his utopian concept of the ‘Ville Radieuse’ or the Vertical City.  This being a city of high density housing in skyscrapers, located in a parkland area with shops, leisure, and cultural amenities as part of the development.

 

South tower of Cables Wynd House

 

Cables Wynd House

 

Concrete tower

 

The Banana Flats curve

 

The Banana Flats curve

 

The Banana Flats curve

 

The Banana Flats from Henderson Street

 

Constructed of concrete, Cables Wynd House has a distinctive curve, that has resulted in its nickname of the ‘Banana Flats’.  At the time of its construction, it was the largest block of flats in Edinburgh being ten storeys high with 212 flats, the majority of these having two bedrooms. Cables Wynd House was regarded as being innovative in its design with features such as heated floors, lifts, refuse chutes, and a concierge.  It was also built with external access decks to recreate the sense of community that had existed in the neighbourhood it replaced, and has a North-South orientation to give as much natural light into the flats as possible.

 

Originally seen as a desirable place to live, things changed in the 1980s when the building, and surrounding area, gained a reputation for drugs and violence.  Things have improved, but Cables Wynd House, though seen as iconic by many, is still plagued by problems, and is regarded as the most deprived part of Edinburgh.   

 

The building gained fame as being the home of the character Simon ‘Sick Boy’ Williamson in Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh, and was featured in the film. It has also been used in the BBC television dramas Wedding Belles and Guilt.  

 

The Banana Flats

 

Model of Cables Wynd House showing the curve

 

In 2017 Cables Wynd House became a Category A Listed Building, for demonstrating ‘a culmination of contemporary architectural theories, bearing a close resemblance to Le Corbusier's Unité d'Habitation model housing and other notable near-contemporary English schemes’, as well as being ‘both a positive and negative architectural icon, representing a period of great social reconstruction in Scotland’s cities.’

 

After taking a walk around Cables Wynd House, on a typical Scottish day of rain, sunshine and then rain again, I left the Skulferatu that had accompanied me on a cobwebby ledge by the Dry Mains Riser.

 

Skulferatu #125

 

Dry Riser Inlet

 

Skulferatu #125 on a cobwebby ledge

 

Skulferatu #125 on a cobwebby ledge

 

Map showing the location of Skulferatu #125

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are -

 

Latitude 55.973143

Longitude -3.17431

 

what3words: wells.reap.over

 

I used the following sources for information on the Banana Flats –

 

Brutalist Britain (Second Edition)

By David Navarro & Martyna Sobecka

2022

 

Historic Environment Scotland - Cables Wynd House, Cables Wynd, Leith, Edinburgh

 

 

Edinburgh Evening News - People of Edinburgh's most deprived area speak about life near the Banana Flats