Burges from Cross Cheaping

This first shot, looking from Cross Cheaping down the Burges in 1892, is not quite so recognisable as its counterpart looking back in this direction. Most of the shops at this top end of the road on the right hand side were demolished to clear the way for the original Owen Owen as part of the 1937 Trinity Street project, which can be seen in the second photograph. In my opinion none of these has ever been replaced with anything of any architectural merit.

Clicking the 1892 photo will reveal a zoomed-in view showing the steeply sloping Bishop Street in the distance. The amazing detail visible is testament to the superb quality attainable by cameras back in Victorian times. People can clearly be seen walking up Bishop Street well over 200 metres away, and the shop sign "Comley's Furniture" can be read further down at numbers 1 & 2 the Burges, next to Well Street.

The photo that I took in 2025 is actually standing further forward toward the Burges than in the first shot. To take the picture from the same place today would mean standing inside the Primark store, formerly Allders and, before that, Owen Owen, which sits across the route of the original Cross Cheaping. The modern buildings nearest to us on the right would have been behind the site of the ill-fated 1937 Owen Owen store, which would have been exactly to the right of the photographer.

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